The Design Museum and Deutsche Bank support D&T curriculum with the 14th edition of the Design Ventura competition
March 11, 2024
Design Ventura, Design Museum and Deutsche Bank’s national design and enterprise challenge for secondary schools, aims to address gaps in the current Design & Technology curriculum, giving students an opportunity to respond to a real-world brief.
- Design Ventura is the Design Museum's award-winning, free design and enterprise competition for school students aged 13-16, supported by Deutsche Bank. 2024 is the 14th year of the competition.
- With the number of Design & Technology GCSE entries in decline while the design industry continues to grow, the competition looks to bolster the curriculum with free online learning resources, workshops, webinars and live events.
- The 2023-2024 brief – set by South London-based textile designer Kangan Arora – asks students to design a new product for the Design Museum Shop, inspired by the theme of Colour and Community.
The Design Museum and Deutsche Bank have reinforced the importance of early design education through the Design Ventura competition, devised to support and fill gaps in the current Design & Technology (D&T) curriculum.
Despite the UK being the first country in the world to make D&T a compulsory subject in the school curriculum as part of the 1988 School Reforms, the number of GCSE entries has been declining fast in recent years. In its prime, D&T had over 430,000 entrants, a figure which has dwindled to just 78,000 as of 2022, according to research by the Design & Technology Association.
The report published in Summer 2023 revealed that KS3 – which covers students aged 11-14 – is a real problem area in the curriculum and could be affecting how many students choose the subject at GCSE/KS4 level.
The Design & Technology Association found that the curriculum focuses heavily on ‘making things’, with student tasks lacking any kind of iterative design process.
On the contrary, Design Ventura offers students the chance to respond to a real-world brief, bringing the business of design to life for UK state secondary schools while supporting Design & Technology and Art & Design programmes by providing free online learning resources, workshops, webinars and live events, supported by industry professionals.
"I'm so thrilled to be involved with Design Ventura this year. It is such a crucial programme that allows school children to engage in design, making, creativity and ingenuity in a real-world context,” says designer and brief setter, Kangan Arora. “I set the theme of Colour and Community in order to challenge them to think in their teams about the importance of community practices, supporting and learning from one another and also consider the wider community who may be their 'core customer'. I’m looking forward to seeing brave and joyful use of colour and I can't wait to see what the various teams come up with."
The competition is run by the Design Museum in partnership with Deutsche Bank’s global youth engagement programme Born to Be. Now in its 14th year, it has seen over 110,000 students participate and grow their creative and entrepreneurial skills by designing and developing a product for a real target audience.
Chief Executive and Director of the Design Museum, Tim Marlow OBE, says: "Design has the power to transform lives and I hope that the thousands of young people involved in Design Ventura are able to develop the ideas, skills and experience that they get from participating as they start to build their own careers and help shape a better collective future for many more.”
Christoph Woermann, CMO Corporate Bank at Deutsche Bank, has been instrumental in the project of Design Ventura and a keen supporter since it was founded in 2010. He says: “It’s so important that students get the opportunity to explore the combination of creativity and business skills at a young age because without it, they won’t know what the possibilities are and what they are capable of achieving. I am surprised and impressed, year on year, with the ingenuity and enthusiasm these young talents display. And I am delighted that we are able to support them in this venture.”
HOW IT WORKS
Students work in teams of four to six people for the project, with the 10 shortlisted state school teams being invited to Deutsche Bank’s London head office to pitch their ideas to a panel of expert judges.
The winning team will develop their designs with a professional agency before their product is manufactured and sold in the Design Museum Shop, with money raised from the sales going to a charity of their choosing.
This year’s 10 shortlisted schools are:-
- Christ the King Voluntary Catholic Academy, Nottingham – entry “Road to Go”
- Comberton Village College, Cambridge – entry “Creative Colour Box”
- Dover Girls Grammar School, Kent – entry “OUTFITY”
- Ferndown Upper School, Dorset – entry “Bouncy Buddies”
- Haggerston School, Hackney London – entry “Braille Calendar”
- Heathcote School, Chingford London – entry “The Study Buddy”
- Manor CE Academy, York – entry “SCRAP (Safety-Conscious-Reflect-And-Protect)”
- The Piggott School, Berkshire – entry “Colour Countdown - Find the Colour in Your Life!”
- St Joseph's Catholic High School, Slough – entry “Emergency Cache”
- Upper Shirley High School, Southampton – entry “Dish of the Day”
WHY DOES THE ECONOMY NEED DESIGN?
Cultivating the next generation of designers is crucial as, in 2019, the design industry contributed £97.4 billion to the UK economy in GVA (4.9% of total UK GVA) and is growing at an extremely fast pace.
"Design Ventura has established itself as one of the leading external competitions of its type in the sector, and we know it is highly valued by design and technology teachers nationally. Competitions such as this add real-life context to learning as well as helping students, their parents and industry to see the value of a high-quality design and technology curriculum. The D&T Association is fully supportive of this initiative, and I look forward to seeing the winning entries later this year," Tony Ryan, Chief Executive Officer of the Design & Technology Association.
Ensuring that students can access jobs in other design-related industries, such as manufacturing and engineering, is another goal of the competition. Around 2.5 million jobs are provided by UK manufacturing, with average wages higher than the whole economy (UK Manufacturing, The Facts 2022, Make UK), while the engineering profession generates an estimated £645 billion GVA for the UK’s economy annually.
The 2023-24 Design Ventura competition winners will be revealed at a celebration event in April 2024.
A two-month display of shortlisted and winning entries at the Design Museum will follow and the product that takes the top spot will be sold in the Design Museum Shop.
ABOUT THE DESIGN MUSEUM
The Design Museum is the world’s leading museum devoted to contemporary architecture and design. Its work encompasses all elements of design, including fashion, product and graphic design. Since it opened its doors in 1989 the museum has displayed everything from an AK-47 to high heels designed by Christian Louboutin. It has staged over 100 exhibitions, welcomed over seven million visitors and showcased the work of some of the world’s most celebrated designers and architects including Paul Smith, Zaha Hadid, Jonathan Ive, Frank Gehry, Eileen Gray, Dieter Rams, Margaret Calvert and Yinka Ilori.
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