Futures of design education: editorial.

The articles in this special issue on Futures of Design Education have been selected from the 9th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education
conference proceedings. This international conference was held at Newcastle upon Tyne in the UK in September 2007 and brought together representatives from education and
industry that have an interest in shaping the future of design education. The conference provided a forum for educators and researchers from product development, engineering and industrial design, together with industry and government representatives to discuss current educational issues as well as how design education might ‘be’ in the future. Themes explored at the conference included: curriculum development, responsible design, global issues, learning environments, and industry-university collaborations.
Seven articles from the conference have been included in this special issue with aim of providing a range of papers from the interdisciplinary field of product design
education. The authors of these articles come from different disciplinary backgrounds and different countries, including the Netherlands, South Africa, Israel, Australia, the USA and the UK. The outcome is an edition that tackles diverse design education issues from a variety of perspectives, both disciplinary and institutional. Further, the articles are written from various pedagogical perspectives, ranging from those informed by psychology to
those incorporating socio-cultural theorisations of learning.

Special Issue on Futures of Design Education