Dear all,

I really like John's ethnographic description of the material space 
of the 'crit'. I also think of the crit as a discursive space. This 
affords a different analysis of how it functions as 'performance' in 
design education in the university. As a discursive space, a crit 
produces power relations between people as they 'perform' various 
roles/subjectivities, such as teacher 'performing client/accreditor', 
and student 'performing designer-presenter/defender'. These 
relationship structures are imbued with power and produce tensions in 
how the crit actually functions and how people experience and 
reproduce this experience/function (as they become 
teachers/designers).

In practice, the crit can perform several functions associated with 
assessment/evaluation of student (discursively produced as 'novice 
designer') artefact (discursively produced as professional outcome) - 
a summative function (awarding grades as required for institutional 
certification), a formative function (feedback for student learning) 
and a simulation function (performance of design practice). In some 
cases, and as others have noted, external advisers are brought in to 
provide the 'expert' viewpoint. This changes the power dynamic in the 
crit-as-discursive space, which can be fraught for the teacher as 
well as student (in my research, teachers have talked about this as 
feeling themselves assessed as they 'defend' their assessment of 
their sudents' outcomes in light of the 'expert's' view). This can 
also be fraught for the student, caught in the 'space' between 
assessment-as-accreditation, assessment-as-preparation-for-practice 
and assessment-of-future-learning-needs/directions (see Boud 2000, 
Boud & Falchikov 2006).

As others have also pointed out, the disciplinary context often 
simulates the practice context, and thus can vary. In my twenty years 
plus experience as a graphic designer with a large range of 
corporate, government and community clients, I have not found client 
presentations harsh. Rather, 'unpredictable' is a term that springs 
to mind. Thus, I take the view that in a (graphic) design education 
setting, the most important function is enhancing students' capacity 
to develop and sustain learning-in-design beyond the discursive space 
of the university, particularly in relation to a wide range of 
responses. That means the 'crit', which I also call 'review', is a 
discursive space where the other students' voices (as user/client) 
are as relevant as mine (as teacher/'expert'). There are several 
pedagogical principles underpinning the review - one being suitable 
and appropriate feedback (see McFarlane-Dick & Nichol 2005), another 
that students engage in the intention they perceive, rather than 'I 
would have done this'. Such a space provides opportunities to hear 
other voices, hear a range of feedback comments (that I wouldn't have 
thought of), and learn to verbally articulate design (in response to 
work-in-progress).

Based on my working experience, I also take the view that in 
(graphic) design practice, there is often an established relationship 
with the client, or word of mouth connection, and very little 
'pitching' involved. Thus, the client presentation process provides 
an opportunity to for the designer to present the work-in-progress, 
listen to feedback, make amendments, and repeat the process until 
production is approved. In my educational context, the students' work 
is laid on the floor/wall, depending on wall space and availability 
of pins (it sometimes takes huge amounts of time for work to be 
pinned to the wall, and it is often mounted, and sometimes falls 
down). We have reviews every class, and sometimes several times 
during class, which means students get used to the process, and work 
up more courage to comment, and I get an opportunity to provide 
'group feedback' (to deal with the lack of class time mentioned in 
other posts). Students do not 'present' their work, it is produced in 
the format in which it will be accessed by the audience and they 
don't get to explain what their intention/concept is. The aim is to 
simulate the user context (ie. I don't get to stand by my brochures 
and explain what my concept was as people pick them up and read 
them). The other students comment by providing their response to how 
they interact with the work as user/client and their perception of 
the designer's intention. Then, I give them a week to amend their 
work and submit it for assessment. This makes for stronger designed 
outcomes, better grades, happier students, more articulate written 
statements, and pedagogically, completion of the 'feedback loop' - 
meaning, as teacher, I get to see the student's tangible, immediate 
response to commentary applied in the work.

Nice discussion, thanks,
cheers, teena


Boud, D. 2000, 'Sustainable Assessment: rethinking assessment for the 
learning society', in Studies in Continuing Education, Vol. 22, No. 
2, pp. 151-167.

Boud, D.J. & Falchikov, N. 2006, 'Aligning assessment with long-term 
learning', Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, vol. 31, 
no. 4, pp. 399-413.

Nicol, D. & Macfarlane-Dick, D., 2006, 'Formative assessment and 
self-regulated learning: A model and seven principles of good 
feedback practice', Studies in Higher Education, vol 31, no. 2, pp. 
199-218.