Leading by Design -Chris Cohoon ’16, TLAD

The climate here is hot.  Since my arrival on June 15, the temperature and humidity have rarely dipped into the mid-eighties.  Okinawa is a magical emerald mountaintop breaching the aquamarine canvas where the East China Sea meets the Pacific Ocean.  Its history and culture are rich.  It is the birthplace of karate, the site of one of the fiercest battles in World War II, and boasts the world’s largest population of centenarians per capita.

Due to Okinawa’s location halfway between Taiwan and Kyushu, Japan, it has served as a crossroad of commerce, culture, and conflict.  The ancient Ryukyu Kingdom payed tribute to China even after they were annexed by Japan in the 1600s.  Their remote location allowed them to maintain a degree of political freedom and preserve their native language and culture.  During WW II, local people were pressed into service to build air fields and defensive structures, boys as young as middle school were put on the front lines and many of the girls served as nurses for the impending U.S. invasion.  When the battle was over, some estimates claim as many as 140,000 (about 1/3 of the population) civilians were killed or missing.

America held onto the island after the war, until 1972, when it was handed back over to Japan.  One of the conditions of the post-war treaty with Japan is that they cannot have their own military.  They are allowed to maintain a small self-defense force, but the U.S. is largely responsible for defending Japan.  Okinawa has remained a strategic location for the U.S. presence in Asia, playing key roles in Korea, Vietnam, and even recent conflicts.  Some of the outer Okinawan islands have been in the news in the past couple of years because of  China’s claim of sovereignty over them.  Tensions have risen in the region with China, North Korea, and Russia all rattling their sabres.  When North Korea test fired its medium-range missile, last year, one of my friends was able to see the contrail on the horizon from a block away from my apartment.

Because of these factors, America maintains upwards of 50,000 military personnel on island, along with 45,000 family members and civilian support personnel.  The vast majority of those troops and family members rotate within 3-years, many sooner.  One can imagine that, with a population of 95,000 at any one time (or likely close to 150,000 individuals/calendar year due to rotation), there are some bad apples that come through.  A hand-full of violent crimes have been perpetrated by Americans since 1995.  The local political climate has heated up a little more with each incident until it seems to have finally matched Okinawa’s subtropical weather.

The week after I arrived on the island, reportedly 65,000 people turned up for a rally to voice their concerns about the U.S. military presence.  The rally was centered around a recent murder and the controversial decision to move a Marine air field to a base on the north end of the island.  As I have talked with my Okinawan neighbors, they express that their anger is not so much with the U.S. presence, but with the Japanese government for treating them as other, and for not including the local people in the discussions about decisions which greatly effect them.  Nearly 50% of U.S. personnel are housed on an island that makes up .6% of Japan’s land mass.  U.S. bases use 20% of Okinawa’s land mass.  The question, for many of my neighbors, is why there was no consideration to move the air field to the mainland.

So why does all of this history matter to my project?  Because the undergirding principle for any design project is empathy.  And to adequately empathize with someone, you need to understand the context.  In fact, you can likely guess what my lesson covered for the first design as leadership classes on Saturday…EMPATHY!

Now I get to tell you the exciting news about my classes!  We meet for 3 hours each, every Saturday.  In the mornings, I have a group of Marines, and in the afternoon, a group of high school students.  Because of the week’s work schedule, the marine class was smaller, with 2 marines, an Air Force airman, a chaplain, and his daughter.  We have 3 more marines confirmed for next week, which is exciting.  The chaplain grew up surfing and often commutes the 3 or 4 miles across the bay to work on his paddle board!  He said he’s excited to learn the leading by design program so he can start one on his base down south with marines in the fall!  Our high school crew reached 9, including one dad – who is a Navy dentist on the Marine Corps base.

To provide a framework for our experiential learning program, we are designing and building a stand up paddle board for each class.  I was a little concerned when I arrived on island and learned that the goals of the class might have been miscommunicated and people were expecting to all build their own boards.  I braced for the worst when I told them that I have never built a board, but that design is a collaborative learning process.  To my surprise, all of the students left excited to learn design thinking skills, whether we successfully build a usable board or not!

So, how does one introduce a paddle board design project with little-to-no expertise about paddle boards?  If you have tired of my droning and skipped directly ahead to the pictures, you know the answer.  You go to the beach!!  The first step in the design process is research!  So, after an introduction to design thinking, students took one for the team and hit the water to try out a few different types of boards.  You could tell they were gritting their teeth and gutting it out as they laboriously plodded through the tedious research.  Sometimes it’s hard to get any work done when you live in paradise.  But, with great resolve, the students pushed through to the end.

