Presentation slides from my talk about the COTEN Project at the Service Design Network Conference in Berlin, 2010.

1. College of Fine Arts • The University of New South Wales • Australia
School of Pharmacy • University of Auckland • New Zealand
2
A collaborative online research
coten activity exploring service design
for higher education in 2010
Examining Higher Education through Service Design
SDN Conference, 2010, Berlin
Dr. Andy Polaine
Lecturer/Research Fellow - Service Design
andrew.polaine@hslu.ch
Twitter: @apolaine

2. I need your help with this
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/spigoo/

3. Education is steeped in a production line mindset

4. Based on the jobs people would be doing
Assembly Line At Texas Instruments,1959.
Source: Google hosted Life magazine archive

5. We’re still using the same methods...

6. ... albeit clothed in new technologies
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/popofatticus

7. We spend a lot of time on restructuring & curricula

8. But we don’t know much about our students’ lives

9. And we’re unlikely to correctly predict their futures
Image: http://www.paleofuture.com/

10. The Play Ethic (2004)
“For the culture of industrialism, in which
an individual’s submission to routine is
what is most valued, a network society is
something of a disaster. The industrial
mindset is too brittle to cope with the way
that networks operate.”
- Pat Kane
Shift from industrial to network mindsets

11. A collaborative online research
coten activity exploring service design
for higher education in 2010
Re-thinking through the lens of service design

12. 1999 2002 2003
Virtual Design Studio [VDS] ‘99 Graphics & Contemporary Society Visualising the Science of Genomics
2005 2006 2007
Creative Waves 2005 Omnium Creative Network Creative Waves 2007
Creative Waves - a quick history
COTEN set out to answer two questions

13. 107 Participants 61 Students 22 Teachers/Mentors
22 Countries 35 Colleges 21 Special Guests
2005 - Photomedia

14. 200+ Participants 120+ Students 80+ Teachers/Mentors
30+ Countries 60+ Colleges 20+ Special Guests
2007 - Visualizing Issues in Pharmacy

15. A collaborative online research
coten activity exploring service design
for higher education in 2010
80+ Participants, 9 Special Guests, 24 Countries
1. How can we re-imagine the structure and experience of
higher education using service design techniques?
2. Can service design methodologies be used in a purely
online, collaborative environment?
COTEN set out to answer two questions

16. Can we re-create some of this (without the Post-Its)?

17. Special Guests

18. Discussions

19. Discussions

20. Teams

21. - Problem/brief to broadly framed
- Professionals have experience, but little time
- Students have more time, but lack experience
(but often have great insights)
- Timing hard to get right
- Difficult to move from talk to action
Problems
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/themadlolscientist/

22. Don’t do projects during the World Cup
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rhyick/4790598337

23. Positives: Cultural Probes

24. Positives: Cultural Probes

25. Favourite teaching and meeting spaces

26. 4. Change the way of teaching
...more engagement/ shift to enablers and facilitators
Insights
In their cultural probes many people state they have learned the most from a parent or another
family member. Fewer state other people they met later in life like teachers, mentors or so.
How does this come, is this due to the quality of the relationship, time spent with the influential
person or is it something occuring with a transfer of basic values, culture, confidence & trust?
I put away my computer except to
“Keeping it real” or surreal. Will show examples of things, and took
online help or hinder? Action Re- out the marker. What happened? the
search? This is more about balance, level of engagement changed in my
the difficulty with online is where it classes, unexpected conversations
is an economic substitute for ‘face emerged and I transformed from
to face’ delivery. teacher to knowledge facilitator.
... teachers should be passionate and inspiring!
Synthesis of insights
... a great teacher / trainer. He .... a wonderful person who inspired
manages to inspire and really bring me again and again to look at the

27. The Big Lesson: Small Change

28. How to create small change and nurture big change?
Image © Meena Kadri

29. Thank you!
Take a look at the project and archive here:
http://www.creativewaves-coten.com/
Dr. Andy Polaine
Lecturer/Research Fellow - Service Design
andrew.polaine@hslu.ch
Twitter: @apolaine

30. One more thing....