In 2026, after nearly 90 years, the Institute of Design was folded into Illinois Tech's School of Design & Society.
This website is an archive of the impactful and inspirational work produced by the ID community before that transition.

László Moholy-Nagy opened the New Bauhaus in Chicago in 1937, treating design as a discipline that was teachable, testable, and consequential. Nine decades on, its scope had widened from the things people use to the systems they depend on: hospitals, government agencies, classrooms, supply chains, digital platforms. Along the way, ID community members developed the published research, methods, and frameworks that designers rely on every day.

Chief among them is human-centered design: close attention to how people actually live, and advocacy for what that research reveals. It shaped designers who are comfortable with complexity and ambiguity: curious, rigorous, inclusive, and stubbornly optimistic about design's ability to change the systems that shape our lives.

To every one of them, who taught, studied, built, critiqued, and stayed late in the studio: thank you, and keep designing.

institute
of desiGn
Search

Building and Understanding Context

Building and Understanding Context

Introduces basic methods of secondary research, argumentation and innovation strategy.

“
Context is the lens through which we view design challenges. Without it, we risk developing solutions that are blind to the world they inhabit.
—Don Norman, Professor of Design Psychology

Objective & Outcomes

This course will expose students to basic secondary research methods and mindsets critical for their design process. Honing the tactical and critical thinking skills needed to identify, organize, interpret and share relevant information and develop greater understanding about an issue, students will practice drawing conclusions and building arguments to support these conclusions.

Students will conclude this course being able to argue a robust, convincing and immersive position on a given topic and present it in a written paper, a project board and a strategy presentation.

Typical Schedule

  • Session 1: Introduction
  • Session 2: Building Arguments
  • Session 3: Research Planning: Research questions
  • Session 4: Literature Review: How to read & insights
  • Session 5: Conferences & Thought Leaders: Frameworks
  • Session 6: Facts/Data/Investor Calls/Patents: Review
  • Session 7: Project Board Gallery & Argument Paper
  • Session 8: Trends & Futures
  • Session 9: Drivers & Signals
  • Session 10: Futurecasting
  • Session 11: Backcasting
  • Session 12: Strategy Development
  • Session 13: Argument Development
  • Session 14: Final

See all MDes Courses