After the water session, we all piled into our workshop to talk about the importance of empathy as research.  Okinawa (as demonstrated above) is a rich context in which to learn such a valuable skill.  The two young marines arrived on island in February and new very little local history, or why there is so much talk about protests and demonstrations.  This was also their first chance to venture off base and were timid to try anything but the local McDonalds to eat (consequently, after each class, we will eat lunch at a different momasan & popasan restaurant – they don’t know what world-class treats they’re in for)!  I hope to incorporate some Okinawans into the class, as well.  In fact, I’m just about to head to a local surf shop to meet some of the local experts while students are busy conducting surveys, interviews, and just getting to know people.

Until next time, get out and get to know your neighbors!

Chris

Visualizing the Invisible| Genspace | Callie Clayton | BFA Textiles ’17

Tucked away on the east(ish) half of the seven floor of an unassuming building in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, a maker-space that happens to be the world’s first government compliant community biotech biosafety level 1 laboratory is located. Opened in 2010, Genspace, (gen- latin: “that which produces”) acts as a public educational resource and facility through genetic engineering classes, workshops, talks and as a production space for anyone who wants to be a member of the lab.

For the past two weeks and coming six, I have and will continue to collaborate, learn and make through investigating how community bio-labs such as Genspace (STEM to STEAM style teaching and learning environments) allow for clear discussion of the social and ethical possibilities and considerations within synthetic biology. Through this research, I’ll be designing visual graphics in digital pattern and educational forms communicating in a broader perspective the innocuous processes and positive potential of synthetic biology projects in relation to regulation. My goals for these visuals are to generate more public understanding and knowledge around community bio-labs and genetic engineering in order to encourage their establishment through STEAM programs and increase accessibility to these spaces and education.

First arriving in the lab, I was at once surprised and comforted by the mismatch of computers, papers and lab equipment on the main table outside of the two wet labs, a space arranged in a very fluid, “maker-space”-esque manner. In talking with one of the directors, it had been decided that I would observe all the courses: CRISPR and Genetic Engineering Introductory courses, observe the iGEM (International Genetic Engineering Machine) Competition lab work activity and weekly workshops and talks throughout my two months here. Starting this upcoming (third week) I’m participating in one of the Genetic Engineering introductory courses in line with (my determined) developmental steps of involvement for my research. For the coming weeks, I will continue to participate and further collaborations with different lab course teachers at Genspace to develop educational visuals simply explaining lab protocols for advanced processes such as CRISPR. Additionally, my participation in terms of addressing discussions of ethics associated with synthetic biology for art and design versus or in accordance also with scientific research has already become apparent. For these upcoming 6 weeks, a long term goal of mine is to collaborate with lab instructors in order to further develop educational discussion and content around differing and similar considerations of ethics and synthetic biology  when present in art and design and scientific research.

Re-reading what I have just written, the framework and simple actuality of what my place, role and actions within this lab space are sounds so precise and defined. It’s quite hilarious (please excuse my dry humor-warning: it will most definitely emerge multiple times within each blog post).  There are an infinity of angles, thoughts and ideas cultivated each and every subsequent day in the lab.

Examples ( to develop thoughts and observations of research on through writing, visuals and text) :

• Ways biotech regulations come out of experimentation (or don’t).
• Benefits from lack of regulation of citizen science in the United States and nonpartisan policy groups based research on citizen science projects’ development.
• Scaling of perspectives in protocol vs. effects/ meaning of protocol.
• Timelines of growth rates/lab work compared to levels of public concern and lack of understanding around certain GE (genetic engineering) techniques.
• Media interpretations versus reality.
• Metaphorical examples of how specific research on one environmental change affecting one organism affects a myriad of other, scaled-out ethical considerations and organisms.
• Translating research protocol/process explorations as a design process with the commonality of “making/tinkering” for the experimental sake and developing product / art as a result- ideas of “playful making.”
• How does the act of biology lab research and connotations of science reflect emotion based connotations associated with the lack of touch?
• Exploration of ethical understandings of the word: contamination or trust through the context of synthetic biology.
• Human harm to lab organisms- enlarging microscopic processes.
• How do we make design decisions in the context of genetic engineering and so are all choices an act of design? Where limitations come into play?
• Innocuous quality of genetic engineering protocols + application.
• How GE quantitatively finds difference in the small scale yet in doing so, discovers humanity’s similarity in the large scale. ex: Sequencing your DNA, your mitochondrial DNA which is passed down maternally, is extracted; meaning that all of humanity is linked by one “Mitochondrial DNA Eve,” the originator of the DNA extracted in this protocol.

What is most worthy of my attention and focus? As a designer, I have a different perspective, what aspects of my interpretations of these lab protocols, classes and design processes is most unique and what are the opportunity costs of choosing one focus over the other?

