Dahl, Avril

Conformity & Creativity: tensions in portfolio requirements

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Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design

This paper investigates how prospective fashion design students at a University of Technology are required to reflect an understanding of the process of design and the process of construction in their sketches, which are a component of the portfolio they submit for evaluation. I begin by outlining how the portfolio guidelines initiate the anomaly between two desired requirements of novelty and originality / creativity versus the technical / conformity. I reveal how the portfolio requirements encourage students to conform from the onset and argue that this is because the fashion design program continues to train undergraduates to service a traditional and conservative mass market.

Shifting pedagogies: the impact of recurriculation

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy

On Monday, June 5 2006, on the front page of the Business Report, it was stated that, “Schools fail to teach the basics, MPs hear”. The article proclaimed that young people were leaving school without having reading or numeracy skills, and because of that businesses were often unable to train young recruits. Each year, fewer than half of the million children who started at grade 1 will register for grade 12. Even those who leave after grade 12 do not have the basic skills to seek work (Hamlyn, 2006: 1).

Some of those school leavers may become our students.

DEFSA conferences

DEFSA promotes relevant research with the focus on design + education through its biennial conferences, to promote professionalism, accountability and ethics in the education of young designers. Our next conference is a hybrid event. See above for details.

Critical skills endorsement

Professional Members in good standing can receive a certificate of membership, but DEFSA cannot provide confirmation or endorsement of skills whatsoever. DEFSA only confirm membership of DEFSA which is a NPO for Design Education in South Africa (https://www.defsa.org.za/imagine).