Christina Holman | Design Blog

As many of you know, I have spent this Fall semester in Germany with the IES European Union program, which allows students to visit multiple European countries on topics of EU politics, economics and social policies. I have also taken several personal trips myself that have added tremendously to my experience overseas. Because of this little break in STEM activities, most of my classes are economics-focused and, hence, the lack of STEM posts. BUT I have kept an online blog of my travels: christinaholman-studyabroad.weebly.com ! Check it out.

This summer, I have been given the great opportunity to join the internship program at MIT Lincoln Laboratory in their Cybersecurity division. Unfortunately, because of the level of security, I cannot discuss my work - and thus the lack of blog posts this summer. However, I have only a week left of the internship program and time has flown by so fast. This summer has absolutely been incredible and I would not trade it for anything. From the facility tours to my summer work to the monthly lunches with Wellesley alums working there, I believe I really explored myself as an engineer  and an economist. While engaging in the culture at the Laboratory, I was forced to reflect on what type of environment I want to work in - academia, government, FFRDC or private sector - and, frankly, I still am not sure as I have no comparison for the private sector outside of a few tours. Regardless, this summer has greatly increased the number of things I need to consider for the field I will choose. My

The final poster and prototype, including the flatpack-style box in which all materials are delivered.

Our third and final review went very well: the instructors praised our ability to dive deeper into the heart of our users and present a bold yet still "simple" product for their opportunity areas of improvement. We decided on pursuing the double-decker garden out of all the ideas from Phase 2: the two-tiered structure would allow plants to grow on both the upper and lower layer. The top shelf is tilted upwards at an angle to allow for a larger window (and thus more sun) for the ground-level bed, and the structure is equipped with insulation curtains that would allow for the plants to survive through the cold weather of December and prismatic crystals can disperse light from the top layer to the bottom layer. Promising research shows a potential development in light, strong cardboard (bridge-like) structures that can hold thousands of pounds, which would lower the cost for our product significantly and allow it to be reusable and formed via flat-pack kit. The goal of our produ

"The goals of this phase are to develop, from the perspective of  experience and interaction design, one to two of your promising conceptual directions into more-detailed proposals for products or services that could significantly better the lives of your users and to do so in a way that effectively captures and communicates your extensive thinking through product or service representations." Phase 3 is the third and final portion of UOCD: in this phase, designers are asked to pursue and fully develop one of the project ideas generated through more co-design sessions, table of requirements, while also specifying and building the final product. The team is expected to fully utilize interaction maps, representations of people and products in the product poster along with models and prototypes of the product.

In general, PLANTS received great feedback on our presentation: we presented a plethora of design ideas for our user group -- some that veered on the  magical  side more than others -- and updated our personas, specifically star maps to indicate emphasis on certain values/project directions. Our ideas ranged from a Garden Co-Op to self-guided interfaces for communal plots to vertical gardening to plot monitoring technology. We created gallery sketches for all of them. We also formed charts that indicated the level of impact-change for the ideas as well as the values of the designers in comparison to the users'. (It is important to identify our own biases in this project.) After taking some of the ideas to users, we marked down their own responses and rankings of values, which allowed us to begin slimming down the project ideas into probable proposals.

Setting a plan of attack for Phase 2 was relatively simple: the team created a table of co-design methods that would be effective for each people portrait/interviewee (aliases), ranging from role-play to story-telling to talking tours. The team also formed a process map along with a chart for goals, execution and measurements of success.

After the Design Review for Phase 1 (EXPLORE), the next class, we were immediately were prepped for the second phase of UOCD: CONCEPTUALIZE. The goal of this phase is "to establish bold conceptual directions in which meaningful contributions could be made to people's lives while evolving your appreciation for and understanding of those lives." Again, the designers should not take the approach of just "design for" but also "design with" and "design by." Thankfully, Prof. Linder and the staff take on a more humble approach to the design project that I think many STEM students could benefit from: "We don't seek to look smart." For Phase 2, the symbol is no longer a sponge but a compass. Now that we have "soaked" and "squeezed" to gather information about our users, it is time to "make sense" of this information. We ended Phase I with our insights about the experience of community gardening, identif

