Most people are unaware that when a person is a professor, teaching is only a third of the work that they do for the university. As mentioned, teaching is a big part, research is another and service to the university or society is the last. Teaching is my passion, research gets me up in the morning (not early btw), and service is my reason for being a professor and from my perspective, all areas are intertwined and if they aren’t, they should be.

The major thrust of my research is that research can take many different forms. I am not a botanist that studies a very specific symbiosis of plant and fungus — the mycorrhiza — and every minute detail of it’s relationship for years upon years (do they have a “relationship?”).

My scholarship consists of a body of research to determine the trajectory of the Communications Design industry and the state of design education. I pursue a body of research that examines the future of the Communications/Graphic Design industry and its relationship to academia. I continue to ask and challenge what are the qualities that a designer student today must possess to be viable in the quickly evolving future. What are those attributes that will ensure today’s student must obtain to be successful in a job that may or may not exist in its current form. How do I train designers for jobs that don’t currently exist?

I also believe that a designers’ processes, including design thinking and critical thinking are the necessary skills that will benefit a designer through an ever changing industry. Further, I believe and continuously seek opportunities to discover and apply those skills to any industry/problem/scenario to problem solve an even better solution.

I have a multifaceted research approach and all projects fall under this broad category. Specifically there are three main areas that I worked with this past year:

1. Design Education: Is education preparing students for a constantly changing industry:
a. Design in Decline: Breathing New Life Into an Industry Through Education
b. Deprogramming Design Education: Breaking down a traditional curriculum to build a better program
c. Redesigning Design: Reestablishing Our Relevance After Losing Our Value.

2. Design Thinking/Critical Thinking and their roles in society:
a. Decoding Democracy through Visual Literacy: Reading Between the Memes
b. Decoding Democracy: Arming a New Generation to View Social Media with Critical Thinking: Phase II
c. Viral Design: User Concepts of Virality on the Niche Social Media Site

3. Design as Social Innovation:
a. VIEWpoint Kit: Design Tools for Achieving International Perspectives (Visual + Idea Exchange Workshop)
b. Decoding Democracy: A Social Media Accountability Project, A.I. and the News grant: An open challenge to educate society to navigate on social media for the betterment of society (recently found out that I made the finalist list – only 12% accepted, no others from SU but institutions such as M.I.T. and BBC are represented)