Imperial-RCA design for global challenges summer school

49 contact hours spread over 7 days covering lectures, workshops, tutorials, project work, social activities and relevant visit.  Classes will be delivered on weekdays.

Students will be allocated in small groups for Project work which will be done through team-based learning with supervision. Final project will be presented in groups to a panel of experts on the last day of the programme. A prize will be awarded to the team with the best project.

The entire programme will be taught in English.

On completion of the summer school, students will be able to: 

• Analyse and evaluate the impact of climate change on society and the environment.
• Analyse and evaluate the impact of major global diseases and the changing future of healthcare policies and innovations.
• Analyse and evaluate the challenges of the internet and new frontiers in cyberspace/digital media security that companies face.
• Understand how advances in robotics and data science technology are transforming the future.
• Apply service design tools and develop a service to tackle a global challenge.
• Understand how businesses differentiate and compete in global markets, and to define and build business models to establish competitive advantage.
• Understand how technology are transforming marketing and advertising.
• Develop and practise valuable professional skills in team building, leadership and presentation.
• Develop and employ team building skills to work as a team towards a group design project.
• Find out what it is like to study in the UK, make new friends and practise your English.

The group project not only provides an opportunity for students to learn teamwork, but it is also designed for students to apply their learning throughout the summer school and to assess their learning outcomes.  Students will be allocated in small groups at the start to identify one area of a global challenge that needs tackling and propose an innovative idea to design a service that could either control or reduce the global challenge. 

Students will be encouraged to think creatively and innovatively to develop ideas which will be challenged by tutors who will provide guidance, tools and support them in developing their service.  Each group will present their ideas to a panel on the final day and the best project team will be awarded a prize and a letter of recognition.   All students will receive a project assessment score. 

Creativity and Ideas Generation

This session helps students "to think outside the box" to generate ideas. The techniques presented and tried during the session are particularly useful for people who do not believe they have time to think differently due to the pressures of daily life.  The session will take students through a pragmatic problem solving process. Students will apply the process from problem definition through to implementation.

Introduction to Service Innovation & Design Thinking and its Impact

Our RCA interactive workshops are designed to address specific challenges through the use of practical tools such as design thinking and people-centred service innovation, with reference to real-world projects, experiences and case studies.

At the end of the workshop process the students will have worked in groups to develop a proposal in response to the challenge.

Learning aims:

• Empathy, clarity, creativity, networking, self-reflection, integrity, confidence, agility, positivity, equality and diversity, influence, collaboration, communication and inclusion.
• Ethnography, data visualisation, ethics, principles, sustainability, critical thinking, problem identification, analysis evaluation, innovation, public and impact.

Project Introduction & briefing

Students will be allocated in groups of 5 to identify one area of a global challenge that needs tackling and propose an innovative idea to design a service that could either control or reduce the global challenge.   This is a tried and tested format at the RCA and each year the MA students take part in the college wide “Grand Challenge” 2021 and Cern.

New Frontiers in Global Health

The aim of this session is to provide students with an understanding of current challenges in Global Health and what are the latest innovations to meet these challenges. 

This session will cover:

• What is Global Health?
• Problems and Challenges
• Solutions with case studies examples
• Current innovations in Global Health

Building Effective Team Workshop

Through the medium of practical exercises and guided review, students will explore ways in which team performance can be enhanced.  The session will give participants the opportunity to participate in a range of tasks designed to highlight common ways in which team performance can come unstuck and the behaviours that can mitigate against this. 

Discovery

In the discovery phase of the Design Thinking process, we encourage divergent thinking, the purpose is to organise a broad range of information and gather insights.

• identify and break down the problem statement
• what are the main factors that have contributed to the problem?
• what other sectors/markets/geographies have addressed this problem
• what are the key contextual issues/drivers that might suggest a way forward

Innovations in Climate Change

Climate Change is one of the biggest challenges to development today.  While climate change poses a number of risks to vulnerable communities and businesses around the world, many opportunities are unfolding for private companies to implement actions towards reducing risks to their business operations, as well as investing in adaptation action in vulnerable regions in a sustainable and profitable manner.  The session will give students an understanding of what Climate Change is, its impact and the challenges businesses and academia face as they find innovations to tackle these problems.

