Undergraduate Courses 2021-22

Undergraduate courses marked with [EXP] may adopt the approach of experiential learning subject to different offerings. Students should check the delivery mode of the class section before registration.

• ISDN 1002

  Redefining Problems for the Real Needs

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  Design Research is an introduction of research methodology and methods used for exploring problems as well as identifying opportunities for design initiatives. It guides designers how to unravel needs and problems in the real world before inventing. This course introduces students various design research principles, methods and ethics for investigating people and their world. It is a learning-by-doing course in which students, work in groups, learn the principles in class and apply them in the field. The course sets out several challenges in local context. After conducting both contextual research and user research, students are guided to seek insights and identify opportunities for technological innovation aiming to solve the identified problems. Overall, students explore the real world in a lively yet methodical way.
• ISDN 1004

  Sketching

  1 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course focuses on developing the skills to generate, visualize and define design concepts in 2-D and 3D in both paper and digital formats. Topics covered include freehand sketching on paper, freehand sketching on mobile devices, illustrating the basics of perspective and orthogonal drawing, storyboarding, and visual communication. Students will develop skills in sketching both organic as well as geometric forms.
• ISDN 1006

  Human-centered Innovation

  3 Credit(s)
  Corequisite(s)

  ISDN 1002

  Mode of Delivery

  [EXP] Experiential learning

  Description

  A project-based, experiential course that exposes students to practice the five modules in design thinking - “Empathize”, “Define”, “Ideate”, “Prototype” and ‘Test”. The unmet needs will be identified by observing the daily routine of real services and people. Research on existing solutions and how to conduct the stakeholder and market analyses will be taught for designing the needs screening matrix in needs selection. Students are going to unlock their creativity potentials through the in-class activities.The new ideas of addressing the unmet needs are generated in which the ideas are grouped ad organized into a concept map. To translate a promising concept from an idea into a rudimentary design, the concept exploration is facilitated by prototyping. The prototypes are tested by the potential users. This course aims to develop students’ communication, interpersonal, analytical, design and project management skills.
• ISDN 1100

  Experiencing Design

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course aims to cultivate students’ appreciation of design and sense of aesthetic sensibility. This raises students’ awareness of design to the visuals and beauty of surroundings and equally important, solving everyday problems in an aesthetic way. Furthermore, the course familiarizes students with design language, which enables them to discuss design and exchange their viewpoints. The course covers design fields from city planning, architecture, lighting, cars, consumer products, to information, services and interaction design. Different design stories from different parts of the world are unfolded wherein the need, cultural and environmental specificity of the design in different societies and at different times are explained. Each week, a special topic is addressed, for example, form follows function, design and technology, color theory and so on.
• ISDN 2000

  What is Design and Why Design?

  3 Credit(s)
  Previous Course Code(s)

  ISDN 1000

  Description

  This course introduces what design is and why it is valued. Students understand fundamental design principles and methods, and experience creative design process through project-based learning. After grasping the fundamental design theories and principles, the design process begins from defining real-world problems through to initiating changes to society. This unique process has been studied as “design science”, which refers to the design approach of exploring and developing new ideas as well as scientific approach of proving and demonstrating innovations. The two merges into a rational yet inventive designerly way of thinking and doing. This is the creative process that students are guided to undergo phase by phase. As a result, students are able to develop and justify good designs. By adding design perspective, technological development likely results in useful innovations meeting real-world problems. Students with particular prior learning experience will enhance their understanding in this course.
• ISDN 2001

  Second Year Design Project I

  1 Credit(s)
  Prerequisite(s)

  ISDN 1002

  Corequisite(s)

  ISDN 1004 AND ISDN 1006 AND ISDN 2300

  Description

  This course is the first part of a one-year project course offered to second year students. The project requires application of technology and design to develop innovative solutions to a challenging problem. Each student is assigned a component of a large project, which is sponsored by industry. Project planning. Distribution of tasks among the team members. Identification of the problem through interactions with the staff of the sponsored company. Ideation. Design concept generation. Selection of ideas. Prototyping. Testing and redesigning. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 2002

