Jon Kolko, a blindingly intelligent and generally unique human being, was my Interaction Design professor in school. Jon is now working for frog design, far from the deep south town of Savannah, Georigia and still writing, thinking, listening and responding to all things design. He has written an article featured on Core 77’s website called “Out of the frying pan, into the fryer: From consulting to academia and back”. This blog is in response to his article and is not a good summary of what he has written. It deserves it own read for many purposes, but here are the reasons why it resonates with me.

Myth #2: Teaching is a mechanism for disseminating knowledge
There are some disciplines where an educator has a great deal of content stored up, and they need to distribute that content to the students. That sounds dreadfully boring, and so I’m glad that Design education is nothing like that. One of my friends and colleagues, Professor Bob Fee, used to say, “I like teaching Manufacturing Technology, because it’s the only class where I can stand at the front of the room and actually know something.” He wasn’t being overly humble; at the end of his forty-year career, he still feels a sense of awe and newness in the unique, contextually-sensitive learning that goes on in Design. As an educator, I learned more about Design—and about myself—than I can claim from all of my previous professional and educational experiences combined.

This paragraph sums up my entire experience at school in a beautiful candy coated nutshell. It is blissfully true. When I tell people that design school was the best thing I have ever done with my life I mean it and this is why: Design school for me, like Jon says, was a collaborative learning experience with our professors, and we as students didn’t know that until well into our senior year - or perhaps not until we walked across that stage. Continue reading ‘“Out of the frying pan, into the fryer: From consulting to academia, and back” by Jon Kolko’