sort of territorial behavior is
deliberate; they might be right.
Departments controlling academic content realize the inherent value of the portion that
they control, but rather than
taking the time to understand
the holistic nature of what interaction design is capable of by
validating its broader need within an increasingly global community and recruiting the intellectual talent to support it, for a
variety of political and budgetary reasons departments often
petulantly cling to their piece of
the academic pie. The net effect
is to minimize the true value of
an integrated program of study
with a philosophical value of
its own. This dilutes the intellectual development of students,
the structure of the discipline
and the necessary self-reflective
criticism that will make such a
program not only viable but also
essential to the understanding
of technology and its humane
and rational integration into our
daily lives.
Beyond these subject-matter
silos, the other challenge that
goes into designing an educational program of study, especially a newer field like interaction design, lies in defining the
discipline itself. This is never
more difficult than when it has
to be done in advance of, or in
the midst of, arguments about
the validity of its anticipated
need—or for that matter, in
advance of changes to the status
quo. Unfortunately, due to both
internal and external pressures,
the current model of curriculum
and academic program development in higher education is one
that has become highly standardized, requiring everyone
to have advance confidence in
the process and the outcomes.
This so-called consensus model
sounds good theoretically, and it
is, for those vested in perpetuating it. However something is
lost when institutions fail to
be inventive because they are
placed in defensive mode which
allows academic programming
to naturally gravitate toward
that which satisfies only the
minimum standards and won’t
solve the problem. In fact, minimum standards are actually
counterintuitive to the future-oriented discovery method that
is central in moving interaction
design (or any discipline) forward.
The politics of change are
often revolutionary rather than
evolutionary for good reason;
those who financially and politically benefit from existing models are loath to embrace new
models. Those guarding that
status quo are often very threat-
ened by change and tend to feel
that they have the most to lose
from any influence a change
agent may have. But here we are,
not only at a collision of old versus new technology, but also old
versus new thinking about the
notions of finite resources, sustainability, and even social engineering and personal and community responsibility. Of course,
this crossroads argument could
be used to talk about revisions
to many programs of study, not
just interaction design. Indeed,
the future of man is increasingly
in need of more forward-looking
curricula within all disciplines
to begin to move our societies
beyond current models. Given
the potentially tectonic shifts
that are coming, by failing to
do anything new we are simply
rearranging deck chairs on the
ship when we should be looking
toward the horizon to set a new
course.
Interactions: Cultural, Social,
and Environmental
How do we move beyond this
stasis point? The course we
set should be directed away
from the current dichotomy
between what we want (
continued consumption) and what
we need (continued survival).
That dichotomy has never been
greater. Because maintaining the
