NEIA HCD Education

Project overview

I developed and taught a multidisciplinary Innovation Studio at NEIA, where students learned UX fundamentals including user research, interviews, prototyping, and iterative testing. The program culminated in a capstone project where teams designed, developed, and publicly launched their own products at a school-wide sales event called the Gala.

NEIA Site

tools

Notion
Miro

role

UX Research
Design Education

Timeline

1 - 2 Years

Team

Designer: Nicholas Tamas
IS Teacher: Francisco Mireles
Head of Branding: John Turner

challenges

Designing a curriculum accessible to students across grades 6–12 with varying skill levels and learning accommodations.
Introducing complex subjects like design, engineering, and entrepreneurship to students with no prior exposure.

Designing a curriculum accessible to students across grades 6–12 with varying skill levels and learning accommodations.
Introducing complex subjects like design, engineering, and entrepreneurship to students with no prior exposure.

Me instructing a student on the proper use of an x-acto knife.

Goals

Create an inclusive curriculum that engages students from grades 6–12 with diverse learning needs and backgrounds.
Align learning experiences with a competency-based education model and encourage cross-subject collaboration.

Introduce foundational concepts in design, engineering, and entrepreneurship in an accessible and engaging way.
Foster hands-on making and real-world problem solving as core components of the learning process.

a multi-disciplinary design studio that teaches responsible innovation and entrepreneurship

impact

First graduating class of seniors following the second iteration of the Innovation Studio curriculum during the spring of 2024.

The program contributed strongly to increasing the student retention and application rate.
In Fall 2023, the Innovation Studio and NIEA passed NEASC accreditation, the first program of its kind to do so.

program development

Design program competitive analysis

The Innovation Studio adapted college-level design principles from the IDM program into projects that were accessible and engaging for middle and high school students.

MIT’s IDM program.

student design process

HCD Process

Students were taught a Human-Centered Design process—based on Agile development—that emphasized iterative ideation, prototyping, and user testing before final implementation.

dFV Framework

Students used the DFV framework—Desirability, Feasibility, and Viability—to assess their designs, refine ideas, and decide which concepts to move forward with during early project phases.

Me, John Turner, and Devin Worthington interviewing a parent.

User interviews

After each project, student reflections and interviews—along with feedback from teachers and parents—were used to improve and iterate on the program.

Curriculum annual themes

Each grade worked within a year-long theme that guided all of their projects, culminating in the design of a product or service to be sold at NEIA’s end-of-year Sales Gala.

list of all of the curriculum themes

program implimentation

student prototyping

Students would learn a variety of skills in the Innovation Studio depending on the theme of their given year. Some of the skills include digital and physical prototyping, CAD, coding, wood working, and much more.

Students giving an express presentation on their designs.

Students cardboard prototyping a design.

Students creating a library redesign for VR in CAD.

Student working in the school’s woodshop.

Students prototyping an electronic piano design using cardboard and PCB’s.

Students working on a kitchen utensil design for the Gala.

Student opportunity identification & research

Students went on field trips to identify design opportunities, study market trends, analyze competitors, and connect with potential users for their end-of-year projects.

A student doing farmwork in order to identify pain points in farming manual labor.

A group of students touring a kitchen specialty store in order to perform a competitive analysis.

NEIA Sales Gala

At the end of the year, students sell their team-designed products at NEIA’s Sales Gala, where they manage design, pricing, and budgeting to try to turn a profit. They keep all profits and IP, and some have even turned their projects into real businesses after the event.

Overview of NEIA’s Sales Gala.

Students setting up their booth for their lighting design.

Students discussing their lighting design for a modular light.

The design of the invitation distributed to the public for the Sales Gala.

Students standing in front of their booth for their product “Pop Soap.”

reflection

A major challenge was making the curriculum accessible to students entering at any grade, which limited the ability to build on design principles year over year. Returning students often had to repeat foundational content to accommodate new classmates, which slowed overall progression. To improve this, I would implement a foundations course for incoming 6th and 9th graders, enabling returning students to move into more advanced, theme-aligned design work or more specific course electives.

case studies

playground

contact

contents

NEIA HCD education

A human centered design approach to teaching design, engineering, and entrepreneurship to grade school students.