Teshia Treuhaft Awarded Grant

Teshia Treuhaft (BFA 2012) has been awarded a RISD 2050 Fund grant to research ​“Hacking our Educational Spaces” this summer.

I have been awarded a grant to travel to NYC, Berlin and Vienna from June to September 2014 through the RISD 2050 Fund. The goal of the RISD 2050 Fund is to imagine our future and stimulate the landscape of possibilities for art and design education. 

For my 2050 project I will be looking at alternative educational spaces that facilitate the development of similar skill sets to that of traditional design programs in Higher Education. These spaces typically are considered ​‘Hacker’ or ​‘Maker’ spaces many of which are started by groups of members that pool together resources to make spaces in which they can do creative projects. My initial interest came about as a result of working as the ​“emerging artist-in-residence” at Maker Works in Ann Arbor Michigan immediately following my completion of my BFA at the Stamps School. 

The goal of the research is to accumulate data and a series of interviews with founders and members of these hacker and makers spaces. Because of the striking similarity of skill sets — the eventual plan will be to allow the findings to guide curriculum recommendations for RISD and like-minded institutions interested in physical making skills (including cross-overs into tangible computing, open source hardware etc) and identify a potential for relationship building between the university and these grass-roots spaces.

Details on Teshia’s project: https://​teshia​-treuhaft​.square​space​.com/​r​i​s​d​-​2​0​5​0​-​p​r​o​ject/

For more on the RISD 2050 Grant program: http://​aca​d​e​m​i​caf​fairs​.risd​.edu/​r​e​s​e​a​r​c​h​/8736 – 2/funding-opportunities-m-ir/risd-2050-fund/