C o u r s e   C u l t u r e

                     "In order to understand things, we have to build them."
                              – Ruzena Bajcsy, a founder of modern robotics.

D E S I G N   C U L T U R E - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

My courses foster a culture of design.

Students work in class and outside class on assignments with guidance from the instructor(s).

Developing student work is reviewed in class, by the class.

Students offer design critiques of work in development by other students.

Students with no coding or electronics experience have done well in this course. The Grove hardware kit components make "physical computing" accessible to the novice who is willing to "roll up the sleeves" and work at it.

This course is foremost focused on "thinking big" and "thinking different" about designing interactive and adaptive systems that enable and augment people. It expects that you - with the best information you can acquire, and with your most intensive and exploratory effort - develop compelling, meticulously conceived and crafted interactive, physical things and environments responsive to challenges and opportunities of living. Given this ambition, I ask that you to take responsibility for your education by attending class, participating, and submitting and presenting assignments that advance thinking at the interface of design, engineering, computer science, and social science.

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A key objective for this course is to have every student in the class design not only their project but every project in the class. How? By benefiting from various inputs:

• You will benefit from informal exchanges with peers.
• You will deliver formal presentations at designated milestones throughout the semester.
• You will advance your project through "desk crits" with the professor and TAs.
• You will consult with D2FS staff on fabricating your project.
• You will review and respond to critique and grades.
  
  —and perhaps most critically—
  
  
• You will offer design critiques of developing projects accomplished by other students, for which you will be graded as part of your participation grade.

For DEA 2730, 5210, and 6210, there is a specific organizational structure described in the course syllabus.

Please note: I do not share my lecture slides. If you miss a class due to illness or for any other reason, we won't share slides with you or meet with you to repeat the lecture missed, Instead, we ask you to read carefully any assigned readings and review any linked materials for the missed class: the assigned readings and other materials convey the content of the lecture and/or discussion you missed. In missing a class, what you will miss is our class consideration of student work in-progress; it is however, difficult to capture what you missed of this class component. Accordingly, we encourage you to ask a classmate for a summary of this consideration of student work, and for any notes taken about it. Again, it is not the responsibility of the instructor or the TA to repeat the delivery of course sessions missed.

D E S I G N   C A R E E R S   I N   A N    A .I .  W O R L D - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Robert Capps. (2025). "A.I. Might Take Your Job. Here Are 22 New Ones It Could Give You. (In a few key areas, humans will be more essential than ever.)" The New York Times, Available at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/magazine/ai-new-jobs.html. Key point presented in 5 slides. Full article.

D E S I G N   S O C I E T I E S  /  J O B S   /   O P P O R T U N I T I E S - - - - - - - - - -

C O R N E L L   D E S I G N   C L U B S   &   S O C I E T I E S  
Across the Cornell campuses are clubs and affiliated societies you may consider joining. One of these that I'm especially fond of: Medium Design Collective.

I x D A ,   S I G C H I ,  &   D R N  
The IxDA (Interaction Design Association) lists on its webpages hundreds of internships and jobs related to the skills and knowledge covered in this course. Students are encouraged to join (at no charge) email postings (listservs) for ACM SIGCHI ANNOUNCEMENTS and DESIGN RESEARCH NEWS (both of these for design opportunities) and also ACM SIGCHI JOBS (in design). Students are also encouraged to become a student member of SIGCHI which brings you a 1-year subscription to interactions magazine [print] and discounts on ACM conferences. Directions for joining all these.

CORNELL BOOM!
BOOM! is an opportunity for Cornell students to show the Cornell and Ithaca communities the technology projects they've been working at BOOM! typically occurs in mid- April; sometime March is the deadline to submit your interest.

REV START-UP ACCELERATOR
Rev Ithaca Startup Works offers a free summer prototyping hardware accelerator. The info session and final application deadline are both in March. Take your design prototype from the classroom to the marketplace!