These past two weeks have been an immersive experience of taking notes on as much as possible, absorbing, learning and understanding specific protocols, techniques such as:

1. iGEM Competition Activity: Isolating tardigrades (microscopic invertebrates with four pairs of stout legs that live usually in water or damp moss, also called “water bears”-how cute haha) so to test different food sources to increase efficiency of their growth using techniques such as CRISPR (most recent form of highly specific gene editing). Ultimately, a goal of this project is to extract a gene linked with retaining water in drought-like conditions.
2. Ellie Irons, interdisciplinary artist and educator (around art and environmental science) who is actually a teacher at Brown University(!) came to do a workshop on foraging for invasive weeds in the urban jungle in order to make watercolor pigments. It was exciting to see the combination of botany, chemistry in terms of oxidation color changes when crushing petals and alum additions and art all in one. Her work at: http://ellieirons.com/#/
3. I went to an event called “Sketches for Science” upon recommendation from a colleague at Genspace (Karlijn is doing research on biomaterial growth with algae growth under different environmental conditions and kombucha scoby growth https://karlijnsibbel.com/ ) at a space in Manhattan. The event was led by The Leading Strand, http://www.theleadingstrand.org/#intro a collaboration between neuroscientists and designers to communicate science. Observing a mix of people with an academia background in the sciences, designers and friends, interacting and suggesting what scientific term the two artists of the night (one with a degree in neuroscience, the other design) should visualize in a 10 minute time-period, I feel I began to get a taste of what it means to “accurately” visualize: There is no such thing as fully “accurate” it seems. Everything is and always will be somewhat subjective perhaps and that’s a positive insight into the realm of visualizing science. Zoom into a process or image and it may seem to necessitate exactitude (ex: edit and deletion of specific codons) but zoom out and the application of this exactitude is subjective and unlimited. And is the big picture what is (often- I’m stressing often, not always by any means) most important?
4. CRISPR Class and Workshop: CRISPR is (since 2013) the most recent and accurate (arguably depending on whether it’s a prokaryote-plasmids still work best or eukaryote-CRISPR works better) targeted genome editing tool. CRISPR was discovered as part of adaptive immunity in select bacteria, allowing organisms to respond to and eliminate invasive bacteria/viruses. CRISPR is made up of a number of genes (“Cas”) including a protein called Cas9 which is programmed by small RNA (RNA= “DNA Photocopier” which creates multiple copies of a piece of DNA in the form of messenger RNA which is then made into proteins by the cell’s ribosomes) to cleave DNA. When Cas9 is fed a specific sequence of sgRNA (single-stranded guide RNA) a double-stranded break of the target DNA eliminates a specified section of DNA. After this break in DNA has been made, the cell wants to repair itself using either NHEJ (Non Homologous End Joining) or HDR (Homology Directed Repair). Using HDR, a template of DNA desired to replace a mutation or other DNA sequence (what was cut out) is replicated by the cell when repairing the break in the DNA. Meaning the cell has repaired itself using the DNA sequence template you/scientist/whoever put into the cell and is viewed as a natural DNA break repair. This means that CRISPR leaves no trace; one can not test whether an organism has or hasn’t been genetically manipulated using CRISPR! (Note: other site-specific editing technologies working in a similar way yet are detectable with varying levels of effectiveness and are still used for a variety of function include: restriction enzymes modifying plasmids to be put into DNA of course, site-specific recombinase technology, zinc-finger nucleases, etc) Observing and learning about the technology, tool of CRISPR I’m realizing the importance of pattern, matching and visuals in order to understand each step of the process and matching the act of pipetting DNA into a solution with the purpose of that action being making guide RNA. During each class, we’ve had some exciting discussion about ethics associated with use of technologies such as CRISPR. In the case of Germline genetic modification (a form of genetic engineering which involves changing genes in eggs, sperm, or very early embryos meaning that successive generations inherit the same modified genes) what true differences exist between that act of genetic modification and invitro fertilization using selected sperm and the act of two partners naturally and/or “naturally” choosing one another because of subconscious and conscious inclinations to certain physical and personality traits? As one of the course instructors said:

“Lack of change and the maintenance of something in its “natural” state is unnatural”

so could that mean, resisting evolution of the body or health through technology is               striving to maintain the “natural” that has already developed into a different form of          ‘further evolved “natural”‘? Where and what are the ‘limitations’ we create for                       ourselves in this design problem? CRISPR information: New England Bio-Labs

Gel Electrophoresis Ladder for CRISPR course

plate for course

5. Dr. David Putrino, P.T., Ph.D. gave a talk through “Knows Science ” a non-for-profit education and advocacy organization working to share the latest scientific discoveries with the public about the human brain’s responses during performance in relation to endurance. He spoke also about a number of research projects and collaborations to crowd-solve previously insurmountable healthcare issues using assistive technology done through Not Impossible Labs. The necessity of designers, design collaboration in each of these projects, such as “The Eyewriter” designed for an ALS patient, was emphasized by David himself when he said:

“Medicine must look outside of technology to know how to make people better.”

