Students to design their own 'future-ready' courses at DIDI

The debate of whether humans will face job redundancies due to the rapid adaptation of artificial intelligence and robotics has been ongoing for the past few years.

A new non-profit education institute in Dubai seems to have an answer to these concerns. The Dubai Institute of Design and Innovation (DIDI) is offering programmes that will prepare students for futuristic jobs that will be available to humans, such as augmented reality designer, chief drone experience designer, internet of things conductor and chief design officer.

Students will be given the freedom to design their own degree by choosing a cross-disciplinary education from a choice of four concentrations, including product design, strategic design management, multimedia design and fashion design, working across two disciplines the entirety of their educational journey.

The curriculum has been crafted in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Parsons School of Design.

"Today if you graduate from an engineering school, you might do coding for an app or you might be able to do interface if you graduate from graphic design school. But, you won't be able to understand the user experience part of it because that requires human factors," said Hani Asfour, the associate dean of DIDI, 

"If students were to study multimedia and product design today, they'll immediately be able to work on designing apps. They'll have a sense of how products are designed and a very good sense of how the screen interface should be, while understanding how to make the shell of it. So, the students have a wider aspect of knowledge. This will help with working for companies that are looking for hybrid talents." 

"What we teach students is how we humanise technology, how do we humanise artificial intelligence and how we humanise self-driving cars and build experiences around them." 

DIDI will also help students broaden their minds when it comes to fashion designing. "There are super interesting things that are being woven into textiles, like electronics and jackets, where you can use them to answer your phone," said Sass Brown, the founding dean of DIDI.

"If I take fashion as one of the four concentrations that we offer, fashion is not just designing clothing - it's about wearable technologies, growing textiles in a lab and responsible clothing. Combine that with multimedia design - now you've got the digital space and fashion."

The institute is currently accepting students and will begin courses from September. The tuition at DIDI is Dh98,000 per year and offers four-year-long degree programmes.