Interaction Design
Santa Monica College
ANNUAL
REPORT
20
21
Hello!
I’m Nicole Chan, Faculty Lead of the Interaction Design Bachelor Program.
A major strength of the SMC IxD program has been the student based cohort model. Each Fall a new group of students come together to begin a two year journey through the IxD program. In the beginning students know little about each other, the faculty, or the staff. Slowly, over time, a community takes shape. From each cohort emerges a unique personality based on shared values.
These communities don't form spontaneously. There is an intentionality, aided by a supporting structure to help grow connections. The program hosts kick-off events, workshops, and promotes teamwork in classes. All of this is meant to aid in building a solid collaborative base. Last year, when the world went into lockdown I became concerned. A program of people focused on creating meaningful connections between humans, technology, and design were suddenly staring at each other on screens unsure of how to move forward.
My initial unease turned into hope as I observed our students' interactions evolve. Creative fun and play was expressed through weekly virtual movie nights.
Students initiated Zoom coffee chats between Juniors and Seniors, to talk about work and more importantly to check in on one another. I observed genuine kindness and patience between teammates during class projects. Students made time and space for each other to care for themselves, friends, and family. There was also a continual ability for students to ask for help and communicate their true needs. There were and are deeply personal challenges, and students continued to really see and hear each other, and let each other know they weren’t alone.
Lockdown did not stifle the IxD community. These students explored different ways to work together during classes, used new tools to connect with each other, and to build their relationships and support systems. Most important of all, they used the wisdom of their feelings to guide them in redefining the values of their community during this difficult time. I have deep gratitude for their example. It brings me hope to observe and work with these designers who prioritize the values of kindness, patience, and self-care. The Class of 2021 are the future designers and leaders that are tasked with the hard work of creating a more compassionate and inclusive world for all of us. I can say with confidence, they are ready.
Nicole Chan
Faculty Lead, SMC
B.S. Interaction Design program
IxD by the Numbers
89
4
23
24
4
7
92
84
79
90*
3.7
857
25
29
343
$10,000*
*Private college IxD degree cost: $170,000
12
120
3
Year in Review
Fall 2020
Graphic Design Curriculum Development Workshop
New
Acting as feeder into the IxD program, the Graphic Design program was due for a curriculum update. In collaboration with current instructors in the Graphic Design program as well as those full-time professionals working in the industry, these workshops aimed to harness the institutional and professional knowledge of those working in both academia and industry.
IxD Fall Kickoff, with IxD alumna Amanda Sanchez
New
Amanda is a designer and researcher with a special love for novel problem spaces, human-centered design, and scalable solutions backed by both qualitative and quantitative data. Most importantly, she graduated from the first IxD cohort. She talked about her professional experience working as a design researcher for CRE Digital Product Design at JP Morgan Chase.
Activision Design Challenge
New
This design challenge asked students: How can the Call of Duty companion app create social features to keep players engaged with the game and each other? More details in Industry Collaborations.
Design Club Rebrand
New
Design Club rebranded itself to appeal to a larger range of design students, not just those in the Interaction Design program. Under the leadership of Di Xu, Miguel Bryan-Juteau, and Dave Giammarco, the club hosted speakers, encouraged students to take part in weekly design challenges, and boosted a sense of community during a 100% virtual school year.
IxD Finishes Top Three, Adobe “Jam for Change”
New
Adobe invited seven different design programs to participate, both private and public. IxD seniors Sara Pope, Gaby Castro, and Porfirio Moreno earned third place! See details below.
IXD Mentorship Program
New
Last semester the IxD program launched the beta of the IxD Mentorship Program with the Senior class. Students connected with their individually assigned mentor at different touchpoints to present resumes and portfolios to get feedback and support. Mentors were designers from the companies IDEO, Hulu, Apple, Microsoft, Lyft, Riot Games, Activision, JP Morgan & Chase, and SAP.
