Anticipations on the conference programme
The conference preparation process has arrived at the crucial point. The Peer Reviewer Committee is finishing its work. In two weeks time we will have a clear view of the selected papers, and therefore of the specific themes into which they will be clustered. Now, what we can do, is to anticipate an overview on the whole conference programme’s architecture.
The Changing the Change core will be, of course, the selected papers presentations. As the Newsletter readers know, we received more than 300 abstracts (and this is a success!). At the moment we don’t know how many of them will be accepted by the Peer Reviewers. In any case, we are working on the hypothesis of having around 100-150 good papers accepted. These papers will be presented in 5-6 parallel sections with different, specific themes that will emerge from the clusterization of the selected papers. The main issue here, is how to conceive these clusters in order to promote real and productive discussions between the presenters and the public. Each section will be chaired by a member of the Steering Committee, who will coordinate it bringing also the contribution of his/her views and experiences.
Another important element of the conference is brought by the plenary session speeches and the opportunities for open discussions. We are still working on the preparation of this part of the programme, but some orientations are clear.
- Plenary session speeches. There will be a highly international group of 6 speakers who will be asked to draw an overview of their specific country or region for what regards design research and its contributions in “changing the change”.
- Round tables. There will be 2 round tables where invited discussants will be asked to bring their opinions on 2 relevant topics. These topics will be: Design, social innovation towards a sustainable wellbeing (round table 1) and Design, technological innovation towards a sustainable production (round table 2).
- Final module. It will consist of 4-6 parallel discussions on themes that will be defined by the same conference participants. Each one of these discussions will have a facilitator who, at the end, will be in charge to presenting the discussion’s results. At the end, in plenary session, the facilitators of the previous discussions will present the meeting’s outcomes.
As you can see, we are dealing with a rather complex conference’s architecture. The motivation of this choice is to find the most effective compromise between the different, equally important demands: to give to many good researchers the possibility to present their work and the time to discuss it; to listen to several important plenary session speeches; to participate to the debates on some specific topics and, finally, to have time and spaces for open discussions.
samuel m. maina says, on April 3rd, 2008 at 7:38 am:
Ezio Manzini says, on April 4th, 2008 at 8:56 am: