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My HCDE Experience

My time in HCDE 210 was very enlightening. This course was very well put together. It covered the whole creation process for designing a human-centered service or product. But beyond that, it also went over different ethical issues involved in designing products for people. I had to determine whether my design was inclusive, environmentally friendly, kept the user’s privacy, got their consent when testing my products, even considered the political ramifications of my actions. All issues that need to be kept in mind when you are designing products for humans to use. I never really understood what human-centered design meant until now, despite what I may have believed before I took the course.

Beyond just the ethics, this course also describes the entire HCDE process. From User Research to User Testing we not only learned what is expected to be accomplished at each step, but I actually participated in making projects at each stage of this process. I developed apps to practice designing products for the ease of users. I went out and observed people shopping in the Saturday Market to see what problems I could find that needed to be fixed. I sketched rapid-fire ideas diverging and converging to find the best way to solve a transportation problem. I found actual people and had them test a product to see how well they could figure out how to use it. There was so much hands-on work in this course that I was always excited to see what we do next week. By far the most creative engineering class that I have taken.

Then there are the lectures, after the first one we didn’t have a single traditional lecture. All of the lecture periods were dominated by guest speakers from the HCDE industry presenting their work and how it is connected to what we are learning. Not only was I getting hands-on practice of real-life methods, but I was also able to directly see how all of those practices are then implemented in real-world work and scenarios. I got presentations about a variety of topics as well. There was one on an app created to promote inclusivity of play between children despite any handy capabilities they may possess. There was one on fake news and how it causes a dilemma of misinformation in our modern political scene. I was told about how people with multiple chronic conditions could have their lives improved if their doctors possessed more information about them. So many varieties of topics that I can now see the applications of human-centered design anywhere that I look.

All in all, this course was amazing to participate in. I am glad I was able to gain this experience before I graduated. Hopefully, the lessons I learned here will be able to apply to my life and work moving forward. Now onto what comes next!