Challenges of the Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve several billion users worldwide.  Whether for business or leisure, use of the internet is becoming part of our daily lives.  To understand what impact this can have, the session will cover:

• An introduction/overview of the internet and its power
• Current challenges of the internet and problems faced by companies.
• What businesses are doing to overcome these challenges?
• Current innovations in managing Internet Challenges (academic and business)

Innovation in Robotics – reshaping the future

This session provides an insight into machine learning, robotics and AI.  Students will learn the latest real-world application and innovation in the area and see how robotics can reshape the future and transform the world in different sectors.

The Future of Data Science and its Application

Modern science typically involves big data, taking advantage of high-throughput data capture and high-performance computing capabilities. Data science is therefore an essential element of all modern interdisciplinary scientific activities. It acts as the glue to facilitating collaborative scientific discovery and involving the whole life cycle of data, from acquisition and exploration to analysis and communication of the results. Data science is not only concerned with the tools and methods to obtain, manage and analyse data, it is also about extracting value from data and translating it from asset to insight.  This session aims to showcase data science and its applications to address data-driven scientific grand challenges.

Business Model Innovation

The aim of the session is to facilitate students’ understanding of how businesses differentiate and compete in global markets.  Students learn to define and build business models to establish competitive advantage. The session to include:

• Explain the difference between market-pull and technology-push
• Recognize different types of innovations
• Introduce the business model canvas and systematically understand, design & differentiate  new business models

• Differentiate between product & business model innovation

Effective Communication for Presentation

This workshop will take students on a journey through fundamental principles of communication and presentation. Through exercises, plenary and interaction, students will learn more about their strengths and natural abilities, and how to perform at a higher level. The session will allow students to work experientially within a group setting and will give participants exercises, ideas, tips and practises for inclusion in their presentations on the last day.

Definition

Using convergent thinking, the aims is to interrogate and refine the problem to arrive at a design brief that makes sense of the possibilities.

• what are the most relevant pointers from the Discover phase
• which elements matter most and which are most feasible?
• how do these elements fit together, and what is the convergent path on which they might sit?
• how might and actionable creative design brief be developed and articulated?

Design

The design phase is about creating ideas. Through using divergent thinking, the aim here is to generate a range of different creative ideas to address the challenge.

• what are the most relevant and resonant creative design responses to the brief?
• how can these concepts be described visually in model or sketch form?
• look at other sectors or countries for ideas to cross-pollinate.

Concept Delivery

Finalise the design solution describing its key characteristics, benefits and beneficiaries. Present the ideas to the group. Suggest several routes to implementation.

• what shape should the final proposal take
• what are its key features and attributes?
• describe a range of delivery mechanisms to make this happen
• how do you communicate the essence of the proposal to an audience?

Distribution and Diffusion

Use convergent thinking to bring the proposal to a wider audience, what are the elements required to scale up the solution and create impact?

• what is the preferred route to implementation?
• who are the key players needed to make the project real?
• how will you promote and market this innovation to a wider audience?
• how will you test the solution and incorporate feedback to further improve the solution?

Future Challenges in Service Design

Services represent around 80 per cent of the economy. Service design applies human-centred design principles to make services that are more sustainable and desirable for changing consumer priorities. It delivers better experiences, successful innovation and business value. It can be applied to global challenges in all sectors ranging from retail, banking to transportation, health, and education etc.  In this session, students will discuss some of the challenges in service design as a key enabler to humanize the world and to create a better future for all of us.

Project tutorial sessions

The teams will work in small groups and the workshop facilitators will be available to visit and comment on the projects in the rooms to give feedback.

Opportunities for International Students

This session provides an opportunity for international students to find out more about studying in the UK and at Imperial and RCA.  They will find out about student life and facilities on campus, programmes available, the application process and scholarships.

