Opinion, Belief, and Knowledge: On the Realities of Interior Design Graduate Education Today and Challenges for Tomorrow

Opinion: a judgment or assessment thought out but open to dispute Belief: a state of mind about a phenomenon based on trust or faith Knowledge: information or understanding of facts gained through study, investigation, observation, or experience Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (2005) Those who know me have likely witnessed that I am a person with strong opinions. Through my personal lens of experience and study, I have opinions which I am rarely hesitant to share. It is my concern and my opinion that graduate education in interior design is in jeopardy because it is not sufficiently valued by the profession or university administration. It is also my opinion that we as design educators have not served graduate education well. The lack of coherence, collaboration, productivity, or visibility of North America’s many graduate programs in interior design have too often caused the outside observer to ask, with no small amount incredulity, ‘‘What does one do with a graduate degree in interior design?’’ Or, even worse, ‘‘Really? You can get a master’s degree and Ph.D. in Interior Design?’’ About the undergraduate programs, my all time favorite: ‘‘It takes four years?’’ (Emphasis in the originals). Such exclamations are not confined to any component of the ignorant masses that may never have thought about or employed a licensed designer. It was not long ago that I ran into a former client, who is a highly successful Harvard lawyer, who was stunned and asked those very questions when I told him about my career taking an academic turn, a pathway requiring multiple advanced degrees. This, from a client for whom I designed three progressively larger offices over several years as he and his colleagues moved up the ladder of success. During our many years of association, I had clearly failed to educate him about the value and reality of his designed work environment. I now believe he thought I just had good taste and necessary connections with the furniture industry. Sadly, I believe this perception is not uncommon. Even more disconcerting was my own university’s (president, provost, and dean’s) recent decision to eliminate our fledgling doctoral program in design (without consulting any of the students or faculty). It is my opinion that such a decision and action was made because even they did not understand the value of design and the need for research that informs design decisions. It is not difficult to understand how they arrived at this misinformed opinion: low dollar volume in grants, research, and publication when compared to the typical productivity in the ‘‘hard sciences.’’ Severe budget cuts at the state level have made it increasingly difficult for public universities to adequately support or even maintain programs such as interior design that do not typically secure external funding. It is a simple equation: Low revenue stream +lack of understanding of the discipline =high probability of elimination.