Jan 30 - Slippages to Portals: A Laboratory for Practicing and Implementing Relationally
Michal Osterweil will delve deeper into the possibilities and limitations of applying the framework and principles of relationality introduced in the book Relationality: An Emergent Politics of Life Beyond the Human. Attendees will explore how to implement the five principles of relational politics (contingency, emergence, radical uncertainty, non-normativity, and heart-based epistemology) and delve into the concept of slippages to recognize how “slippages” can become portals.
About Michal Osterweil
Michal Osterweil is a co-author of “Relationality: An Emergent Politics of Life Beyond the Human” with Arturo Escobar and Kriti Sharma. Associate Professor, The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Michal Osterweil’s research focuses on contemporary social movements and their knowledge production. Her dissertation focused on the theoretical-practice and political imaginaries of the Italian “Global Justice Movement” and related transnational networks, in particular those affiliated with Zapatismo. She has also published on World and Regional Social Forums, as well as other actors active in contemporary anti-capitalist movements. She is interested in the “new political imaginary” being developed at the intersection of the Counter-Summits, World Social Forum, and Zapatista movements.
In addition to her research, Dr. Osterweil is committed to cultivating new knowledge-production practices within the university community and beyond. She has been involved with UNC’s Social Movement Working Group since its inception, as well as various research/working groups in the University Program in Cultural Studies, and is dedicated to involving her students (as well as neighbors and friends) in inter- and transdisciplinary projects aimed at solving social and political ills of our day.
Dr. Osterweil lives in Carrboro, where she is involved in various community projects, including the Carrboro Greenspace and the Carrboro Community Garden. Beyond the local area, Professor Osterweil is engaged in an Inter‐University Consortium on the Americas in Comparative and Transnational Perspective, entitled Social Movements and 21st Century Cultural‐Political Transformations. She is also a founding member and editor of Turbulence: Ideas for Movement.
Feb 27 - Designing the Worlds that We Need Right Now! Our Collective Responsibility to Create Social Change
Lesley-Ann Noel will share key ideas and frameworks from the book Design Social Change: Take Action, Work Toward Equity, and Challenge the Status Quo. Attendees will learn and discuss practical strategies to integrate social impact into their creative practice and leadership.
About Lesley-Ann Noel
Lesley-Ann Noel is Dean of Design at OCAD University in Toronto, Canada. She has a BA in Industrial Design from the Universidade Federal do Paraná, in Curitiba, Brazil. She has a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of the West Indies in Trinidad and Tobago. She earned her Ph.D. in Design from North Carolina State University in 2018.
Lesley-Ann practices design through emancipatory, critical, and anti-hegemonic lenses, focusing on equity, social justice, and the experiences of people who are often excluded from design research. Her research also highlights the work of designers outside Europe and North America as a form of decolonizing design. She also seeks to promote greater critical awareness among designers and design students by introducing essential theoretical concepts and vocabulary into the design studio, e.g., through The Designer’s Critical Alphabet.
Lesley-Ann’s research interests are emancipatory research centered around the perspectives of those who would traditionally be excluded from research, community-led research, design-based learning, and design thinking. She primarily practices in social innovation, education, futures workshops, and public health. She is co-Chair of the Pluriversal Design Special Interest Group of the Design Research Society.
Before joining OCAD University, she taught at North Carolina State University. She was the Associate Director of Design Thinking for Social Impact at Tulane University and a lecturer at Stanford University and the University of the West Indies.
Mar 27 - Everyday Emergence: Practicing Pluralism in Uncertain Times
Haley Fitzpatrick invites participants to build a pluralistic awareness of their own relational field, or how the systems, places, ideas, and multi-species communities interact and shape their daily lives. We will explore this by creating a simple experimental prototype: a personal practice that helps you interact with your relational field with intention and notice what emerges when you listen in pluralistic ways. The hope is to spark imagination around how you can strengthen trust in emergence by attending to what arises through relationship rather than planning, and to strengthen confidence in your own capacity to act in “unknown unknowns.” This session is inspired by what Hawaiian scholar Dr. Manulani Aluli Meyer (2025) describes as “mutual emergence,” as a way of living in relationality that supports collective growth and flourishing.
