Making Design Research Work: New Knowledge Paradigms and AI Upskilling

By demonstrating, communicating and empowering the value of Design Research, this programme ultimately seeks to strengthen the UK's global leadership in the responsible development of transformative technologies like AI and IoT. The goal is to ensure these powerful technologies are leveraged to drive positive economic and social impact while proactively addressing critical ethical challenges around privacy, trust, and fairness. Design Research brings together the creative problem-solving mindset of design, with the analytical rigour of academic research and social science. The UK has been a leader in establishing this unique way of looking at the world, and this Fellowship seeks to empower the world's leading Design Researchers by clarifying and communicating the value of this way of understanding today's challenges and opportunities. The Fellowship will promote the groundbreaking documentary film about Design Research, Permission to Muck About. The film will bring Design Research to new audiences, and stimulate rich new conversations to help communicate the value of design. The Fellowship will launch the Design Research Observatory, a unique curated collection of the world's best examples of Design Research. Finally the Fellowship the bring together several applied and impact-focused projects that are demonstrating how to put Design Research into action in the wild.