Manuela Maier-Hummel
The devastating effects of the anthropocene grow increasingly stronger, and though all generations need to learn how to deal with it (UNESCO, 2017), especially young people must come up with strategies that prepare them for unpredictable futures. With the realisation of the damage human interventions leave behind, the current paradigm must shift to post-human-centred design with systems thinking’s understanding of interconnectedness. Therefore, this study seeks to examine how interdisciplinary trained students in the fields of design and computer science perceive their gain in competencies and to what extent these competencies match so-called future skills. Students create hand-drawn milestone maps to indicate landmarks in their course of studies and mark the skills or knowledge acquired or consolidated; in 1-on-1 sessions, participants describe their milestone maps with the depicted most formative events, applying a varied photo elicitation method. Audio recordings of the conversations, as well as the hand-drawn maps, are analysed by the researcher; a graphic translation of Ehlers’ (2020) future-skill profiles serves as the basis to compare the collected data with the existing categories of the framework visually. Semi-structured interviews were used to examine results from the first data analysis in greater depth. The results show that in addition to a broad wealth of experience in digital literacy and design/creativity competence, students obtain during their studies a profound range of different categories of future skills. Mapping one’s individual knowledge ecology enables one to perceive one’s actions as effective and provides information about personal strengths. This empowers young generations to overcome potential feelings of powerlessness or even paralysis. It further enriches the discourse of design education by integrating design as a relational element in interdisciplinary programmes, providing future generations with the most urgently needed competences.
Keywords: systemic design, interconnectedness, interdisciplinarity, future competences, future skills, future literacy, digital literacy, design education, post-disciplinarity, empowerment