Designers are improving lives through the emergent field of design for social innovation. With increasing force, corporations and nonprofits have begun to recognize the value designers bring to problem solving and the creation of human-centered products, services, environments and systems. The pioneering Designmatters department at ArtCenter College of Design, a leader in shaping design for social impact education, has published the collective wisdom of 84 game changers in the field in a new book. LEAP Dialogues: Career Pathways for Designers in Social Innovation is the first publication of its kind to present a comprehensive overview of new professional pathways to successful and meaningful careers as experienced first-hand by a who’s who of respected thought leaders who are making seminal contributions to the field.
Comments Dr. Mariana Amatullo, lead editor of LEAP Dialogues and co-founder and vice president of ArtCenter’s Designmatters department: “Our goal was to create a provocative and engaging framework to capture this influential shift in our practices and the impact it’s having on the positioning of design overall in organizations. The objective was to deliver complex content in an informative and accessible way that does justice to the compelling impact of the field… The book demonstrates how design matters in social change and how an education in design allows a professional to move throughout their career making contributions to the world.”
LEAP Dialogues: Career Pathways for Designers in Social Innovation was edited by Amatullo with Bryan Boyer, co-founder and partner at Dash Marshall; Liz Danzico, creative director, NPR and founding chair of the MFA Interaction Design, School of Visual Arts; and Andrew Shea, founder and principal of MANY. The book was designed by Martin Lorenz and Lupi Asensio of TwoPoints.Net.
