Poggio Participates in Winterhouse Symposium on Design Education and Social Change

In August 2012, Natacha Poggio, assistant professor of visual communication design at the Hartford Art School, participated in the Winterhouse Third Symposium on Design Education and Social Change —an invitation-only gathering of educators to explore the teaching and practice of social innovation design in undergraduate and graduate design education.

The initiative, which was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, recently released its final report.

The symposium took place during a three-day retreat where leading educators from the most prestigious institutions throughout the United States (including the School of Visual Arts, Parsons, Pratt Institute, Art Center College of Design, Art Institute of Chicago, Stanford University, and California College of the Arts) gathered to discuss the intersection of design and social change, and how this new paradigm could effect solutions to social problems within the teaching and practice of design.

Poggio's participation in Winterhouse has been a key factor to further promote the work that her Design Global Change initiative has been doing to create a positive impact on local and global communities. In this course, Hartford Art School undergraduate students have been actively engaged in projects that other institutions reserve almost exclusively for their master's programs.

Currently, Design Global Change students are working on a mural for Weaver High School in partnership with the CT Center for Nonviolence. The mural presents Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s first Principle of Nonviolence: "Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people." This new mural will be unveiled during Dr. King's holiday celebrations on Jan. 19, 2013.