  Second Year Design Project II

  4 Credit(s)
  Prerequisite(s)

  ISDN 2001

  Corequisite(s)

  ISDN 2400

  Description

  This course is the second part of a one-year project course offered to second year students. The project requires application and integration of technology and design to develop innovative solutions to a challenging problem. Each student is assigned a component of a large project, which is sponsored by industry. The focus of this course is testing and redesigning of the design concept created in 2001. The process is repeated until a final design emerges. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 2100

  Storytelling in Design

  1 Credit(s)
  Description

  The fundamentals of storytelling are about describing, telling or writing stories and it is also a useful design tool to enhance design and product development. As a communication tool, it conveys ideas and meanings of new products and services. As a creative tool, it is used for brainstorming that helps imagination and visualization of what could be, which supports exploration of ideas. In user research, sequences of pictures describing possible scenarios illustrate how service design could work and probe into user needs as well. Last, it can be used as a brand strategy to build corporate identity and loyalty by connecting business goals and user needs through storytelling. This course introduces storytelling in a systematic way by explaining elements and structure of stories, additionally storytelling methods of how to create logical arrangement. It aims at enabling students to master skills of storytelling to improve communication and enhance design process. Graded DI/PA/F.
• ISDN 2200

  Systems Thinking and Design

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course in Systems Thinking aims to gain students systemic understanding when tackling global challenges in the real world. For example, as widely understood that climate change is more than merely a technological problem. Rather, it is systemic problem underlying aspects of people, technology and environment that are all interconnected in the entire environment. With emphasis on systems, it is important to broaden students' perspective from merely viewing problems in isolation but in relationship with its surroundings. This course stresses on attaining a systemic perspective when approaching technological design in integrative systems. The course introduces studies of systems thinking to aid students systemic understanding. In the course, students are given specific assignment, such as intelligent mobility or waste management systems, and work in groups. At the beginning, they define the systems and analyze specific issues underlying in the systems. Afterwards, they suggest, justify and evaluate their solutions in systemic context.
• ISDN 2300

  Introduction to 3D Design

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course will provide the theoretical principles and real-life examples of a wide variety of digital design technology. The course includes using computer-aided techniques to convert sketches into digital 3D models, animate static 3D models into computer animation, and finally render the 3D models to become the final product image or video. The course also describes how the 3D models and renderings are being used in Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality. Topics covered will include Photogrammetry, Fundamentals of 3D Modeling, NURBS, Principles of Traditional Animation, Computer Animation, 3D Rendering, Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality. Instructor’s approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 2400

  Physical Prototyping

  3 Credit(s)
  Prerequisite(s)

  ISDN 2300

  Description

  The aim of this course is to take design concepts to reality. Students will convert their concepts that were created using sketches or 3D design software to tangible prototypes. Quick prototyping using various materials will provide hands-on experience. The course will also provide knowledge on various 3D prototyping technologies so that students can explore the most suitable means to generate functional and aesthetically pleasing prototypes. Hands-on experience with assembly to generate complete prototypes will be emphasized.
• ISDN 2500

  Introduction to Systems Design Engineering

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  A project-based course that introduces the core concepts in Systems Design Engineering. A system is a purposeful set of interrelated components that form an integrated whole and work together to achieve some objective. The course aims to better prepare future design engineers, as they will be challenged with different multidisciplinary systems in the future. Topics covered in this course include multidisciplinary system design, the design process (problem definition, life-cycle design, design specification, concept/design generation and evaluation, design for manufacturing and assembly), system modeling and analysis, mechanical design and prototyping, ergonomics & human factors through industrial design, user experience & usability testing, design documentation and communications. Instructor's approval is required.
• ISDN 3001

