Rafe Steinhauer will build on the “Range and Radar” course that leveraged design thinking to help young alumni navigate some of life’s big questions around work, family, and social justice. (Photo by Rob Strong '04)

It’s an effort grounded in human-centered design principles at the heart of Dartmouth’s engineering education approach. DIAD, co-led by engineering professors Eugene Korsunskiy and Sol Diamond ’97 Th’98, is providing funding and the tools to enable faculty from engineering to art history and film and media studies to infuse design thinking, critical thinking, and social awareness into their practice.

“These projects provide a glimpse into the diversity, creativity, and interdisciplinarity of scholarly work in design across the institution,” says Diamond.

Engineering professor Rafe Steinhauer will build on the “Range and Radar” course he taught last summer that leveraged design thinking to help young alumni navigate some of life’s big questions around work, family, and social justice. With this new project, Steinhauer will guide a team to develop a “Range and Radar” toolkit—including a card deck with prompts, activity workbook, and video series—alumni and students working with the Dartmouth Center for Social Impact can use.

Other projects by professors across the curriculum will draw in collaborators from the Hopkins Center, Data Experiences and Visualizations Studio, and Dartmouth Center for the Advancement of Learning (DCAL). 

Art history professor Nick Camerlenghi will develop an interactive, virtual reality experience for students and scholars of Rome’s Basilica of St. Paul. Digital humanities and film and media studies professor Jacque Wernimont will explore how humans gain and share knowledge. Studio art professor Tricia Treacy will invite journalism, politics, music, visual arts, performance, literature, and electronic media experts to create content on specific topics.

The ongoing effort to integrate human-centered design with liberal arts can also be seen this winter and spring in new joint DIAD and DCAL-supported courses ranging from anthropology to sociology to Italian literature. Says Korsunskiy: “It’s exciting to see how faculty from across different disciplines are using the tools and mindsets of design to enhance their teaching and bring their subjects to life for their students.”

This article appeared in the Spring 2022 issue of the Dartmouth Engineer magazine.