Branding Workshop with Robyn Young
New
In this fun, interactive workshop, brand strategist and entrepreneur Robyn Young took students through a step by step process to define their personal brand and leveraging their point of view to build interest and momentum. Students learned how to:
• Connect their personal & professional experiences to find purpose
• Determine what they stand for to craft their unique point of view
• Position their brand to the right audience and problems they care about. • Create a catchy personal brand title for LinkedIn
Jennifer Morehead Wins World Usability Challenge
New
World Usability Day is an international movement sponsored by the HCI International Conference to encourage designers to the raise the standards of ‘common practice’. SMC IxD junior Jennifer Morehead won First Place for her Teachers Assistant Bot prototype that helps engage and motivate students in online classes. View her project here: worldusabilityday.org/design-challenge.
Me in a Minute Videos
New
IxD seniors were asked to describe their brand, design philosophy, and greatest project accomplishments in a 60-second video. These videos can be viewed on the IxD YouTube page as well as the Class of 2021 webpage.
Project Manager Jeff Gordon joins IxD Team
New
The SMC Center for Media & Design welcomed Jeff Gordon as the IxD Project Manager! Some of Jeff's roles include marketing the IxD program, running our Info sessions, creating new industry and educational partnerships, and overseeing the health and growth of the program.
Mentor Meet & Greet Networking Event
New
At this event, IxD seniors were given the opportunity to network with their peers’ mentors. Through three 15-minute conversations, students developed relationships and asked detailed questions about the industries that most interest them: technology, banking, entertainment, and product invention.
Spring 2021
Michael Bierut mentors Miguel Bryan Juteau
New
Awarded by Made in the Future, senior Miguel Bryan Juteau was paired with graphic design legend Michael Bierut for a year of mentorship.
1st Ever Regional IxD Infosession
New
Embracing an equity mindset, this first-ever regional IxD information session focused specifically on outreach to underserved populations and equity. This session included both counselors and students from around community colleges in southern California in programs such as Umoja/Black Collegians, Latino Center/Adelante, Puente, EOPS/CARE, CalWORKs, Veterans, Dreamer Programs, Pico Promise, Guardian Scholars, Disabled Students, and Upward Bound.
IxD Industry Partner Website Update
New
This winter, IxD students Di Xu, Irene Rivera, and Miguel Bryan Juteau updated the industry partner page. This updated website showcases the program’s history of Industry partnerships, including mini-sites from collaborations with Activision, Red Bull, Bird, and Hulu.
Spring Kickoff with Antonia Galindo from Riot Games
New
Antonia has been leading teams across cultures and continents for over twenty years at companies that include Apple, Pandora, and Riot Games. Specifically, her work focuses on Diversity & Inclusion, Learning & Development, and Mindfulness Facilitation within larger organizations. For IxD students, Antonia led a co-creative workshop that provided students with the tools to thrive personally and professionally.
Articulation Agreement with Pasadena City College
New
This new articulation agreement, the first since the launch of the IxD program, helps guide PCC students who may want to transfer classes when applying to the program.
IDEO & Beyond 12 Design Challenge
New
This design challenge asked students: How might Beyond 12 use its digital coaching platform to mobilize community college students to redesign their institutions so they are more accessible, affordable, inclusive, and relevant? See details below.
Design Challenge with NASA JPL & Begin
New
This design challenge asked students: NASA has recently identified an emergent landform—MS DOS Island. How might we design a new civilization on this island? Students worked with Ian Fenty from NASA JPL and Geoff Moore from Begin. See details below.
IxD Admissions Process Consolidation
New
In the past, the IxD admissions process included early and regular admissions deadline dates. This year, the program had a one-time deadline date of March 1. This change to a single date reinforces an equitable process for the growing number of students applying to the IxD program.
Professor Luke Johnson Presents at National CCBA
New
IxD professor Luke Johnson presented his paper Community College + Industry Collaborations: Designing Meaningful Partnerships To Identify Diverse Talent at this year’s national Community College Baccalaureate Association conference. This paper focuses on how tech can address the final hurdle of hiring students from different educational, socioeconomic, and cultural backgrounds.