  Third Year Design Project I

  4 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course is the first part of a one-year project course offered to third year students. Each student is assigned a component of a large project, which is sponsored by industry. The project is expected to be of increased technical complexity compared with the second year project. Project planning. Distribution of tasks among the team members. Identification of the problem through interactions with the staff of the sponsored company. Ideation. Design concept generation. Selection of ideas. Prototyping. Testing and redesigning. In addition, students have to consider sustainability, manufacturability, and marketability of the proposed product solutions, which have to fulfill needs of the client under a budgetary constraint. Students are expected to spend less time on planning and idea generation as they have already gained these experiences in the second year but more time on prototyping and testing, as this project requires application and integration of more advance technologies and design. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 3002

  Third Year Design Project II

  4 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course is the second part of the third-year project course offered to third year students. The focus of this course is testing and redesigning of the design concept generated in 3001. The process is repeated until a final design emerges. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 3100

  Design for Sustainability

  2 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course takes students a walk-through of different concepts of design for sustainability to study the evolutionary concepts, objectives, approaches and outcomes (societal, environmental and economical multiple impacts). To achieve experiential learning, students select ‘product type’ and work in groups to present its evolution by analyzing its concepts, objectives, approaches and outcome/impact, with focus on ‘technological influence’. For example, lighting (from gas to LED to smart lighting system) or cars (from petrol-powered car to bio-fuel/electric car to smart mobile systems). In addition, students suggest a better design for sustainability solutions of what could be done towards sustainable futures.
• ISDN 3200

  Graphic Communication

  2 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course aims to get the students acquainted with a number of basic components used to build a coherent and meaningful graphic project/entity, which are central to understanding visual communication on fundamental level. This is done through series of lectures and related assignments where these are broken down and applied with special purposes. Necessary technical requirements for digital and physical/material application are covered at the start, after which main design tools (image and text) are analyzed along with basic visual design rules and guidelines (unity, hierarchy, balance, contrast, etc.) followed by addressing elements to build a fundamental graphic narrative (color, reduced visuals, full visuals, infographics), concluded by application of aforementioned items across different media: Deliverables ‐ Poster, Booklet, Digital Presentation, with consistency in translation of semiotic values and with showcasing basic visual literacy in execution of each as a final requirement.
• ISDN 3300

  Interaction Design

  2 Credit(s)
  Description

  Interaction Design is a design practice to enhance the interaction between users and design solution. This course stresses user interaction with technology-based products, services or systems. It also studies the broader interaction design beyond merely interaction between users with computer platform that Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) focuses. Students will be introduced several forms of interaction design and their core design principles and tools improving user interaction. They include, Interaction Design (IxD) studying how to form a structure for users to act and react to the products, services or systems; User Experience Design (UX) exploring how to enhance a positive feeling for users while interacting with the products, services or systems; User Interface Design (UI) enhancing the positive experience through better design of the interface elements in the structure. For example, navigational components and screen layout on apps and websites, buttons and ergonomics on products, such as digital wearables. May be repeated for credits.
• ISDN 3350

  Global Product Development

  3 Credit(s)
  Previous Course Code(s)

  ISDN 4350, ENTR 4000A

  Alternate code(s)

  ENTR 3350

  Description

  Joint lecture and project-based course on global product development through a global and interdisciplinary team approach among three institutions in Beijing, Hong Kong and Seoul. This course requires students to go out into global society and industry companies beyond (China, Hong Kong, Korea) for seeking and defining a global user-centered design problem by themselves, to develop the engineering design alternative to solve it, and then to build a working critical function prototype. Students will collaborate through online tools as well as 3 face-to-face meetings throughout the semester in the three respective campuses. This course provides various lectures such as marketing, industrial design, patent law, creative thinking, conceptual design methodology, and case studies in problem ideation. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 3360

