Jonsson School Hosts International Design Conference

More than 400 participants from 30 different countries traveled to The University of Texas at Dallas for the 25th International Conference on Engineering Design (ICED).

This was only the third time the Design Society hosted a conference in the United States. The Glasgow, Scotland-based organization previously hosted the conference in the United States at Stanford University in 2009 and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1987.

With the theme Design is a Team Sport, keynote speakers presented on a range of current topics, including future career pathways in design, human-centered design, design collaboration and design ethics. Workshop sessions focused on a broad range of topics including AI, sustainable design, process improvement and virtual reality product models for design education.

Dr. Joshua Summers, professor of mechanical engineering and interim associate dean for undergraduate education in the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science, served as conference chair. Summers, who also serves as an engineering accreditation commissioner at the international program accrediting organization ABET, is focused on improving design education within the Jonsson School as well as internationally.

“I am excited about growing the engineering design research community in the United States,” Summers said. “I am particularly excited to help establish UT Dallas as a true center for excellence in the field of engineering design research and education.”

Additional conference sponsors included the Office of Research and Innovation at UT Dallas, the Lyle School of Engineering at Southern Methodist University, Onshape and the UT Dallas Design Research Lab.

While a few attendees wore suits, Summers encouraged a relaxed approach to the conference, where participants visited food trucks parked on the Engineering and Computer Science West (ECSW) courtyard for lunch and some wore tropical shirts appropriate for the late summer Texas weather.

Design Society President Gaetano Cascini from Milan, Italy, joined Summers onstage to welcome guests in the Edith O’Donnell Arts and Technology Building (ATC) lecture hall.

UT Dallas graduate students Oredola Adebayo and Pavan Kumar as well as Summers chaired sessions on collaborative design, challenges in embodiment design and design creativity and team performance. Graduate students also participated in a marketplace where they displayed and discussed their work in the ECSW’s ground floor during lunch.

At the closing ceremony, Summers and his wife Cheryl, Jonsson School program director, were honored for their efforts in planning and organizing the event. Afterward, conference participants were invited to the new Athenaeum, home of the Crow Museum of Art, for hors d’oeuvres and drinks.

Other organizing committee members at UT Dallas included Dr. Anne Balsamo, professor of arts, technology and emerging communication and Arts and Humanities Distinguished Chair; Dr. Emily Choi, associate professor of instruction and academic program director for innovation and entrepreneurship; Dr. Yanwen Xu, assistant professor of mechanical engineering; and Dr. Jie Zhang, professor of mechanical engineering. The committee included other faculty from Texas Tech University and partnered with the Lyle School at SMU.

The conference was an all-hands-on-deck experience for Jonsson School staff, including Melissa Maxey, Jonsson School events manager, who helped arrange event logistics, and school leaders including Dr. Poras Balsara, Jonsson School vice dean and professor of electrical and computer engineering.  Over 30 UT Dallas students volunteered throughout the week of events, helping ensure that the international guests were welcomed and supported with excellent Texas hospitality.

Summers, a member of The Design Society since 2003, was a founding member of the New American Chapter, initiating the first Design Summer School program in the U.S. in 2015 with over 30 graduate students who spent two weeks learning how to conduct engineering design research using experimental designer studies, observational protocol studies and systematic case studies. During the past year, a group of UT Dallas students have begun working on establishing the first student chapter of The Design Society. At the conference, it was announced that Summers was elected to serve on The Design Society’s board of management, only the fourth American to serve on the organization’s board since it was established in 2001.