• What are the difficulties students face during multidisciplinary co-creation processes?
• What are the essentials of efficient and effective multidisciplinary co-creation processes?

In the scope of T-Crepe project, answers to these questions were presented online at the 6th International Conference for Design Education Researchers, Learn x Design 2021, on 24–26 September 2021 the design.nexus (design education and industry pillars) research team, who is involved in T-Crepe. The paper entitled “Challenges in multidisciplinary student collaboration: Reflections on student peer assessments in design education” is now published in the conference proceedings:

https://dl.designresearchsociety.org/.../researchpapers/9/

Abstract:

This paper reports on a study currently conducted in the scope of an Erasmus+ KA2 project on the subject of co-creation in design education. A case study was carried out on a third-year bachelor design engineering course (“Co-creation”) at which 48 students from different study disciplines, levels and countries worked together in groups to tackle societal challenges. This research aims to gain insights into students’ experiences and problems with regard to taking part in a multidisciplinary co-creation process by scrutinising student’s self-and peer-assessment reports. Findings refer to the essentials and challenges of multidisciplinary co-creation processes from a student perspective. In particular, soft skills were highlighted as fundamental skills while working with peers. Moreover, challenges in collaboration, specifically, in a remote learning environment during the COVID-19 pandemic, were noted. Recommendations were provided for design educators to ameliorate the multidisciplinary co-creation and learning environment in order to sufficiently prepare students for Industry 4.0.