Educating:
Parsons: Thesis


I have taught and coordinated the BFA Communication Design thesis many times over the last decade. The course synthesizes the previous three years of learning into a self-driven project or series of projects that demonstrates the students’ individual critical thinking and design skills.



In 2011, there was no connection between the 8–10 sections, some were media-specific, and in many sections, students would just meet with their faculty for ten to fifteen minutes once a week, alone. Together with both full-time and part-time faculty, I created shared structures to transition the course from its 1:1 and 1:15 routines to include both small groups and large-group activites that command the energy of the 100+ students in each cohort.  

We aligned the course times, created a system for manually placing students into course sections, instituted an all-cohort thesis fair for students to share work with each other, and redirected the exhibition budget towards a printed and virtual catalogue.



In the last few years, we added shared workshops on writing and intellectual property, lectures with practicing designers, a coordinated critique with 45+ external critics, and external lectures in weeks 12–15 addressing the job market, money, etiquette, and print production.  

Collaborators: Matt Barnes, Luke Bulman, Paul Carlos, Ingrid Chou, Dinah Fried, Pascal Glissmann, Tom Griffiths, Geoff Han, Allen Hori, E Roon Kang, Lynn Kiang, Hoon Kim, Jieun Kim, Caspar Lam, Andrew LeClair, Prin Limphongpand, Joe Marianek, YuJune Park, Damien Saatdjian, Sam Sherman, Lucille Tenazas, Kelly Walters, Dave Yun

Virtual catalogue ︎︎︎
Thesis 1 course template ︎︎︎
Thesis 2 course template ︎︎︎
Mark