The UCDA Design Education Summit is an annual national academic summit designed for design educators and graduate students who are seeking to engage in presenting academic research, pedagogy, and creative projects through peer review, discourse, and presentation.

The summit provides an exciting and enriching experience for all attendees to gather as a national academic community. Participants have the opportunity to showcase their research and projects through peer-reviewed presentations and posters, workshops, panels, and keynote presentations. Design educators and graduate student who choose not to submit for presentation yet would like the opportunity to benefit and learn from academic work presented by their peers are encouraged to attend.

Mindful Design

As human beings, we are constantly learning and unlearning how the world works as it changes and evolves. We try to anticipate what changes might come, and how our roles and responses as designers and educators may need to shift and evolve in response to these changes. One approach to managing and navigating our world's fast-paced changes in technology and society is by applying the principles of mindfulness in our pedagogical and design research practices. The practice of mindfulness is about paying attention to the present moment with active attention, openness, curiosity, flexibility, focus, and acceptance. This can manifest in approaching our work as designers and educators in various ways—including through deeper explorations and asking questions, how we approach the creative process, inviting empathy and other design thinking processes, and approaching problems from different angles.

We invite you to explore and share how mindfulness plays a part in your own pedagogical and design research practices. We will engage in an exchange of ideas, experiences, and academic discourse through presentations, panels, workshops, and posters that explore the topic of Mindful Design at the 20th Annual UCDA Design Education Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina May 19-21.

Join us by presenting your work, learning from the work of others, and benefiting from networking and the exchange of ideas with like-minded design educators. We look forward to seeing you there.