Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum has developed three variations of their City of Neighborhoods program, each using community as the focal point to bring design thinking to new audiences.  At the AAO conference, Mei Mah, Deputy Director of Education, and Kim Robledo-Diga, Professional Development Manager at Cooper-Hewitt led a break-out session that was a case study about the City of Neighborhoods program.  They shared models that have been successfully engaging New York City public school students, K-12 educators nationwide, and a rural Texas border town. 

Be sure to scroll to the bottom for the audio!

Mei Mah, Deputy Director of Education, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution

Mei Mah is the Deputy Director of Education at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution (CH-NDM) where she is responsible for strategic educational initiatives and collaborations. She served on the development and launch team of National Design Week and www.educatorresourcecenter.org  (ERC), the Museum’s online resource design hub.  During her tenure at the Museum, Mei, has produced symposia, hands-on activities, and gallery programming for over sixty exhibitions including Open Talks: Pioneers of Change, Extreme Textiles: Design for High Performance, Feeding Desire: Design and the Tools of the Table, 1500-2005, and the National Design Triennial series. Mei sits on the New York State Council of the Arts (NYSCA) museum panel and cultural committee of the Netherlands America Foundation. Her interest in design education began while working in architecture and community development and prompted her to pursue a M.A. in Arts Administration from Teachers College, Columbia University.

Kim Robledo-Diga, Professional Development Manager, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution

Kim Robledo-Diga, has over nine years experiences in arts education.  As Professional Development Manager at Cooper-Hewitt she is responsible for integrating design thinking into local and national school curricula standards and professional development trainings across the country. Kim earned a Bachelor of Fine Art with a Minor in Art History from the Maryland Institute, College of Art and a Masters of Fine Art with additional studies in arts administration from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In her prior positions, Kim developed workshops and content that utilizes museum’s collections which address state and local educational standards, designed youth exhibitions, family guides and produced a variety of cultural events and educator training on techniques for using works of art to enhance the learning experiences of children. In addition to her work in the museum field she taught at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, was the ceramics department head at the Instituto Allende in Mexico and taught and oversaw special events at Baltimore Clayworks in Maryland.

If you polled the architecture and design field about who are the leading experts in using academic standards in design education, chances are the Chicago Architecture Foundation would be mentioned first.  Jean Linsner, Jennifer Masengarb, and the rest of the youth education department at CAF are always ahead of the curve when it comes to planning and creating innovated education programming and curriculum.

Since CAF hosted the 2009 AAO conference in Chicago, we were lucky enough to have Jean and Jennifer lead a session break-out session about this exact topic.  Participants rated their session as one of the highlights of the conference, and we're happy to be able to share some of that presentation with you today.  

Using Academic Standards in Design Education

Using academic standards in design education is not an oxymoron.  Academic standards can provide a framework for developing programs that meet the needs of teachers.  Learn strategies for demystifying state and national academic standards; making connections between your content area, target audience, and the standards; walk away with a plan for developing engaging and responsive programming.

Academic Standards Presentation

Using Academic Standards in Design Education Handout

Jean Linsner, Vice President of Youth Education, Chicago Architecture Foundation
Jean Linsner is responsible for the strategic development and supervision of CAF’s Youth Education Programs. Linsner is an expert in education program management for child and adult learners in both for-profit and not-for-profit settings. She is the co-author of CAF’s Schoolyards to Skylines: Teaching with Chicago’s Amazing Architecture. Linsner has been at CAF since 1999. She holds BA degrees in English and Telecommunications and an MS in Education from Indiana University.

Jennifer Masengarb, Education Specialist, Chicago Architecture Foundation

Jennifer Masengarb is Education Specialist at the Chicago Architecture Foundation and served as the author of CAF’s high school curriculum, The Architecture Handbook: A Student Guide to Understanding Buildings, awarded a 2009 national Honor Award from the American Institute of Architects.  She is also the primary author of Schoolyards to Skylines: Teaching with Chicago’s Amazing Architecture, CAF’s award-winning K – 8 curriculum. 

In 2000, Jen came to CAF with experience gained by working at architectural firms, by researching for historic structure reports, and in teaching high school English and history in Eastern Europe.  She holds a bachelor of architecture degree from the University of Detroit Mercy and a master's degree in architectural history from the University of Virginia.