IxD Career Resources Hub
New
SMC Job Development Advisor Ann-Marie Leahy and IxD teamed up to develop a Career Resources Hub beta website.
Genevieve Johnson accepts CMU MIIPS Fellowship
New
After receiving acceptances for Design for Sustainability at Savannah College of Art & Design, Design for Social Impact at Paris College of Art, and Interaction Design at Harbour.Space University, Genevieve chose to pursue a Masters of Integrated Innovation for Products & Services (MIIPS) at Carnegie Mellon University on a university-granted fellowship. She moves to Pittsburgh in August.
IxD Students earn Stanford’s Innovation Fellowship
New
Miguel Lucas, Zoe Torrealba Marin, Irene Rivera, and P.J. Rodriguez were accepted into Stanford’s d.school University Innovation Fellowship program. Fellows connect with a global student network, which has trained 2,399 students at 270 schools around the world. More importantly, they learn to examine their campus entrepreneurship ecosystems to find the best places where they can make a difference and formulate action plans to implement their ideas when they come back to Santa Monica College.
Grad Show Week
New
This year’s IxD Grad Show follows a unique format. IxD graduating seniors will present their work as part of a webinar and live Q&A (June 7, 8, 9, 10 from 7-8 PM). These presentations reflect a culmination of work produced by students during their time in the IxD program. On Friday, June 11 from 5-6 PM, the IxD program will host a Grad Show Celebration to formally honor the class of 2021.
Industry Collaborations
Adobe Creative Jam
Top 10 - Fridgee
(by Aaron Guhin, Armel Patanian)
The pandemic dramatically increased food insecurity among vulnerable communities. Loss of employment and income increased demand for charitable meal delivery, while the closure of in-person schools and daycares cut children off from a once-reliable food source. In a two-week design sprint involving teams from 10+ design schools, Adobe posed a challenge: Design a mobile phone app that empowers a specific audience to help improve part of the chain of food collection and distribution. Two SMC teams earned spots in the top 10 (among 35 designs) in this highly competitive, nationwide contest.
Activision
Call of Duty is one of the world’s most popular video games. Despite this popularity, less than 2% of players download the Call of Duty companion app. IxD seniors worked with Call of Duty’s publisher Activision to figure out, “How can the Call of Duty companion app create social features to keep players engaged with the game and each other?” Over the course of 16 weeks, students conducted research interviews, concept development, and prototypes tests to present final projects to Activision’s COD Companion App design team.
IDEO + Beyond 12
IDEO is a global design agency headquartered in Palo Alto, CA. IDEO invited senior student teams from Santa Monica College to help solve a project for their client, Beyond 12. Beyond 12 is a nonprofit based in Oakland, CA. Their mission is to dramatically increase the number of low-income, first-generation, and historically underrepresented students who graduate from college. How might Beyond 12 use its digital coaching platform to mobilize community college students to redesign their institutions so they are more accessible, affordable, inclusive, and relevant?
NASA JPL + Begin
Students in Project Management were given the monumental task: “How might we design a new civilization?” This new civilization was to take place on a fictional island, MS-Dos Island, created specifically for this class by NASA scientist Ian Fenty. The goal of this project was NOT to solve the problem, but for students to apply their evolving project management skills both creatively and strategically. Student students then presented their solutions to Ian as well as project management guru Geoff Moore (Begin) for review.
Senior Project Highlight Reel
For her capstone project, senior Ami Kubota created a reel of student work. This video captures the breadth and depth of the projects made by the class of 2021 during their time in the IxD program.
Meet the Students
Class of 2021
Cohort 4
Class of 2022
Cohort 5
Student Internships and Work
Fall 2020 - Summer 2021
IxD Team
As the Dean of Academic Affairs at Santa Monica College, Dr. Patricia Ramos assists the college by developing partnerships with business, industry, labor, NGO, and other educational institutions, in an effort to align SMC’s career technical education programs to the current and projected workforce needs of the Los Angeles region and the State of California. Her civic engagement spans over two decades. Dr. Ramos has served as an appointed official as a member of the Woman’s Commission and the L.A. County Workforce Development Board. She serves on educational and workforce committees at local, state, and national levels. Dr. Ramos holds a doctorate from the University of Southern California.
