BA Curriculum Structure
General Education
Timetable
Unrestricted Electives
Specialisations
BA Industrial Design (Hons) undergraduates from Cohort AY2021/2022 onwards can pursue interests in any of the following areas of Specialisations:
Design Futures & Critical Inquiry
Develops empathetic leaders of innovation who enhance the human experience through exploration and provocation. This design visionary will project speculative futures that machines cannot envision through disruptive thinking and demonstrate high-level inquisitiveness about design ethics, appropriateness, and intended and unintended consequences.
Learning Outcomes
- Contextualise & Critique: Critically analyse and evaluate contemporary design challenges within their broader social, cultural, economic, environmental and philosophical contexts, demonstrating an understanding of the interconnectedness of systems and stakeholders.
- Envision & Communicate: Formulate a vision and articulate it through to a design proposition that challenges paradigms, disrupts conventional thinking, and inspire new viewpoints.
- Iterate & Synthesise: Engage in rigorous and open-ended design processes that embrace experimentation, iteration, and critical reflection to synthesise research, analysis, and ideation into impactful design propositions.
Product Innovation
Develops innovators who possess design-led thinking and relevant creative skills that are synthesised with engineering or technology. These designers apply their creativity to user and business focused benefits through design thinking, while achieving commercial success through developing tangible or virtual products.
Learning Outcomes
- Proof of Concept & Testing: Every project must have a working model and be tested like a real product to show it works.
- Economic Viability & Adoption: Projects should be practical and financially sustainable, designed to meet real needs so they get used and kept by people after they are made.
- Expert Collaboration: Focus on handing off ideas to the right technical experts for development instead of trying to do everything personally.
- Technical Performance & Market Positioning: Ensure projects perform well technically and stand out or compete effectively in the market against existing solutions.
- Commercial Value & Real-World Application: Projects should have clear commercial value and be practical for real-world use, even if they are standalone and not part of a bigger system.
Social & Service Transformation
Develops creators to meet the growing needs of innovation focused organisations and service economies, tackling complex social problems and fluid challenges through insightful problem framing, effective research investigations, and visual facilitations. The over-arching goal is to develop user-centred solutions through co-creative approaches.
Learning Outcomes
- Holistic Understanding of the Customer Journey: Develop a holistic understanding of customer experiences using various user research methods. Design for an end-to-end experience by effectively orchestrating multiple touchpoints.
- Alignment with Organisational Goals & Strategies: Map out the end-to-end service process, including frontstage and backstage activities. Align design efforts with organisational goals and strategies to ensure viability and sustainability of solutions.
- Ecosystemic Approach: Apply systemic thinking to understand the broader picture and interconnections within a service ecosystem. Identify relevant stakeholders and establish new collaborative networks for co-producing services.
- Facilitation & Communication: Facilitate multi-disciplinary collaboration and develop skills to effectively communicate service design concepts and solutions.
- Ethics & Sustainability Consideration: Integrate ethical considerations into the research and design process. Understand the impact of solutions to ensure they are environmentally and socially responsible.
Requirements
Requirements for the Specialisation (20 units)
- Complete a compulsory course ID4121 Project Research (4 units) in the area of specialisation.
- Complete a compulsory course ID4106 Design Thesis Project (12 units) in the area of specialisation.
- Complete one (1) elective course (4 units) from the basket of courses listed in the table below related to the area of specialisation.
Specialisations | Elective Courses |
Design Futures & Critical Inquiry | ID3124 Creative Communication & Design Argumentation (4 units)
ID2115 Digital Sketching & Painting (4 units) CDE2605 Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (4 units) |
Product Innovation | ID3125 Colours, Materials & Finishing (4 units)
ID2122 Ecodesign & Sustainability (4 units) ID2114 The Appreciation of Wood Craft (4 units) CDE2605 Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (4 units) |
Social & Service Transformation | ID3126 Motion Design (4 units)
ID3131 Techniques in Interaction Design and User Experience (4 units) CDE2605 Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (4 units) |
The basket of elective courses (4 units each) comprises courses that support each area of specialisation. Students who wish to take an external course (eg. CDE2605) to fulfil their Specialisation UE requirement, must first consult their Thesis Supervisor and obtain approval from the Specialisation Leader, who will assess its relevance to the specialisation and/or the student’s potential thesis project.
Information on Minor Programme
- Students who are keen to apply for Minor Programmes, you may refer to this link for more information.
- Students can be admitted to Minor programmes at the point of admission to NUS, or by applying/declaring to the relevant Faculties/Schools NO later than the end of the fifth semester of study.
- Declarations can only be made during the designated declaration period for the semester. Students are NOT allowed to change their declaration within the same semester once it has been submitted.
- Students must submit an online application on Academic Plan Application / Declaration (APAD) in EduRec during the application period.
- Students who wish to withdraw from the Minor programme should submit an official request by email to didcjl@nus.edu.sg
Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy and currency of the information. However, the University reserves the right to make changes without notice. For the latest and official updates, please refer to the Office of University Registration (OUR) website.
NUS IP Policy
As University Members, students are subjected to the NUS IP Policy. In summary, the University recognises a student’s ownership of copyright to his/her thesis or dissertation, however, where such thesis, dissertation or design works is submitted to the University to meet course requirements, any intellectual property subsisting therein and any research data or database contained therein, and the physical media on which such thesis or dissertation was recorded, stored or printed, belong to the University.
The student will be recognised as the author of the form of expression in his/her Authored Work (as defined in the NUS IP Policy), and University reserves the right to require the student to assign his copyright in the Authored Work for the purposes of commercialising the Authored Work and the student shall take such action as required to complete the assignment provided that the assignment of copyright contains terms which will enable the student to retain the right to reproduce the text of his Authored Work to ensure that his career benefit from publishing the results of the work. If the Authored Work or any Intellectual property subsisting therein is commercialised by University, the provisions on revenue-sharing in the NUS IP Policy (section H) shall apply.
For more information about the NUS IP Policy (in particular sections E and F), please visit here.