2025 Design Educators Conference Call for Speaker Abstracts

Design doesn’t sit still — and neither should design education.

Design educators, practitioners and thought leaders are invited to submit proposals to present at the 2025 RGD Design Educators Conference taking place in partnership with George Brown College in Toronto on October 3, 2025, immediately after our Toronto DesignThinkers Conference, which takes place Oct 1 and 2 at Meridian Hall.

Deadline to submit: Monday, July 7, 2025, 11:59 pm ET

Presentation Abstracts

This year’s theme, ShiftShaping, asks: How are we as educators reimagining our teaching through experimentation, failure, vulnerability and transformation? What are we letting go of, what are we risking and what are we radically reinventing?

Submissions should address how experimentation, failure and transformation intersect to reshape design and its societal role. Topics can include original research, case studies or theoretical explorations relevant to the theme.

Abstracts should be no more than 500 words in length and include the title, objectives and intended outcomes of the presentation.

Presentation format: 20-minute talk + 10-minute Q&A

“At George Brown College’s School of Design, we are excited to embrace the intersections of ShiftShaping in design education in partnership with the RGD for the 2025 Design Educator's Conference. This collaboration represents our commitment to transformation—viewing uncertainty as a canvas for innovation, failure as a stepping stone for learning and bold experimentation as the pathway to evolution. Join us as we explore design’s potential to adapt, flourish and influence through a mindset rooted in curiosity, resilience and the courage to challenge the norms.”

Ana Rita Morais

Workshop Abstracts

Submitssions for interactive, hands-on, participant-driven sessions should explore the ShiftShaping theme through practical activities, collaborative discussions or creative exercises. Workshops should provide experiential explorations (e.g., practical tools, frameworks or techniques participants can implement) that are relevant to the theme. Proposals should be no more than 500 words in length and include the title, objectives and intended outcomes of the session.

Workshop Format: 60 minutes in length, and facilitators will be expected to provide detailed materials or outlines for participant engagement.

Keynote speakers for the conference:

• Opening Keynote by Danah Abdulla 

  Danah Abdulla is a designer, researcher and educator whose work explores new narratives and practices that challenge traditional disciplinary boundaries in design. She is a Reader in Anti/Post/Decolonial Histories, Theories, Praxes at the Decolonising the Arts Institute, University of the Arts London. Danah is the author of Designerly Ways of Knowing and Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region, and is a founding member of the Decolonising Design platform. She also founded Kalimat Magazine, a publication dedicated to Arab thought and culture. Danah will also be speaking at DesignThinkers Toronto.

   

• Closing Keynote by Lesley-Ann Noel

  Lesley-Ann Noel is a designer, researcher and author of Design Social Change, known for her equity-centred approach to design. Now Dean of Design at OCAD University, her work focuses on inclusive, community-led practices in education, public health and social innovation.

Selected speakers will be responsible for their own travel and accommodation.

They will receive a 25% discount on registration for both the Design Educators Conference and DesignThinkers Toronto 2025, taking place October 1–2 at Meridian Hall.
Speakers will also be invited to contribute to a conference proceedings document to be published after the event.

Please send questions to programs@rgd.ca