About EDS

Education DesignShop is a two-day workshop in which you learn to use design thinking by designing for a systemic change in education.

Design Thinking

Design thinking is a human - centered approach to innovation that draws from a designer's toolkit. Simply put, it is a set of steps to help generate innovative solutions to problems. It is skewed towards actions, tangible representations, and iterative improvement.

For more information on design thinking, check out our invaluably informative FAQ.

Interdisciplinary Teams

Education DesignShop is interdisciplinary by design: it is bringing together policy makers, educators, students, and designers in an attempt to generate ideas taking into account many different viewpoints. While policy makers may have insights into affecting the status quo, students and educators are in daily contact with the educational reality, and designers are experts on the process of iterative innovation. Collaboration is never easy, but diverse team have the potential to generate greater insights and better solutions.

Working on Real World Challenges

Unlike in some workshops, we will actually work together to solve real challenges from the very beginning. Why waste valuable time learning the process on a trivial dumbed-down problems? Let's crash and burn together. We crowdsourced the problem focus areas from teachers, students, and education scholars, and our design briefs (link to the topics page) will help you to dive deep fast!

Exquisite Workshops

Education DesignShop uses just-in-time instructive workshop to give you the exactly the skills you need when you need them. It's the pinnacle of modern professional development. No hours long lectures that make you dreary with ennui. We'll just quickly show you how to use the parachute and we'll jump - all together. Moreover, we will have mentors and users on-site so that we can test our ideas quickly and iterate towards better solutions!

Awesome Prizes

You and your team can win incredible and utmost practical prizes. Many design thinking workshop end up being dead ends as far as the projects go. Education DesignShop is different. The teams with projects that generate greatest interest will be directly supported in furthering their efforts! There's audience prize, mentor's prize, and sponsor's prize.

  1. Free consultation sessions with IDEO
  2. Strategic advising and support from key education policymaker
  3. Reimbursable stipend up to $1,000 for project development

About Us

We're just some untraditional souls trying to bring positive change to the education system.



Jessica Artiles

The head and the heart of the Education Designshop. Jess is a community engagement veteran who has spearheaded half a dozen events with hundreds of participants before coming up with the wholesome grail of workshops: the Education DesignShop. She researches how design thinking can be taught to non-designers in order to innovate in large systems, and she's excited to make history with you all! Her international experience with SPEED (the Student Platform for Engineering Education Development) has enabled her to try out design thinking methods with engineers from across the globe, and she's committed to spreading the love for "design with a small d" to continue to impact education. Jess is such an MIT kid - in a good way. By the time she finishes grad school, she will have gained degrees in Mechanical Engineering (both a Bachelor's and Master's) and in Technology and Policy. All around proud of her Cuban heritage, Jess is an accomplished salsa dancer with about two plethoras of friends. Her amicability will blow your head off.

Filip Goc

A Learning Interaction Designer freelancing in the greater Boston area, Filip directly applies his love for late night philosophizing when tweaking the subtleties of the DesignShop. His attention to design thinking processes, visuals, and fine espresso gives the DesignShop a unique perspective that only UVa and HGSE grad can combine. A Czech native with love for the Czech language and tongue twisters. An aspiring (perspiring) swing dancer and a recreational printmaker. When he's not facilitating curriculum re-design, you can find him on a silver bicycle running across the whole city while wishing he was somewhere in the mountains.

Prof. David Wallace

An inspiration to most, and an honest critic throughout, just one class with David will re-ignite your passion for education. Professor Wallace embodies what every good educator should: a love for education, and a ruthless knack for improvement. Professor Wallace teaches many levels of Product Design within the Mechanical Engineering Department at MIT and serves the unordinary role as Jessica's Research Advisor, thus sparking the exploration into the integration of design thinking and education.

Advisors Near and Far

This event wouldn't be possible without the invaluable input from big thinkers that dared to entertain the idea of the DesignShop. Some of these folks include, in no particular order: Karen Brennan, Michelle Chung, Bill Wisser, Edward Clapp, Jim Bales, Jennifer DeBoer, Darshita Shah, Sanjay Sarma, Emily Martin, and all of our excellent mentors that have committed their time to the event. On behalf of tomorrow's generation of students, Thank You.