Selected Courses
These three courses provide a sample of the types of classes that I taught, particularly as a Teaching Fellow at Carnegie Mellon University. The three courses display (1) a graduate level seminar that I designed, developed, and taught; (2) a mandatory undergraduate course that build upon existing syallbi; and (3) a mandatory undergraduate course that I co-taught with senior Teaching Fellows where we built upon an existing syllabus as we made personal adjustments. Each class includes a link to a medium page that provides an overview of the syllabus.
Design’s Reverberations: Ripple Effects of Innovative Ideas
Graduate Level Seminar | Primary Instructor on record
Description: Design and technology are often associated with the notions of innovation and (societal and individual) progress. This course brings these close ties to the fore by complicating the way design and technology approach identifying the centers and edges of innovation — decisions that ultimately shape the ethos and practice of (emerging) practitioners. The aim of this class is to provide students with an intellectually stimulating and creatively experimental space to develop and articulate their ethos, and, thus, their analysis, and practice, detached from the existing, dominant market(-driven) logic.
More on this class here.
Image by: Céline Chuang
Design Studies: Place
Undergraduate Level Seminar | Primary Instructor on record (for Fall 2023)
Description: This mandatory class is for first year, first semester undergraduate design students. It introduces students to contextualizing their design practice and their voice as designers. Students are introduced to frameworks and concepts in how cities and narratives surrounding them shape design decisions and outcomes. Through this approach, students learn how to read cities from the perspective of design decisions, what drove those decisions, and what resulted in the outcomes. The objective of the course is to underscore to students that designs affect existing realities and require an understanding of context.
More on this class here. The syllabus is inspired by works done by former Teaching Fellows, specifically Sofía Bosh Gómez, and includes my own spin to it.
Image by: Map-projections.net
Design Studies: Cultures
Undergraduate Level Seminar | Co-instructor with Hajira Qazi and Marysol Ortega Pallanez
Description: This mandatory undergraduate course is for second year design students and intended to inform their studio practice. Students are introduced to the ways ideologies of what is “normal” are embedded into design decisions that inform the look, shape, and affiliations of designs. The class focuses on designed objects, spaces, experiences, and the narratives that contextualize them. The objective of the course is to provide a framework for students regarding cultural differences and varying worldviews to inform their design ethos and, ultimately, develop a design practice that accounts for diversity and equity.
More on this class here. The syllabus is inspired by works done by former Teaching Fellows, specifically Ahmed Ansari, and includes my own spin to it.
Image by: Alina Grubnyak