Investigative Studios are required studios within the Industrial Design Program that are also open to students in other majors. Investigative studios are taken in any order. Content, structure, and focus of these studios varies from semester to semester. Students can sign up for the studios that best fit their schedules and interests.Design is changing more than ever before. We're living in a rapidly evolving overlap of industry, technology, and digital experiences. How might these influences affect how we shape our professional and personal goals as design practitioners? In this course we will investigate how we as designers can shape our agenda as entering professionals, evolve our career trajectories to suit our beliefs and passions, and shape our long-range future - not just through portfolios and job searches, through a deep and revealing journey seeking out our stories, our personal goals, and how the brand of "you" can be shaped and sustained as part of your design experience. In addition to the broader topics, we'll discuss career strategies, evaluate existing projects and portfolios, frame new ways of thinking about work, evaluate the value of consulting roles, and build informative narratives not only to meet the needs of our professional portfolio, but also for our personal life portfolio. We'll investigate the mechanics of consulting and contract work, how to bid jobs, structure and run a small business, and how to build and sustain independent income as a freelance designer. We'll also examine the advantages of corporate design work, how to structure productive career changes and gaps, and how to manage shifts from traditional design roles to the emerging design roles of tomorrow.  

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