Winning 2nd place in the competition last year in 2010, the BEST Labbers in the CARES project is poster image for the Big Ideas flyer and website for 2011.

Second Place Co-Winner: Students-Community Collaborative Design Challenge

This project will enhance community engagement on campus on three levels: practice, education, and research. A collaborative process between design students on campus, a nearby community, and CARES – a multidisciplinary team of designers and researchers – will be initiated through a design challenge, where students will offer design ideas to a real life design problem of an underserved community in need. The collaborative design process will provide ideas ready to be used by the community, real-life design experience, and a research platform for evaluating various methods for their ability to engage the community in the design process and produce more locally appropriate designs.