Jason,

The PhD in Design at Stanford is wht you make of it.  It does not have
the strongest design specific coursework compared to TUDelft and some of
the other European universities.  There is actually an engineering
design methods workshop run every summer by Prof Lucienne Blessing and
Prof Mogens Myrup Andreasen.

At Stanford the Design PhD students search out the methods of other
disciplines.  Many take courses in Sociology, Organizational Behavior,
Computer Science, Anthropology, and of course, Art.  This allows the
students to expand their cohort into other disciplines as well as learn
various research methods from the academics that pioneered them.  There
is also a heavy emphasis on bringing practioners into the classroom
within the Product Design Program, similar to most of the design
programs out there.

The seminar topics change each quarter based on the professors and
students involved in the discourse even though the course title remains
the same.  It would be more instructive to look at the readings in the
seminar courses than the course titles.

For myself, it is worth it to get a PhD in Mechanical Engineering since
that's the path I'm on!  Working towards defending in the next two
months, changing my path now is not an option.

But back to you, Jason.  What do you want from the PhD?  What will the
degree enable to do.  This is critical information for the list to have
to support the questions you are asking.  Stanford is right for some
people, MIT for others, Ivrea for still others.  You must be clear what
path you a trying to take for this discourse to be effective.

Terence correctly notes that the main audience of this listserv seems to
be Art and Design.  As one of the few engineering designers that
participate in the list, I find it fascinating to understand how the other
sub-field view design.  Though related, sometimes these fields seem like
distant cousins that speak about design with unique accents and
languages.  That has been one of the wonderful things about doing a PhD in
Engineering Design, the opportunity to participate in a larger family of
research and practice.  While my peers in Thermodynamics go to Physics
conferences, I move across the domains of art, market, product
development, etc.

Pursuing design through engineering can be difficult at times.  You'll
find many of your peers do not "get it."  While teaching at the Air Force
Academy my analytical minded colleagues many times viewed my attempts to
bring design as a tool for teaching in their classroom with suspicion, as
if designers were plotting to take over the world.  One of the hazards of
being passionately exuberant about design.

Good luck and I look forward to hearing more of where you want to be after
the PhD.

John




On Wed, 29 Sep 2004, Jason Foster wrote:

> > The course at Stanford is an interesting one for this discussion. There
> > they teach product design within an engineering department. I have
> > worked with many of the Graduates. Companies like Apple I think favor
> > their graduates over some other schools. Some well known designers
> > teach
> > there like Bill Moggerige one of the founders of Ideo. I think the RCA
> > has a stream that combines engineering and design at graduate level bur
> > I am not familiar with the content.
>
> I'm afraid the "RCA" is a new acronym for me, and a google for "RCA
> stanford" didn't turn up anything that looked appropriate.  If you
> could clarify the acronym that would be great.
>
> I did a quick look at the Stanford initiatives and was impressed by a
> couple, especially the "design observatory".  However when I looked at
> the courses and at what is required to obtain a PhD I started to feel a
> little concern.  From what I can see there are no formal courses
> offered in areas such as research methodologies, research design,
> researching design, etc.
>
> There does appear to be a lot of good courses covering particular
> technical aspects of engineering design, but in terms of research into
> design the coursework seems to stop at "Design Seminar" and "Design
> Processes".  In both cases the focus appears to be on enumerating
> existing design approaches, not on examining design.
>
> I would *love* to be proven wrong, and maybe the reason that I am not
> seeing what I was hoping for is that I am looking for that which is
> tacit.
>
> A question for the list:
>
>    Do you feel that a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford would
> satisfy your vision of a PhD in Design?  If not, why?
>
> Thanks for the pointer!
>
> Jason
>