Visiting Assistant Professor of Design

Visiting Assistant Professor of Design

The Multi-disciplinary Design Division (MDD) within the College of Architecture + Planning invites applications for a two year Visiting Assistant Professor of Design. We are seeking a passionate design educator specializing in digital product and experience design.

This position will be a nine-month appointment (1.0 FTE) to begin on July 1, 2023. The two-year appointment will continue until June 30^th 2025. Upon completion of the Visiting position, the appointee may be considered for an ongoing position, subject to performance and program requirements.

Multi-disciplinary Design at the University of Utah is an exciting digital, physical and platform product design program. We are a diverse community of academics, professionals and students engaging in design to meet the needs of a rapidly changing world. Students in the program move through a series of experiences exposing them to new technologies, grounded research, craft / making, ethics, leadership skills, entrepreneurship and systems thinking. Faculty collaborate across campus and around the world, with funded projects resulting in spatial design interventions, installations, exhibitions, systems, policies, programs and scholarly outputs that address multiple scales and environmental and social issues. Collectively, we design products, experiences and the relationships around them, intelligently tackling complex social and environmental problems by creating innovative design solutions – see https://www.uofu.design/

We invite applicants interested in digital explorations in relationship to physical/spatial and/or digital platform design. All scales of design and their socio-environmental impacts will be considered. The definition of design includes all design and creative disciplines including industrial, product, fine arts, graphic, landscape, urban design, architecture and digital platforms. Regardless of the design specialization or discipline, a passion for exploring how complex systems, data sets or phenomena can be visualized and communicated is sought. Design ethics will also be central to the successful candidate’s work, for example through the application of inclusive design methods, working with diverse stakeholders to co-design solutions and / or contributing to theories of change. The visiting assistant professor will be expected to teach 2 x studios per year (of approximately 15 students each), plus 2 x seminar or lecture-based courses per year. In addition, they will deliver 1 x workshop or seminar-based course within the Department of City & Metropolitan Planning (CMP).

Required qualifications:

• a terminal degree in Design or a related field (if the terminal degree is in another field, exposure to design is expected)

Preferred qualifications include:

• previous teaching and/or mentoring experience with examples
• peer-reviewed research and/or creative work
• awards for teaching and/or design

Review of applications will begin March 15.

Qualified candidates must submit a curriculum vitae; a letter of intent addressing the candidate’s approach to teaching and relevant experience; a design portfolio (submitted as pdf via https://utah.peopleadmin.com/postings/145268 and a list of three references with phone numbers, post and e-mail addresses. (Referees will not be contacted without asking candidates’ permission beforehand.) Candidates may be asked to provide additional information during the search process.

Please address questions about the search for this position or the MDD program to Professor Nicole Porter, Chair of Multi-disciplinary Design Program by email: nicole.porter@utah.edu

THE COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE & PLANNING

The University of Utah College of Architecture + Planning (CA+P) is a community of award-winning and highly recognized set of faculty, entrepreneurial students, and supportive staff which together create a creative community unlike any other.  Structurally, the College is made up of the School of Architecture, the Department of City and Metropolitan Planning, and the Division of Multi-disciplinary Design. CA+P is also home to two research centers–the Ecological Planning Center and the Metropolitan Research Center–and two collaboratives: the Healthy and Resilient Places (HaRP) Collaboratory and the Transforming Places, Practices, and Pedagogies (TP3C) Collaborative.

CA+P enrolls approximately 575 undergraduate and 145 graduate students and employs 21 tenured track faculty and 7 career-line faculty. The College’s total budget is approximately $9,800,000.

CA+P is at the leading edge of transforming design, architectural and planning education, engaging in critical work within an ethic of care. The College functions from an understanding that the global dynamics of population growth and aging, environmental degradation, and resource inequality are calling on 21st century designers to think, work and make in new ways. As such, students, faculty, alumni, and clients are challenged to seize upon these intrinsic resources to inform the creation of purposeful, inspiring interventions that foster ecological, social, and economic resilience, and further health and well-being for all, especially those for whom design makes the greatest difference.

CA+P is guided by four commitments related to teaching, scholarship, creative work and service:

1. Responsibility: A responsibility to past, present and future generations for the sustainability of our creative expressions that reallocate natural resources
2. Resilience: A systemic understanding that polycultures and diversity nurture greater ecological and community resilience
3. Respect: A respect for the health and culture of all people and all places
4. Response: The demand to respond to the grand challenges of our time through innovative and collaborative modes of practice that demonstrate our commitment to excellence and quality

CA+P puts its values into action, leading to a record of successes that includes:

• The development of student support resources including a campus model of a Student Success Center with private consulting rooms and dedicated advisors, a digital fabrication lab, collaborative studio/lab spaces, a video/photo lab, and a café that serves as the social hub for the college as well as the adjacent College of Fine Arts.
• A recruitment and retention strategy resulting in 150% growth over seven years and one of the most diverse units on campus served by a female-majority faculty and the most diverse staff on campus.

Positioned on the East Bench of the Wasatch mountain range, the University of Utah is the flagship of the state higher education system. The location in Salt Lake City has an active design community, inspired by and responsive to the outstanding mountain desert context.

The University of Utah values candidates who have experience working in settings with students from diverse backgrounds, and possess a strong commitment to improving access to higher education for historically underrepresented students. Individuals from historically underrepresented groups, such as minorities, women, qualified persons with disabilities and protected veterans are encouraged to apply. Veterans’ preference is extended to qualified applicants, upon request and consistent with University policy and Utah state law. Upon request, reasonable accommodations in the application process will be provided to individuals with disabilities.

The University of Utah is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity employer and does not discriminate based upon race, national origin, color, religion, sex, age, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, status as a person with a disability, genetic information, or Protected Veteran status. Individuals from historically underrepresented groups, such as minorities, women, qualified persons with disabilities and protected veterans are encouraged to apply. Veterans’ preference is extended to qualified applicants, upon request and consistent with University policy and Utah state law. Upon request, reasonable accommodations in the application process will be provided to individuals with disabilities. To inquire about the University’s nondiscrimination or affirmative action policies or to request disability accommodation, please contact: Director, Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action, 201 S. Presidents Circle, Rm 135, (801) 581-8365.