For my readings this week, I had to write my response of which I felt the most among a number of short essays by Kees Dorst from the book, Understanding Design. To me, I respond most to the short essay on “Limits of an Education“.

I feel that there is a limit to everything we do, and that we have to take responsibility towards our own future/education. Kerry Polite (2004) states that the design solution of a student either succeeds or fails, but in both cases, the student benefits by gaining the ability to discern the reasons behind the success of failure.This is an important aspect of a process. They are learning to see and learning to think on their own.

Everyone is born in a unique way with different talents, different opinions, different ideas, and as a design student, I learn through my mistakes. Grades definitely do bother me, but in actual fact, it doesn’t really matter. It’s what we learn and gain from all the failures that makes us a better designer. My lecturer back home once challenged us to fail, rather then to excel. He said, since its so hard to excel, or ace the project, why not produce a work so that he can fail us. Well, come to think of it, it’s equally challenging. At the end of it, we managed to get average results, nothing fantastic, but, it’s definitely something worth pondering.

I absolutely agree that the school is only there to guide and to teach us the basics. A lecturer can do only that much. However, what one does or learns is what matters the most. It is through the downfalls, the failures and the experience of dealing with a design problem that counts. With that, one is then able to learn about the various possibilities that can happen.

Kerry Polite, 2004. “Thinking about Design Education“. Retrieved on 25 April 2008, from AIGA.