Minister of Higher Education and Research meets BTH students at Stanford d.School

• Post by: Christian Johansson
• 28th May 2017
• 1 Comment

The Swedish Minister of Higher Education and Research, Helene Hellmark Knutsson with entourage, came to meet the BTH-affiliated team at Stanford Engineering’s d.School on Thursday to see them in action in their final push to bring their design project to completion in time for the Stanford Design EXPErience on June 8.

We met in one of the open design studios in Stanford d.school, ME310 loft, filled with whiteboards and standing-only tables that have become synonymous with the Design Thinking approach. After a short introduction to the two-decade long relationship between professors Tobias Larsson (then Luleå, now BTH Mechanical Engineering) and Larry Leifer (Mechanical Engineering, Center for Design Research), including our past five years of BTH and Stanford partnership projects with Volvo Construction Equipment as a supportive sponsor, we entered the loft to see the team in their natural habitat.

Upon entering the loft it was clear the group was taken aback by the inspiring nature of seeing so many hands and minds busy crafting innovative solutions for the future to come. The environment of the loft itself added to the shock value, paper bikes hanging from the rafters, crafting materials strewn about in a state or organized chaos, prototypes on team tables in every state of completion running in direct contrast to the traditional Swedish tidiness. This is all part of the legendary ME310 Design Innovation course, running since 1969.

While the team explained their process Helene engaged them with comments conveying her understanding of the topic and encouragement for the globally collaborative nature of the work. With the Minister keeping to a tight schedule we took the opportunity to show the prototype from last year’s team as they exited the loft and bid the team a fond ‘hej då’.

På @Stanford i Kalifornien träffade @heleneHK en grupp studenter från Blekinge Tekniska högskola som jobbar tillsammans med Volvo #utbpol pic.twitter.com/5PW7pM8PZp

— Utbildningsdep (@Utbdep) May 26, 2017