AN INTEGRATED APPROACH TO DEVELOPING HIGHER GRADUATE SKILLS IN DESIGN EDUCATION

This paper highlights some of the current discussions surrounding the appropriate development of design education in the UK. In particular it draws attention to the increasing calls from both industry speakers and UK Government Departments for graduates to possess a broad range of transferable skills which go beyond their traditional subject boundaries. Such discussions are further fuelling the blurring of career paths for design graduates in a market place where commercial awareness, business ‘savvy’ and flexibility are increasingly demanded from graduate employers. In alignment with these national debates, the paper will consider the approach taken by Liverpool John Moores University in addressing calls for higher graduate skills via the introduction of its World or Work (WoW) skills initiative and how the initiative may be meaningfully delivered at a programme level