INLS 697

Undergraduate Capstone

Information Science is a vibrant and rapidly transforming field of study. New issues, topics, technologies, applications and terminologies are continually emerging. One of the key skills BSIS majors must foster in order to succeed in this very competitive job environment is the ability to analyze emerging issues and assess solutions within the context of the information age. A powerful tool to help people analyze and assess needs and solutions is design thinking. In my sections of INLS 697 students have the chance to learn the basics of design thinking within a semester-long project, which will allow them to put to use all of the skills they’ve learned in their time at SILS.

Assessment in this class is currently based on one semester-long design thinking project and a reading club.

The design thinking project is to design and develop a tool or service (determined by the students), with assessments focused on students' completing the steps set out in a design thinking toolkit. In support of this project, students are asked to turn in weekly “meeting minutes” to ensure that the group is keeping up with their work. The final deliverable for this project is a “pitch deck” presented in the Pecha Kucha style: 20 slides, 20 seconds per slide. I’ve designed class sessions so that students can complete the majority of their work on this project during class time.

The second assignment is a book review, where students form groups, choose articles from a pre-selected set, and lead class discussion on the reading. To clarify, all students read all of the articles, some students are in charge of leading the discussion on the articles.

Examples of former design thinking projects can be found in the Extras! page.

The design thinking activity is based on ideas / materials developed by Maggie Melo, and Tim Zak’s Design Thinking short-course at Carnegie Mellon University.