Work: Currently a Design Manager at Meta.
Education: Currently a Ph.D. student in Design at Carnegie Mellon University. I earned a Master's in Strategic Design & Management from Parsons School of Design. I also earned a BS in Entrepreneurship and a BA in International Studies from the University of Utah.
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How might we generate insights within a system through artifacts and objects?
I collaborated with team members from my graduate program at Parsons School of Design and delivered interventions within the education system by showcasing our prototype to alumni, students, and community members.
To identify a leverage point, we designed an artifact that demonstrated the system of higher education. Using this artifact, we created an MVP prototype app that generates a new form of currency within the education system to help the underprivileged.
August 2019
My group, which included three other Parsons Transdisciplinary Design Students, Mohamad Sial, Theo Walcot, and Hannah Devries, worked within the American education system on the quest to make higher education affordable. We focused primarily on educational experiences within America, but we also drew on international educational experiences and our diverse backgrounds for a more holistic assessment.
We were encouraged not to jump to solutions within the system. Instead, we first grew familiar with the system and "played" within it. We examined the system from different angles, dissecting it and playing with its pieces through research. We asked questions: how does the education system work? How do resources flow within it? What correlations could we find?
Our first specific objective was to find an artifact, or physical object, which could represent the system and allow us to use research methods to build narratives explaining the system.
Brainstorming and Participation
Before we could choose an artifact, we allowed our strongest impressions and ideas about the system to rise to the forefront. We mapped out our experiences and new understandings. Quality of education is related to privilege; this understanding drew our curiosity and made us eager to explore further.
At different stages of a child’s education, factors of privilege play important roles. For example, children in low-income neighborhoods almost always attend schools with lower budgets. These schools must pay relatively lower wages, meaning they may not be able to compete for the best teachers. Their access to new books and supplies is lower than in other schools.
Other privilege factors affect education quality; a child with only one parent may receive less help with homework. Larger families may depend on a high schooler’s income to help support the family, leaving that high schooler less opportunity to study and less energy for school.
We saw that various factors outside of a student’s control could greatly affect the quality of the education that the student received. What objects could help us understand and represent that correlation? We used a tool called an “ideation circle” to brainstorm objects.
As we discussed different objects we could find in the education system, playing with different ideas, shoes emerged. Everyone wears shoes. Throughout our entire lives, they serve as markers of our vocations, economic status, and roles.
They are markers of economic status, from people having their leather shoes shined to people wearing old, outsized shoes because they cannot afford to select pairs with good fit or quality.
From kindergarten through college, shoes are visible markers of economic status and privilege. In areas or zip codes where cheaper shoes are more common, school resources will likely tend to be scarce, and vice versa for wealthier zip codes. Some students wear brand new designer shoes and can afford to wear many pairs. Others may wear the same pair of sneakers for PE class as they do in classrooms, and continue wearing them even after the soles wear out. If an entire student body were to line up, standing together wearing the shoes they wear to school, those shoes would tell a story. Those shoes would offer clues to the students’ academic backgrounds and the stability of their lives. In areas where people have fewer resources, the schools will likely have fewer resources too. Meanwhile, wealthier areas will tend to see their resources returned through better-funded education systems. Money flows from wealthier zip codes back to wealthy zip codes.
Discussing shoes led us to play with the idea of school uniforms, which added another dimension to our understanding of privilege and quality of education. In Western countries such as the United States, and in Western cities, like New York City, school uniforms are often associated with charter schools, private schools, and prestigious preparatory academies. They may be symbols of wealth and privilege and demonstrate elite status.
As the group discussed school uniforms, I drew on my own experiences as a child in Sierra Leone. There, and in many parts of the developing world, the meaning of school uniforms is reversed: uniforms are often associated with lower-budget, government-run schools. Sometimes uniforms may camouflage a students’ economic background because all children wear essentially the same thing.
The team needed to highlight how resources are distributed within the education system: how could we design a model that could show how resources in the education system remain fixed in wealthier communities?
We designed and built a wood model to demonstrate the realities of unequal resources within education. The model itself represented the school system and took the form of a narrow wooden box. Coins, representing resources, could be inserted at the top of the box and would feed downward before exiting out of one of two exit slots. One exit represented zip codes with privilege, and the other represented zip codes that are underprivileged.
The design prevented coins from flowing straight through our model; institutional influences direct resources in specific directions. We built wooden bumpers to influence the path of coins inside the model. These bumpers represented institutional influences such as:
- Distribution of wealth across different zip codes through policies
- Salaries of teachers in different parts of the education system
- The training and support available to school staff in different parts of the system
- The education budget of the local government
Just as in the real-life education system, these factors affect the end destination of resources that enter the system.
The design prevented coins from flowing straight through our model; institutional influences direct resources in specific directions. We built wooden bumpers to influence the path of coins inside the model. These bumpers represented institutional influences such as:
- Distribution of wealth across different zip codes through policies
- Salaries of teachers in different parts of the education system
- The training and support available to school staff in different parts of the system
- The education budget of the local government
Just as in the real-life education system, these factors affect the end destination of resources that enter the system.
Schools do not receive equal shares of the resources that enter the education system. The Federal Government leaves the regulation of the system to lower governments. Under the current system, every child has the right to an education, but not the right to an equal education.
Users insert coins into the system. Because institutional influences are often hidden, the coins passed through the system unseen.
We labeled the model’s two exits “Privileged” and Underprivileged” to represent areas of the education system that currently receive abundant resources and those that do not.
We designed the model so that the bumpers always directed resources to the “Privileged” category. No matter where users inserted the coin at the top of the model, the resources always slowly made their way back to the privileged side before exiting the bottom of the box. The coins began to accumulate beneath the “privileged” exit, illustrating the way resources are not distributed equitably.
As a team, we wondered how we could intervene in the education system. Ideally, resources could be distributed to students by merit rather than by privilege. However, the system is currently based on funding. Wealthier areas give more funding to their schools because they have more available. Could the system of funding be completely replaced? Could we design a new system in which students create currencies for themselves?
As a team, we wondered how we could intervene in the education system. Ideally, resources could be distributed to students by merit rather than by privilege. However, the system is currently based on funding. Wealthier areas give more funding to their schools because they have more available. Could the system of funding be completely replaced? Could we design a new system in which students create currencies for themselves?
In response, through a speculative framework, we designed an app that tracks students’ scores on assignments and exams. The app rewards good scores with digital currency, which can be applied toward school supplies or other resources.
In this way, the entire education system could be funded much more equitably. Now, effort and merit would have more influence on access to resources than many of the institutional influences we listed.
After finishing the design process as a team, we presented our model and our app to faculty, department heads, and the public. Users got the opportunity to try our model and attempt to influence the final destination of the coins. Once they had seen how resources continually ended up on the “privileged” exit, we removed the front of the model and revealed the hidden institutional influences. Then we explained our app. Our cohort groups and attendees had the opportunity to explore the app and test it, offering feedback.
Coming from the business and tech world, I was challenged by this exercise. I tend to think in terms of problem/solution. I wanted to jump past the meditative, playful stages and seek solutions.
However, as our group allowed space for “play” within the system by “kicking off the dust,” we began to understand and organize a narrative. I began to see a type of “choreography” emerge. We could intervene in the system because of our familiarity with it, provoking parts of it to lead it to change. We did this by first visualizing the system moving through a state of play.
By the end of the project, we identified potential opportunities for intervention. In fact, they emerged on their own as we grew familiar with the system and how to influence its parts -- not forcing change, but guiding it like a director or choreographer.
