GiveMe Shelter: a people-centred design process for promoting independent inquiry-led learning in engineering

It has become increasingly common for tasks traditionally carried out by engineers to be undertaken by technicians and technologist with access to sophisticated computers and software that can often perform complex calculations that were previously the responsibility of engineers. Not surprisingly, this development raises serious questions about the future role of engineers and the education needed to address these changes in technology as well as emerging priorities from societal to environmental challenges. In response to these challenges, a new design module was created for undergraduate engineering students to design and build temporary shelters for a wide variety of end users from refugees, to the homeless and children. Even though the module provided guidance on principles of design thinking and methods for observing users needs through field studies, the students found it difficult to respond to needs of specific end users but instead focused more on purely technical issues.

The thinking doctor: clinical decision making in contemporary medicine

Diagnostic errors are responsible for a significant number of adverse events. Logical reasoning and good decision-making skills are key factors in reducing such errors, but little emphasis has traditionally been placed on how these thought processes occur, and how errors could be minimised. In this article, we explore key cognitive ideas that underpin clinical decision making and suggest that by employing some simple strategies, physicians might be better able to understand how they make decisions and how the process might be optimised.