Over the past twelve years, the University of Johannesburg Department of Graphic Design students have developed many feasible solutions based on human-centred and participation design principles. Implementing these design solutions to foster positive change is often problematic owing to funding and handovers; consequently, many projects remain at the conceptual stage, with few making a positive difference to the external stakeholders. Nevertheless, despite these challenges, students often produce high-end and in-depth results when working with stakeholders.

Emerging IR 4.0 systems have the capacity both negatively and positively to disrupt. While currently much of the design in this regard has for practical reasons focused on technical systems, there is an urgent need to ensure that these systems due to their physical fabrication, pervasive deployment, and autonomous capabilities, are integrated into our human world in a manner that enhances the human condition and ensure planetary sustainment. Supporting this urgent need, this paper suggests that human-centred design (HCD) can make a substantial contribution, albeit with a recasting of its traditional design role.

Viktor Papanek, in his seminal book about ethics and design, Design for the Real World: Human Ecology  and  Social  Change (1971,  revised  1984)  declares  that  designers  share  responsibility  for humankind’s environmental mistakes, by all the products and tools that they have sold and created, either by bad design or by turning a blind eye (1984, p. 56).

As the focus of design broadens to include problem solving located in complex societal systems the emphasis in design education must shift accordingly. Knowledge of and competence in conducting research within the scope of design practice, and using insights gained from research to conceptualise appropriate solutions is a necessity that design students urgently require.  In support of this need, this paper  will  introduce  and  describe  the  Firma  Model,  a  meta-framework  that  spans  the  human- centered design process, which aims to assist the design student and educator in grappling with complex problems.

Wicked problems are wicked because, amongst other things, understanding problems as existing in society, at the intersection of many possible points of views held by a variety of potential stakeholders introduces indeterminacy. Ethical frameworks in this context may also be multiple and may exist in harmony or dis-harmony alongside each other.

Human-Centered Design (HCD) methods have been identified as valuable and effective approaches to designing with and for people, but is also due to complexity and indeterminacy, often difficult to practice. With the popularisation of HCD in contemporary design education, and the subsequent emphasis of human-centered research an ethical question arises as to whether design students are adequately prepared to engage with the type of research that more and more they are expected to conduct.

In order to produce skilled design graduates schools regularly restructure their curricula to develop knowledge  characterized  by  continuous  advancements  applicable  to  the  ever-changing  design industry. New schools are in demand and a concern arises that these offer little more than specialized software training and do not sufficiently prepare students to become empathetic, thoughtful individuals that may serve the needs of society.  Former president of the International Council of Graphic Design Associations (ICOGRADA), designer and educator Jorge Frascara (2008, sp) confirms this:

"...the [designer's] task is to design for the individual placed in his or her immediate context." (Buchanan 1998, p. 20)

This  paper  about  a  graphic  design  case  study  discusses  the  positive  impact  of  stakeholder participation during the problem-setting phase of the design process on the designer's ability to reframe the design problem and to conceptualise human-centered design solutions that add value and enrich people's everyday lives.

There is no doubt that the role of product designers has changed considerably, not least with the rise of human-centred design. While Papanek’s 1971 “Design for the Real World: Human Ecology and Social Change” seemed radical at the time, his ideas seem entirely at home in the 21st century, including his call to adopt more social responsibility in design. These views are echoed in the contemporary  findings  of  professionals  and  researchers  associated  with  ICSID,  the  International Council of Societies of Industrial Design. The focus has shifted, from the designer as the expert to the user, or community, as the expert in their own environment; and Co-design, Participatory design, and Universal Design are but a few examples of such people-focussed design approaches.

This paper centres around a creative design project for first-­‐year fashion design students. This project was informed by (1) the theoretical underpinnings of design thinking, (2) a human-­‐centred approach to design and (3) protocol studies of novice engineering and industrial design students’ approaches to the design process. The design project assumed a design process method that focused on human beings – and their needs – as the driver for fashion design. The aim of adopting such a human-­‐centred method for creative design was three-­‐ fold. Firstly, the design project aimed to create a culture and awareness of human beings and their needs as a driver for fashion design.

The paper reports on a number of human-­‐centred design projects completed as part of the  undergraduate  graphic design programme at the Vaal University of Technology (VUT). The value of projects rooted  in participatory design practice and social responsibility is discussed in the context of the  multidisciplinary nature of graphic design and the opportunity provided by the Higher Education  Qualification Framework (HEQF) to re-­‐ design existing programmes at Higher Education Institutions  (HEIs) in South Africa.