Group Presentations

Students in groups will apply their learning and present their design ideas to a panel and the best project team will be awarded a prize and a letter of recognition.   All students will receive a project assessment score. 

The summer school will be taught by a team of renowned Imperial and RCA academics leading in their area of education and research. 

Dr Susan Mulcahy, Imperial College London

Dr Susan Mulcahy is the programme Co-Director of the Imperial-RCA design for global challenges summer school. She was previously the Director of the Data Sparks Programme, the innovative student placement programme matching real-world industry projects on data science with a team of our postgraduate students. Additionally, she was the Senior Education Fellow of the Data Science Institute (DSI) at Imperial where she developed the educational offering of the DSI for internal students and external industry engagements. She is a Lecturer in Data Analytics at Ada National College for Digital Skills and a Principal Teaching Fellow at Cambridge Spark. Having facilitated technical courses for corporate clients since 2013, Susan enjoys teaching/facilitating/presenting technical topics to a non-specialist audience.

Susan received her data-driven PhD from Imperial's Bioengineering Department in 2016 where she researched indicators of traumatic brain injury using MATLAB on datasets collecting over 500 million data points per patient per day. In addition to this, she has an MBA from INSEAD in France and a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University in the USA. Susan has been a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society since 2002.

For outside interests, Susan seeks out adventure. In 1999, she spent three months riding her bicycle across the USA. These days, she can be found rowing on or running next to the Thames, hiking up a rugged mountain in the Scottish Highlands, or sleeping in a mountain refuge in northern Spain.

Bahbak Hashemi-Nezhad, Royal College of Art

Bahbak Hashemi-Nezhad is an award-winning designer, researcher and educator with a focus on co-design and social design as well as being Co-Director of the Imperial-RCA design for global challenges summer school. He has worked with the public sector, local authorities, museums, cultural and educational institutions to foster collaborative culture and develop intuitive tools and methodologies that proactively engage end-users and stakeholders in design processes when addressing complex and open-ended problems.

Bahbak Hashemi-Nezhad is the tutor of design innovation courses at the Shanghai Academy of Fine Arts two years running, RCA X OPPO research associate and lecturer on the Design Products programme. He has exhibited and conducted workshops both in the UK and internationally, including with the Serpentine Galleries, London; Liverpool Biennial; Shanghai Biennale; Tokyo Design Week, MACBA, Barcelona and LCCA, Riga.

Imperial & RCA postgraduate students will support the summer school students as ambassadors and participate in social activities, sharing their student experiences and life in the UK.

On days 1, 2 , 3 & 7, classes will take place at Imperial College London’s South Kensington Campus, located amongst many famous attractions in London. 

The culture triangle: neighbour to three of London’s most prestigious (and free) museums. Right next door, the Science Museum. Across the road, the Victoria & Albert Museum, and around the corner? The Natural History Museum. From Neolithic to the latest scientific breakthroughs, experience it all just minutes from Imperial’s doorstep.

The campus is also next to the famous Royal Albert Hall, one of London’s most iconic music venues, established in 1871, host to the BBC Proms and countless world-famous international artists. 

In addition, the beautiful Hyde Park and the famous Harrods Department Store are just a short walk from the campus.

On days, 4, 5 & 6, classes will take place at Royal College of Art’s new London campus. Designed by internationally acclaimed architects, Herzog & de Meuron, the £135 million, 15,500 sqm campus is the largest investment in transformational space in the RCA’s 185 year history.

The classes will take place in the dedicated Executive Education spaces on the top floor of the Rausing Research & Innovation Building, with 360 degree views of London – eight floors of dedicated independent and confidential research space for areas such as materials science, soft robotics, advanced manufacturing, intelligent mobility, and AR and VR visualisation, housed in the Snap Visualisation Lab.

Students will receive an Imperial College London and Royal College of Art certificate of attendance on successful completion of this programme and a prize will be awarded to the best project team.

Each student will also receive a document with their project marks.

Fees include the following:

• 7 days of classes
• Scheduled social activities
• Attendance certificate
• Digital document with project mark