to various practical bodies of knowledge and experts, whether pedagogical or prac- tical, specialist or layman. Both at design time, when the system itselfis being developed, and at use time, when user- designers continue the meta-design project, there is an understanding that social creativity emerges when partici- pants teach and instruct one other. As Elisa Giaccardi explains: Keeping the system open to participation and evolution at use time is meant to join social and technical systems, not only to make them optimized and efficient, but also to let new conditions, interactions and rela- tionships emerge. In this way —by sustain- ing emergence and evolution—new forms of sociability and creativity can develop and innovation can be fostered [4]. Irecently taught a Web Practices class that may provide a practical example of how one might begin applying meta- design to pedagogical practice. The course was multi-disciplinary, with stu- dents coming from visual arts, interaction design, and communication design, and from a wide knowledge background. As a result, the students assigned their own learning outcomes based on their current knowledge and near-term career objec- tives. Based on those proposed outcomes, students were provided with customized resources to enable them to learn the knowledge they needed to succeed. This learning process was supported by lec- tures that specifically avoided addressing a discrete skill or knowledge base; one such lecture focused on helping students better conceptually understand working with Css pre-processors, and some of the tools and resources that would sup- port that practice. Providing resources became a pedagogical imperative, at times requiring a pivot where resources or even learning objectives were determined to be inappropriate. The students themselves were very important resources for each other and, in some cases, for students of future courses. Students with different knowledge supported one another and, as part of their project deliverables, created learning resources that contrib- uted to the larger community knowledge base and will help future students in the course. Rather than having institu- tional tools and technology imposed on them, students chose, individually or collectively, based on what they were most comfortable working with and what they deemed appropriate for the task. Web and desktop applications like Coda, TextMate, Codekit, Axure, and Codiqa Meta-design embraces the notion that the required knowledge to solve complex problems is beyond the scope of one individual or discipline. became new alternatives to Adobe, while cloud-based sharing and networking, through services like Gmail and Dropbox, were preferred over the institution’s email and server network. These applications, to name a few, became the tools of choice, and an open web of familiar options enabled students to develop their own creative platform for project develop- ment. In this case, we can see how users (students) can direct a system (the class) to suit their individual needs, drawing on knowledge and skills from diverse disciplines and sources, including each other, while also creating a foundation for future users. From a meta-design standpoint, the instructor plays a dual role in the class- room as a designer of the pedagogical system and as an active facilitator, while the student (as primary stakeholder), acts as a user-designer of their own educa- tional process [3]. While this more amor- phous teaching and learning method can present workload concerns for faculty, the role of instructor as designer of the system should also lead to a mitigation of those concerns. Attention becomes focused on the roles of facilitation, resource devel- opment (acquisition, curation, creation), and system iteration in collaboration with user-designers (students). Exigent challenges to post-secondary art and design institutions are creating aneed to rethink what we teach, how we teach it, and to whom. Reduced reve- nue to universities from various sources is challenging the quantity and variety of courses being offered while, at the same time, we’re seeing increased indus- try demand for more diverse skills and knowledge, even from within discrete fields of practice. Internationalization creates new opportunities for diversity in student enrollment and enriching the learning environment, but it also poses pedagogical challenges, particularly when adhering to traditional methods and criteria for delivery and evaluation. Infrastructure too is facing its own pres- sures; with physical space limitations and capital budget reductions, we need systems + 33 [1] [2 [3 to change the way we think about the classroom, its physical form, and all the equipment that traditionally supports it. All of these shifts create a situation where adhering to traditional standards and methods creates a suboptimal teach- ing and learning experience—new meth- ods can offer solutions to these evolving circumstances. In meta-design, we see an evolu- tion of design methodologies to more democratized forms of design. What began as an early 20th century modernist approach that expected users to adapt to the designed outcome has transformed to design methodologies that create new opportunities for users to become engaged participants in the co-creative practice of designing solutions to their own unique problems. As diverse social and economic pressures are applied to post-secondary education, innovative approaches to pedagogical methodology are required. The democratizing princi- ples and practices found in meta-design can be applied to art and design pedagogy, not only to rethink the role of the student in their own education, but to entirely re-conceptualize what a framework for post-secondary art and design education might look like. e REFERENCES Buchanan, R. “Wicked Problems in Design Thinking.” Design issues 8.2 (1992): 5-21. Fischer, G. “Meta-Design: Beyond User-Centered and Participatory Design.” Proceedings of Hc! international 2003. June 2003, Crete, Greece. Ed. Constantine Stephanidis. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003. 88-92. Fischer, G. “Symmetry of Ignorance, Social Creativity, and Meta-design.” Proceedings of Creativity & Cognition. 1999. New York: AcM Press, 1999. 116-123. [4] Giaccardi, E. “Metadesign as an Emergent Design Culture.” Leonardo 38.4 (2005): 342-350. [5] Rittel, H. W.J. and M.M. Webber. “Dilemmas ina General Theory of Planning.” Policy Sciences 4.2: (1973). 155-169. [6] Thackara, J. in the Bubble: Designing in a Complex World. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005.