[Design and Technology] Student production and commercial plans

[Pitt, David]

From: Pitt, David
Sent: Saturday, 15 February 2014 7:50 PM
To: 'destech-bounces at edulists.com.au'
Subject: Student production and commercial plans

Hi all

I'm teaching Unit 3/4 VCE Product design for the first time this year, and I'm currently "the Department", as it were.  So, I have a question regarding reference to commercially or publicly available plans for resistant material production for the esteemed minds.

I was curious to know:   How heavily can a student draw on pre-designed patterns (particularly for wood/metal).  I was led to wonder, not just say "Not at all", after a student pressed me on it last week after going through the study design and assessment advice, and I wonder whether he is right, assuming he acknowledges his sources.


I went back to the books, and turned up the following:
The study design, Prod. Des. assessment handbook, and authentication advice do not explicitly state the role that reference to commercial plans can take in the SAT process (except as related to a garment - 3 changes if it is the basis of the work).   I know the implication throughout is that all design work and therefore options should be student initiated. My understanding was that all design options had to be original.  But.

The Key Skills the student needs to demonstrate from Unit 3 Outcome 3 related to the design activities (and therefore the terms of reference)are :


*         Use a range of visualisations, drawing and communication methods, including ICT where appropriate, for the design and development stage of the Product design process and appropriately acknowledge IP and other sources of information.  (emphasis added)

And this is the criteria related to the design (4) from the recent 10pt SAT marking criteria.

Criteria

5                                     -                                6



4. Skill in developing
innovative and creative
design options, ability to
use a decision matrix and
justify the preferred option.


a)      Adequate use of a range of
communication methods to
convey design options.


b)      Design options incorporate
adequate annotations relevant to
the design brief that show
innovative and creative design
thinking techniques.


c)       Satisfactory justification of the
preferred option using weighted
criteria in the decision matrix, in
conjunction with client and/or
end user(s) feedback.







a)       Now, I can image how it would be entirely possible for a student to successfully show knowledge and use of visual communication methods (visualisations, design options) through the representation or expansion of parts of commercial plans which have not been detailed (exploded views, isometrics from orthogonal plans, etc.) to convey their ideas without substantively changing the design, but attributing IP.


b)       Annotation of the design options (assuming a heavily appropriated option) would be easily made relevant to the brief and show the relationship between design brief and option, regardless of who drew it



c)       Justification of any option via criteria should be performable by any individual with the same result, assuming that the criteria are valid, and the Design options are detailed enough to convey the requisite info.


So.  The Crux.

Have I missed somewhere where it explicitly states that a student cannot use, interpret, and/or expand upon a commercial or publicly available plan in the presentation of visualisations and design options for Unit 3 Outcome 3, or which states that by doing so, they will lose marks in Criteria 4 specifically and the SAT generally.

If it turns out "No public plans", I'm also confused what happens if they choose to acknowledge IP of the designer and use their design anyway, but then complete the annotations and justify their choice with appropriate criteria.  They will have achieved two components of the three.  Should they be given the marks?  Or does not satisfying one element invalidate the whole criteria?  Therefore do we need to mark to the lowest achievement in every criteria which is a composite of multiple activities, even if it's the minority that is lower range?

If anyone can definitively answer (with a reference to a specific line of VCAA published advice) this question of how much reliance can be placed on pre-existing designs, I'd really appreciate it.  First year in the study, I don't want to be caught out by missing one line of text, or a "Commonly held understanding" that isn't explicitly stated anywhere at all.

Regards,
David Pitt.
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