Nicole Rife Chan is invested in accessible design education as a medium for positive community impact. She serves as Faculty Lead of the Interaction Design B.S. and Graphic Design Program at Santa Monica College. Nicole held non-profit and corporate design roles involving media, print, and digital before earning her MFA in Media Design Practices at ArtCenter College of Design.
Maxim is a creative technologist and a design educator with experience in multimedia-rich Web applications, interactive installations, and generative computer graphics. He comes with a background in linguistics and audio-video design. His current work centers on new forms of media and emerging interfaces for human-computer interaction. Maxim holds an MFA in Design and Technology from Parsons School of Design in New York.
Luke Johnson is an employee engagement strategist and design educator whose portfolio includes work for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Nokia, and Riot Games. He collaborates with HR, internal comms, and executives to develop customized products to solve unique, internal problems. Luke holds an MFA in Media Design Practices from ArtCenter College of Design. He currently works as a professor in Graphic Design and Interaction Design at Santa Monica College.
Nicola Vruwink, MFA, is an artist, educator, and designer who is committed to mentoring future creatives. With an extensive background in private postsecondary education, Nicola is committed to making high-quality education more accessible and equitable. She has found her home in the California community college system. Her passion for design and design education fuels her teaching practice; currently, Nicola is full-time faculty in the Graphic Design program at Santa Monica College and maintains her own design studio Poni.
As a former community college transfer student and first-generation college graduate, Amanda Garcia is dedicated to advocating for a more equitable and inclusive learning environment that serves all students. Her primary goal as the CMD Counselor is to empower students by highlighting existing strengths, so they can feel confident entering the industry as their authentic selves. Amanda is currently pursuing a Doctorate in Educational Leadership at California Polytechnic University, Pomona.
Ann Marie came to SMC’s Career Services Center with a background in marketing project management. With several years’ experience hiring artists and designers to execute corporate visions, Ann Marie brings and shares her knowledge on how to stand out and get hired to the IxD Program Students.
Jeff Gordon comes to IxD with twenty-plus years of experience at Santa Monica College. He was a highly involved student leader at SMC before transferring to Cal State Northridge for his bachelor's degree in radio and television production. He later continued his studies at Loyola Marymount University for his master's degree in counseling. While at SMC he has served in a myriad of areas including classified staff in student services and as counseling faculty in Associated Students, Scholars, General Counseling and Transfer Services, Welcome Center, and Outreach and Recruitment. In his role as IxD project manager Jeff Gordon is focused on increasing the pool of talented applicants with students that come from a multitude of diverse backgrounds. At the center of his approach in working with IxD is a warm and welcoming environment that is inclusive and equitable for our students, faculty, and staff.
Dr. Julia G. Raz is a faculty member in the Communication and Media Studies Department at Santa Monica College. She earned a Ph.D. in communication from the University of Michigan and a B.A. in communication from UC San Diego, and her area of expertise is women in gaming culture. Dr. Raz has been teaching in higher education for the past decade. In 2017, she created the Media 4: Introduction to Video Game Studies course for SMC.
Dee Foster, an alumna of Santa Monica College's Interaction Design program, is the founder of Wheeler Dempsey Studio and Meadow co-working space. Leveraging her degree, Foster has built a career around helping others. At Wheeler Dempsey, she offers research and design services to kickstart businesses and secure funding for startups. At Meadow, she has created a work space that cultivates community and creativity. Her central mission is to foster innovation and empower individuals, providing the essential tools and guidance to bring their ideas to fruition.
Dr. Lea Hald is a professor in the Psychology Department at SMC. She has a doctorate in Psychology with a focus in Cognitive Science, a master’s degree, and a bachelor’s degree in Psychology. Her undergraduate teaching experience includes courses in research methods, statistics, cognitive science, cognitive neuroscience, and introduction to psychology. Her recent research focuses on applying embodied pedagogy to improve learning.