  From Product Innovations to Successful Technology Startups

  3 Credit(s)
  Alternate code(s)

  ENTR 3360

  Description

  This course is intended for students who want to seriously pursue technology startups. Students will be guided to identify critical steps and important milestones associated with each step in order to build a technology startup. The course requires students to take an existing project idea with early conceptual design and prototype, and bring it to the next level of project realization. Lecture topics include market research, industrial design, patent law, supply chain management and business model development. Cross-college faculty and external experts will provide individual and team mentoring for student projects. Company visits, field trips, trade shows and interactions with experienced entrepreneurs will be arranged. Students with good performance in this course are recommended to different funding and incubation opportunities. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 4000

  Special Topics

  1-4 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course will cover the selected topics related to system engineering, robotics, smart city, biomedical applications and/or design thinking. It may be repeated for credits if different topics are taken. May be graded letter grades or DI/PA/F subject to different offerings.
• ISDN 4001

  Final Year Design Project I

  5 Credit(s)
  Description

  This course is the first part of the final year project course. Students will continue to expand their skills in technical and design elements as well as knowledge about marketability, sustainability and manufacturability of their product solutions via this project. Students will be assigned into a team and they will define their own project. They will formulate a project proposal to demonstrate project feasibility from a technical and business perspective and seek approval through a proposed project presentation. Students will be given resource and time constraints to complete project milestones under the supervision of a faculty advisor. Regular project meetings will be held to track progress. Each student in a group will be responsible to lead one key element for a successful outcome. A first semester final presentation will update faculty advisors, other ISD faculty and mentors on the project progress and future development plans. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 4002

  Final Year Design Project II

  5 Credit(s)
  Prerequisite(s)

  ISDN 4001

  Description

  This course is the second part of the final year project course, which continues the project based learning training from the first semester. Students will continue their project and come to a conclusion achieving the project milestones or coming up with the final product prototype by the end of the semester. A final project presentation covers the overall project achievements to the faculty advisor, other ISD faculty members and mentors. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 4200

  Product Management

  3 Credit(s)
  Description

  A product manager can be considered the CEO of a product line. Interdisciplinary skills are required to deal with the design, technical and business aspects to make the product successful in the marketplace. In this course, students are introduced to various responsibilities of a product manager and clear examples are used to illustrate how product managers interface with cross functional team members to make decisions, assess markets and financials, develop strategies and product roadmaps, and seek customer input. The course aims to get students ready for a position as a product manager. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 4300

  Materials Selection in Product Design

  3 Credit(s)
  Exclusion(s)

  IEDA 3150

  Description

  This course covers the role of materials and processes in product design. Topics include shape, joint and surfaces; materials selection including metals, ceramics, polymers and composites; use of data sources; material indices; generation and use of material selection charts; materials and sustainability; new materials.
• ISDN 4320

  Design Thinking

  3 Credit(s)
  Previous Course Code(s)

  IEDA 4320, IELM 4320

  Mode of Delivery

  [EXP] Experiential learning

  Description

  This course introduces important aspects of modern day "product" design integrating technology, art, business and innovation. The course will focus on how to elicit needs of customers, structure problems, create ideas, evaluate alternatives and then construct aesthetically pleasing and functional prototypes. Emphasis will be on creating concepts and taking them through uncertainties to achieve realistic and working prototypes. Instructor's approval is required for enrollment in the course.
• ISDN 4330

  Ergonomics in Design

  2 Credit(s)
  Description

  Many of the products marketed today have the word "ergonomic" attached to them. How ergonomic are they? The course is designed to provide a basic understanding of ergonomics in design through the introduction of human anatomy, anthropometry, and modeling techniques with the aim of improving safety, productivity, comfort and health of people.
• ISDN 4900

  Independent Study

  1-3 Credit(s)
  Description

  Independent studies or projects under the directed guidance of a faculty member on an integrative systems and design topic. A written report, presentation, and/or an examination are required. Enrollment in the course requires prior approval of the course instructor, and credits assigned depend on the workload. May be repeated for credits. Graded by letter or P/F subject to different offerings. May be graded PP.