Are you a natural born teacher? Do you love BKLYN? Interested in education and community development? We have the perfect project for you.

What is this? This summer, we are partnering with NYSED and iMaps on a really cool project. The goal is to map resources that are necessary for students. It could be tutoring, health or counselling services. The students will be going to each and collecting information that will be used in the mapping. Since this is a pilot project, for the first time, two neighborhoods, Crown Heights and Bed Stuy are going to be mapped by high school students. You can learn more about the project here.

What’s my role? You get to attend the exclusive iMaps training with teachers and parents and then get to work with high school students in mentoring and collaborating with them in the mapping. From June 24th to July 8th, you will be working with education experts, professionals, community leaders and students on this exciting project. To learn about iMaps, you can read this.

Why? Not only do you get the chance to work on a fun project and get to meet some amazing people, the mapping project will have an amazing effect on the Brooklyn community. By teaching young people to map the people, places and opportunities in the community, you will allow young people to impact their own future, that of the communities and the world beyond. There’s also an opportunity for this project to evolve into something big so you can get acquainted with it early.

How? Write to us at designtinkering@gmail.com and we’ll let you know what the the next steps are. You will need to be physically available from June 24th to July 8th, as well as taking part in a virtual training session in June (date T.B.A).

Calling all designers, entrepreneurs, engineers, hackers, and Washington Square Park Lovers!!

Join us for a Design Jam / Hack-a-thon to tackle the problem of rodents in Washington Square Park.

Dive into solving a complex problem that directly affects our community by working with design and industry experts and partnering with students from schools across NYU!

Bring your tech skills, entrepreneurial spirit, and brazen ideas to create a better park experience for humans and animals!

Event details are below (Lunch and other goodies will be served).

Space is limited so please RSVP today at http://frontiersindesign.eventbrite.com

More info here.

Looking forward to seeing you on the Saturday June 1st from 10-2!

What is The Frontiers in Design Hack-a-thon?

The Frontiers in Design Hackathon is an experiment in rapid cross-disciplinary collaboration. Students, professors, and professionals join in small teams to define problems, prototype systems, products, or services, and communicate and refine concepts with other teams.  The result: inspiring solutions, meaningful exchange, and a really good time!

The Challenge:  Rodent Control in Washington Square Park

Rodents damage property, spread diseases and deter people from using Washington Square Park. This is a complex problem which requires expertise from diverse fields to solve.

Who: We’re looking for people who are passionate about design and are driven tackle problems that we face as a community. Students and professionals in fields as diverse as engineering, product and service design, interaction design, business, entrepreneurship, community engagement, public policy and anyone else with a passion for collaboration is welcome!

What: A fun and fast moving design jam / hack-a-thon!

Teams of participants from different backgrounds form to:

·      Define problems around rodent control with the help of experts

·      Prototype systems, products, or services

·      Refine concepts and present solutions

·      Work with design thinking experts

·      Use mindfulness techniques to see new opportunities

Solutions will be presented to NYU’s pest management team.

Why: It’s an opportunity for you to meet, collaborate and network with like-minded people. It’s also a fun way to flex your design-thinking skills to solve a community problem.  This is your chance to improve the lives of the community of park-users from your fellow NYU students to New York residents and their children who play in the park.

When:June 1st, from 10 am to 2 pm. We know it’s a Saturday so we’ll make it short and sweet. Also, lunch is on us!

Where: The Greenhouse at NYU Poly, 6 Metrotech Center, Brooklyn. It’s a student-designed co-working space that was built for events just like this!

Frontiers in Design Flyer

Tackling End-of-Life Care Challenge from the California HealthCare Foundation: Catalyzing Communication about End-of-Life Care

On Saturday, five people got together to solve a unique problem: How might we create better services at the end of one’s life? How do we make sure a person’s final healthcare wishes are satisfied? And how do talk about something that is considered taboo when it is actually merits conversation?

(For more information about the project, you can read this)

As pictured above, left to right: Jeanette Leigh of Addison, Mark Whiting from CMU, Yosef Shuman from SCAD, Bosco Smardzic of GreenPeak and Ashwin Gopi from NYU Poly started their Saturday morning with coffee and a conversation about death.

“We went down to the statistics and found something surprising. More than 70% of the people do not get the type of health care they want, especially when they are on their final journey. Legal and political directives (which stem from cultural perception), make sure that doctors do everything they can to keep a person alive. However, not everyone wants this, based on interviews, many people would rather opt for hospice or home-care at the end but no one has communicated it through writing or even verbally. There do exist legal forms and procedures but no one uses them because no one wants to think about death when they’re healthy.”

Inspired by the actor-network theory, they mapped out the different players in the healthcare-context and realized that the only people making profits out of drawn-out procedures were pharmaceutical companies. After hours of research (and one delicious lunch), they came up with an idea to decentralize the profit model for end-of-life healthcare. By involving insurance companies to make signing the POLST (Physician Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment) an option for their members by incentivizing it through discounted premiums. The cost of the discounts and the cost of making sure the members sign and review their POLSTs would be balanced out by the cost savings when people’s final healthcare options are fulfilled, creating a win-win scenario for both. By communicating and exercising their option of refusing extended treatments, it would not only save emotional energy, effort and money for their family and providers, but also free up resources in hospitals to focus on treatment of people who need it. It also creates a closer relationship between an individual and their insurance provider. Also, by converting their members into advocates through co-creation of value, they will also be able to reach out to members of their family and friends and make sure that the taboo is broken and people are able to communicate what they would want for themselves and their families.

The team ended their day of brainstorming and sketching with a conversation about further opportunities for collaboration. They felt that they should hold more design jams at the Greenhouse and invite other people to join in. So watch this space if you want to participate!

Also, check out some of the pictures from the day.