Alisa Olinova is a multidisciplinary designer and creative consultant. She is freelancing as an art director, graphic designer, and illustrator. She loves making things come alive through design and art. Formerly at verynice, she has held every role from Design Intern to Design Director; working with 100+ organizations, many of them nonprofits, as well as teaching and speaking about design and social impact.
Richard Schuler is a Los Angeles-based product designer focused primarily on architectural lighting. His experience also includes work in furniture and consumer products. He has also had his hand in several creative efforts, including collaborating as an illustrator on the internet’s first hypertext novel, Sunshine 69, and the comic novella Dead in Desemboque, as well as a drummer for the post-rock swamp-boogie band, King Kong. Richard holds a Masters of Industrial Design from Rhode Island School of Design.
Shannon Herbert is a writer and professor in the English Department at SMC. Her dissertation research at The University of Chicago examined the relationship between fiction and the late Twentieth-century fetish for technologically-enhanced objectivity. Both her research and teaching employ feminist and decolonial practices to center the experiences of historically marginalized communities and perspectives.
Guild Copeland is the Co-Founder of Sisu, an award-winning digital design studio based in LA. Guild handles all business development efforts and also serves as the strategic lead for Sisu’s clients, including Disney, DC Comics, American Express, Western Union, and the Grammys. He began his career in Washington, D.C., navigating the high seas of politics after graduating from Yale.
Santa Monica College alumna and adjunct faculty member, Jill DaSilva, is the CEO and Founder of the UX Design agency, Digital Karma. Jill began programming at 8 years old and has been designing digital experiences since the early 2000s. Beyond her consulting work, Jill teaches and speaks globally about User Experience Design, is a mentor for UX Designers, and is an official Adobe XD Instructor.
Sam is a graphic designer and information architect with 18 years of direct hands-on experience in graphic and mobile/web design practice. Sam has an MFA in Graphic Design from OTIS College of Art and Design and a bachelor of science in Biomedical Engineering. Crossing over to Graphic Design with a Mathematics and Engineering background has given Sam the ability to look at communication challenges from a unique perspective. Sam views graphic design as a multidisciplinary practice between “Art” and “System Engineering” plus “Linguistics” with the goal to establish a clear and universally understandable dialogue.
Ben Denzinger is a multi-disciplinary Industrial Designer dedicated to turning client dreams into successful realities. With over 17 years of design experience, he has collaborated with a diverse range of client teams, from Fortune 500 giants to spirited independent entrepreneurs. He holds a bachelor's degree in Industrial Design from Georgia Tech, a postgraduate certificate in Innovation and Entrepreneurship from the Stanford d.school, and has pursued continuing education through night courses at the Art Center College of Design. Ben is part of the MaCher USA team, based on the sunny streets of Abbot Kinney Blvd in Venice Beach, California. MaCher focuses on sustainability and making a positive impact and teams up with brands to help them shine, crafting thoughtful products and solutions that truly reflect their identities. As a certified B Corp and EcoVadis Platinum-rated company, MaCher is committed to using their business as a force for good!
Will Gamez is a multidisciplinary designer/researcher and alumni of the IXD program. Will has leveraged his learnings to construct and facilitate design thinking workshops and organize user research studies that advocate for equitable, human centered design solutions within JPMorgan Chase.
Imani Ritchards is the Director of Product Design at Snap Inc, where she leads a team of passionate and fearlessly creative designers. After earning her BA in Biology from Carleton College, Imani decided to pursue a creative career. She began her journey as a freelance illustrator and eventually returned to school to study Graphic Design and UX Design at Glendale Community College and Santa Monica College. After school, she interned on the Product Design Team at Snap Inc, and the rest is history. Outside of work, Imani loves to dance and get lost in a good book
Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins: An Emmy award-winning journalist, with decades of experience hosting news, entertainment and educational content across a multitude of media and digital platforms. Blaize-Hopkins is also the interim associate dean of the Center for Media and Design at Santa Monica College and the president of the national Society of Professional Journalists.
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