The Design Review is a presentation of your progress/results from the first sprint or phase and both faculty and students can give feedback regarding your project. As a group, team PLANTS! organized and rehearsed extensively in preparation. We reflected on the comments given by our section leaders and ninjas at the benchtop reviews (mini sit-downs) and worked together towards what we understood as the expectations for the first phase. The objectives on the course website listed. We assembled the personas, 2x2 maps, mood cards and insight statements generated until this point in order to show our progress and allowed each group member to present on different sections of the presentation: the tools used, different types of people identified, personas and stories, patterns of themes and tensions, and insight statements.We pointed out our starmaps as one of the ways we captured values and indicated uses of other charts for mapping out motivations/values between both the users and desig

As students begin diving into Phase 1, the UOCD studios become increasingly colorful with the post-it note displays and mapping systems each team hangs around its space. PLANTS! -- after several sessions with persons identified as community gardeners -- began to squeeze all of the notes, reflections and insights we grabbed from each user. The team discussed their thoughts/findings (such as the difference between community  farms  and  gardens)  and set off to create  people portraits  -- a splatter of post-its with notes, insight statements, pictures, etc that we gained for each individual person. Upon creating the portraits, we also had to develop aliases for each to hold their identity confidential. (You may see one or two aliases in this blog when describing separate persons.) These people portraits were then used to create a framework called  personas  -- fictionalized users that hold (or base their traits off of) characteristics from such portraits as a way to identify different

Although studio work is an important aspect of the UOCD course, so are lectures. In lectures from Prof. Linder and other staff members, students get to grasp all of the ways in which a project can be tackled. Immersion methods -- ways to engage -- are an example of the broad range of variation as one can rely heavily on the users (Do-Say-Think-Feel) while others rely heavily on the designers (Look-Ask-Try-Why). If the first step of Phase I is to "soak" (like a sponge), the next is to squeeze. LOOK. ASK. TRY. WHY. This (somewhat) mnemonic device helps us remember that we are to be a sponge throughout this phase. To "look" means to be present (in context), descriptive, visual, sensitive and patient with our users: Walking Tour -- the user guides designers through their environment, describing their routines and stories. Show & Tell (Sort) -- the designers observe users take objects from their environments and sort them into categories or on a spectrum (m

Part of the EXPLORE phase is engaging the user and one can do so by through meeting directly -- which is exactly what we did. We split the group between two user visits, asked questions, took pictures and made our individual notes (to reflect together later). The entire purpose of meeting with our interviewee was to build this connection with the user, evoking stories and emotions while also shedding light on their reasonings behind actions (which they may have never questioned until this moment). However, our UOCD professors also told us to think outside the traditional interview phase. Immersion Methods It is important to grab the most amount of personality data from any user visit: we want to not only understand  what  they do -- but  how  and  why  they do it. How does their environment influence their decisions day-to-day? Is there other ways of going about the same task? Such questions go deeper into the  person  which is really our target here. "LOOK-ASK-TRY-WHY?"

For our first assignment, students had to submit a short proposal for what they thought should be considered as one of the user-group options this year. (They change from year to year.) The staff then sorted through them all to narrow down into select choices, on which the students voted for their top three. Based on that information, the staff sorted students into teams per section. As you can see, this blog features the Section 3 group "PLANTS!" -- an all-female design group focused on Community Gardeners and consisting of four Olin and one Wellesley student. Now, diving into the design process, we reach the first phase: EXPLORE. So what does it mean to "EXPLORE"? Each phase has a metaphor describing the user-designer relationship and for Phase I, it is the "sponge." Like a sponge, designers should just absorb any and all observations from the users. Without any filter or side-goal, the students are going into this "all ears" in order to

Welcome to User-Oriented Collaborative Design (UOCD, ENGR2250)!   Led by Prof. Benjamin Linder and several section teachers, UOCD is is an engineering course at Olin College where students develop detailed concepts and models of authentic new products and services based on a client population.  (Course Website)  The focus is user-oriented and collaborative, encouraging approaches towards the design process that seek holistic solutions integrating both user and functional/designer perspectives. We -- the students -- observe and engage people to help us (and them) develop a deep understanding of their values and the lifestyle patterns. Both the students and the users work together to create a shared comprehension of the user group and the product concepts. What's a User Group? "To design a product, you should know your client." That's the informal motto of this course which is why student design groups spend a great deal trying to observe and engage the target po