FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MEDIA CONTACTS:
Willem Van Lancker
1 (401) 369-5063
willem@abetterworldbydesign.com
Andy Cutler
1 (401) 743-7842
andy@cutlerandcompany.com
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Providence, RI to host annual “A Better World by Design” Conference October 2-4, 2009
Rhode Island School of Design & Brown Students Create International Community of Social & Environmental Change
September 22, 2009 (Providence, RI): Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) will invite a global community of innovative thinkers, professionals, and students to Providence, RI to explore, share, and create experiences of social and environmental design. This three-day internationally acclaimed conference, now in its second year, “A Better World by Design” (www.abetterworlddesign.com) will be held October 2-4, 2009 on the campuses of Brown and RISD in Providence, RI. Nearly 500 guests from around the world will gather to discuss innovative approaches and solutions to extreme poverty, access to basic resources, environmental degradation, the future of our infrastructure, and the design of our societies in order to create a better way of life. Global leaders from the fields of architecture, design, engineering, economics, entrepreneurship, environmental studies, business, politics, and global development will converge during this conference to discuss the critical role of design as an integrative application to improve the world and its inhabitants.
“Building on the success we generated last year, we are using this year’s conference as a vehicle to progress social change worldwide and create a lasting communities of students, faculty, and professionals—both locally and worldwide,” commented Willem Van Lancker, RISD ’10 Graphic Design, one of the conference’s chief organizers. “Today’s students, no matter their academic concentration, are recognizing their unlimited potential to use integrative design methods to make the world a better place. This conference brings together world leaders from a wide spectrum of disciplines to not only inspire students, but to also be inspired by them in an uniquely intimate and creative environment.”
“Art and design have a powerful role in this universe – to take all of the complexity in our world and make sense of it on a human scale,” said RISD President John Maeda. “This collaboration between RISD and Brown is just one example of the difference we can make as a community, with RISD’s powerful expertise in innovation serving as a local and global change agent.”
At this year’s event, the Revolution by Design (RxD) initiative will be unveiled. According to Brown adjunct faculty Kipp Bradford, “The Mission of Revolution by Design is to foster and support a new educational environment, connecting students with communities in order to solve meaningful, real world problems.” This initiative was a direct outgrowth of A Better World by Design’s inaugural conference in 2008.
A Better World by Design will feature keynote speaker Jan Chipchase, Principal Engineer at the Nokia Research Center, who is researching the application of mobile technologies to our everyday lives in both the developed and developing world to increase connectivity and humanity in an ever-fragmented world. Joining Chipchase will be 18 other speakers (www.abetterworldbydesign.com/speakers.php) who are developing trailblazing social and environmental solutions. In addition to the world-class lineup of speakers, the conference will feature 17 intimate panel sessions (www.abetterworldbydesign.com/panels.php) where conference attendees will have the opportunity to participate alongside leaders of the local and international communities on critical issues of our time. Our panels will introduce new ideas in integrative design methods and also tackle some of our most challenge contemporary problems like transportation, climate change, emerging markets, and the evolution of our societies and economies. The weekend will also include several workshop and tour sessions (www.abetterworldbydesign.com/workshops.php) inviting attendees to involve themselves in local social and sustainable design projects aimed at improving the Greater Providence community. These sessions also utilize Providence‘s forward thinking attitude and rich history for innovation as a case study to model worldwide.
A Better World by Design is also collaborating with Core77 (www.core77.com), the award winning international industrial design blog, to host the first in-person One Hour Design Challenge to engage participants to work together to generate a solution to an important issue. The One Hour Design Challenge is one of the most widely generative web design competitions receiving thousands of submissions for each prompt. By introducing the groundbreaking Challenge at the conference, we are inviting our diverse participants to work together toward in a meaningful way providing them with an opportunity to put our mission into practice with real-life cross-disciplinary cooperation.The conference is also inviting the widely acclaimed Project M (www.projectmlab.com) to kick off their (blank)LAB mobile design studio tour with an experiment involving all conference participants interaction and shared perspective. 100 conference attendees will be recruited to enter the (blank)LAB and agree to “Live their Life to the Fullest,” becoming part of a lasting network inspired by a young designer names Jenny Leonard.
To further harness the collective creativity of our speaker and panelist guests we are introducing a poster design series to raise funds for Better x Design’s student Seed Fund for student research and collaboration. Last year the Seed Fund helped support the creation of a sustainable energy generating gym on campus and an on-going project to engineer and design a rainwater collection system for a community in rural Southern India. These projects are crucial in the development of Better x Design’s mission to promote collaborative thinking and extracurricular socially and environmentally conscious projects. Through projects like these we are sowing the seeds for future collaboration beyond Brown and RISD and participating in groundbreaking projects in the broader community.
To register visit: www.abetterworldbydesign.com/register.php
About A Better World by Design and Better x Design
A Better World by Design is organized and run exclusively by a small organization of Brown and RISD students called Better x Design. Better x Design integrates the communities of Brown, RISD, and the City of Providence through interdisciplinary experiences that foster a responsible local and global educational environment. Our goal is to enhance classroom and studio education while generating student interest in social and environmental design, promoting Brown and RISD as world leaders in these disciplines.
A Better World by Design is about instilling a culture of social responsibility, environmental consciousness, integrative thinking, and nascent curiosity by introducing tomorrow’s leaders to the leaders making the world a better place today. At our unique event participants will understand not only how to change the world but also acquire the tools to make it really happen.
For more information on our organization visit, www.betterxdesign.org
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