Design challenges for schools

To help develop skills for creativity, design and innovation in schools we're running two schools design challenges which focus on demonstrating how designers working with secondary school students can make a positive impact on the environment. 

What's next?

Next we plan to take what we're learnt from the Eco Design and Water Design challenges and co-ordinate a National Design Challenge, an annual competition open to all secondary schools. The Challenge will focus on big issues such as health, crime and the environment. Using a range of online support tools, schools will identify a design issue and develop a design brief. Schools will then work with designers and relevant experts to devise a solution.

The National Design Challenge will build on the work done during both the Eco Design and Water Design challenges, and also projects such as Creative Partnerships in Design, Designers into Schools Week which ran from 2002-2004, and The Design Mark The programme aims to enhance design teaching and learning, encouraging learners to think about design process and design thinking in a cross-curricular context; as well as providing a structured framework to connect designers and other business professionals to schools.

To find out more about our plans for a National Design Challenge please contact Bel Reed

 

Water Design Challenge logo

Water Design Challenge

In conjunction with Southern Water we're asking Year 8 students in five schools in the South East to calculate how much water their school uses and then work with designers to reduce wastage.

Eco Design Challenge characters

Eco Design Challenge

Year 8 pupils from across Cornwall have been given the opportunity to make parts of their school more sustainable by working with designers on the Eco Design Challenge. They are calculating the size of their school's ecological footprint, then designing ways to make it smaller.

Geodesic dome

2007 Eco Design Challenge

Read a case study of the first Eco Design Challenge which ran in the North East in 2007, and find out how winning school Acklam Grange spent its £25,000 prize on a geodesic dome.