About Haley Fitzpatrick
Haley Fitzpatrick is an architectural designer and systemic design researcher engaged in community-based transformations toward regeneration. Before earning her PhD at The Oslo School of Architecture and Design, she worked at internationally renowned architecture firms, including Renzo Piano Building Workshop in Genoa, Italy. She is also an educator, teaching bachelor’s, master’s, and executive master’s courses in systemic design and architecture. Haley has been a guest lecturer at ETH Zurich’s Systemic Design Lab for the Designing Resilient Regenerative Systems executive master course and was a Visiting Research Fellow at the Polytechnic University of Turin’s SysLab, where she focused on methodological intersections across design disciplines. Currently, she is a Design Associate at the MonViso Institute, a Senior Advisor at COBALT (Collaborative for Bioregional Action Learning and Transformation) in Portland, Maine, and Research Initiatives Manager at the Transformations Community. Haley currently lives in Wai’anae, Hawai’i.
Apr 24 - Metacognition as a First-Responder: Design Thinking, Learning, & GenAI
Professor Rafe Steinhauer will introduce activities he uses to prompt metacognitive awareness and collective ideation for practical and ethical GenAI. Attendees will explore both how GenAI can benefit and threaten transformative learning opportunities through two design thinking methods: Journey Maps and Janusian Thinking. This Forging Fridays session also includes the latest science on transformative learning and a collective discussion about ways to leverage design mindsets to enhance learning in the era of AI.
About Rafe Steinhauer
Professor Steinhauer is an education-focused designer whose work explores how design methods, particularly design thinking and human-centered design, can transform learning environments. His research examines how these approaches can improve curriculum and instruction and drive meaningful change at the school and system levels. He holds a BSE in Operations Research and Financial Engineering from Princeton University and dual MBA/MEd degrees in Innovation in Education Reform from the University of Virginia. Professor Steinhauer’s contributions to teaching and educational innovation have been recognized through numerous honors, including Dartmouth’s Apgar Award for Innovation in Teaching (2025) and Princeton’s Commendation for Outstanding Teaching (2018). He is an active member of the American Society for Engineering Education and the Future of Design in Higher Education. His recent publications, including Emotional Intelligence in Design Education (2020) and Centering Mindfulness in Design Education (2019), reflect his commitment to integrating reflective practice, empathy, and design-driven problem solving into higher education.
May 29 - Design Process Mindsets: Switching Neural Networks for Social Impact and Participatory Design
Professor Wayne Li takes you through how to identify when and what mindsets to use in your design thinking process. What are the mindsets and design behaviors that produce the most meaningful and transformative outcomes for designers, practitioners, and learners? Professor Li builds upon the teachings of his recent publication, Design Empathy and Contextual Awareness: Frames of Reference for the 21st Century Creative, in this session. By being cognizant of and switching between the mindsets you use when designing in relationship, you can more fully leverage collective social impact.
About Wayne Li
Wayne K. Li is the James L. Oliver Professor, holding a joint position between the Colleges of Design and Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. He leads joint teaching initiatives and advances interdisciplinary collaboration between mechanical engineering and industrial design through classes, the Innovation and Design Collaborative (IDC), and the Design Bloc.
Li’s research areas include ethnographic research, multidisciplinary online education, and human-machine interaction in transportation design. His career spans industry and academia. Li has led innovation and market expansion for Pottery Barn seasonal home products, taught in Stanford University’s design program, led interface development at Volkswagen of America’s Electronics Research Laboratory, and developed corporate brand and vehicle differentiation strategies at Ford Motor Company. He has also worked as a product designer and mechanical engineer at IDEO Product Development.
Li holds a Master of Science in Engineering from Stanford University and undergraduate degrees in Fine Arts in Design and Mechanical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. He has additional continuing education in Industrial/Transportation Design from the College for Creative Studies. Li has been in his current role at Georgia Tech since Fall 2010, while also serving as a principal design consultant at Wayne Li Design since then.