Diploma Courses in Design - A case for integrated Design Departments in Secondary Education

Abstract

Two broad types of courses leading to Diplomas in Art and Design are envisaged in the future. The first is the familiar self-motivated, experimentally orientated course that has evolved from the recommendations embodied in the first report of the National Advisory Council for Art Education in 1962, and the second, more professionally orientated design course suggested in the recent report of the Joint Committee of the National Advisory Council for Art Education and the National Council for Diplomas in Art and Design. The latter is intended to provide an education for students intending a career as a professional designer serving the needs of the community and meeting the requirements of modern marketing methods and industrial production techniques.

Departments of Design in Art Colleges and Polytechnics intending to set up such professional design courses will be looking, within the permitted minimum educational requirements, for broadly educated well informed young people with aesthetic senSibility and social responsibility in equal measure.

The minimum general education requirements for admission to Diploma Courses are to be retained at five G.C.E. passes at '0' level (or approved equivalent) but specific requirements for other qualifications may be adopted for individual courses. The Diploma Courses that have been approved for the past eight years will continue to recruit from Foundation Courses at 18+ while the new 'professional' design courses will have the option to select entrants from the sixth form or equivalent.