The necessity of designers niche-ly understanding the patient’s illness demonstrates the importance of fluid integration of design and science education. More about his work and presentation can be found at the “Knows Science” site.

      6. The vast amount of content I’ve been learning / thinking / exposed to means I don’t think I can share it all in this one blog post! Quick snippet of other topics are: 3A Assembly, Sequencing my DNA, and reading research reports on Citizen Science and regulation from Commons Lab – to better understand regulation in relation to Community Biolabs and Citizen Science I definitely recommend looking at this site and reading some of the articles.

For this week and the coming ones, I plan on really focusing in on my collaboration with one of the instructors on making visuals for the process of using CRISPR in the lab, focus in on certain questions / thoughts, ethics discussion points for courses, visual systems for connecting lab steps and their effect and continue writings / text associating lab processes with design decisions. I’ll be helping out with the exhibition of Biodesign Challenge work done by university students later this week and am excited to see how design and science has manifested in their work! Looking forward to sharing more work, thoughts and updates in a week- also, look out for updates on my tumblr blog with more photos and posts Callie Clayton.

Quote for thought by a Genspace instructor:

“Form follows function, however the form is the function so if you’ve broken the form, then you have no function.”

my regards,

Callie

Some just want a good story – Bo-Won Keum, MFA GD ’17

But no matter what the nature of the request is, each letter always remains earnest, polite, and heartbreakingly thankful.

This time, I come not as a one-off visitor, but as a long-term volunteer, working to contribute to their cause in more immediate ways. The initial proposal through the Maharam focused heavily on what I imagined would be research development on their archiving and record-keeping system—of what books were going through, of what restrictions were being imposed on the package in each facility, of demographic information related to the prisoners making the requests. A conversation with Michelle upon my arrival, however, made the steps for moving forward in this particular endeavor trickier than I had initially thought.

Books to Prisoners, Seattle WA

The restrictions imposed on packages are ways in which individual facilities control the materials flowing into the system. Prisons often ban books with erotic, violent, and politically radical content, but they can also ban hardcovers, magazines, and secondhand books. In order to ensure that packages are sent to prison inmates successfully, Books to Prisoners refers to these restrictions each time they mail an individual package out to a prisoner. While I had assumed that these lists had been compiled according to regulations that each prison had made publicly available, I found out that these lists are compiled from years of trial and error conducted by each book program. They are also unique to each book program—facility regulations imposed on Books to Prisoners, for example, can be very different from those imposed on LGBT Books to Prisoners in Madison WI.

This makes creating a national prison book program database hard.

What I can focus my attentions on right now, however, is on a couple of things. One is a pdf document about the book-packing process that we can make accessible for first-time and infrequent volunteers on the website; they can look at it to get a better sense of what to expect when they arrive and also refer to it when they get come back after a long stretch of time. Another is the document that I hope will be able to contain some of these stories. Michelle tells me about a staff effort to publish some of the letters that failed some time ago, simply because there wasn’t a lot of time, energy, and knowledge on how to develop the project. I know how to do books—I’m a graphic designer. It’s a perfect project for me to take on, especially because it feels a lot like what I was trying to do last year.

“But this feels different,” I remember explaining earnestly to two friends over dinner. “The project that I was pursuing last year was driven solely by my own interests in knowing more about the movement, and I couldn’t help but feel like I was mining information from these organizations… This at least feels collaborative. I would be proud to release this document knowing that it comes from a transparent and cooperative exchange.”

I hope this is true. I hope my actions can match the self-asserted confidence that I seem to project with these words. But a lot of those fears still remain. I think about the conversation that I had with Kevin in 123 Dyer Street, a week before I flew out to Seattle. I confessed that I was nervous of marching into the program as an outsider. I told him that I didn’t want to be accused of sensationalizing something or of creating a spectacle that champions only my efforts as a researcher. I didn’t want to come in and disregard the efforts of volunteers who don’t have the luxury of looking at this as a thing that was ‘interesting’, who come in instead with a mindset of bringing change in the most effective way possible…

But maybe what I’ve really come to terms with in the last two weeks is that having that perspective—of seeing this activity as a strange, fascinating, wonderful, perplexing, sentimental, and deeply complex thing—is okay. There is great value to bringing efficiency to a system, of improving record-keeping, of building statistics, of streamlining a production process. It’s the kind of information that can be pointed to to engage policy makers, to receive better funding and reach out to greater amounts of prison inmates in the country.

But how do we change not policies, but attitudes? How do we kindle empathy and kindness? How do we compel people to act, not because it feels like the morally righteous thing to do, but out of love for another human being?

People in prison ask for books, not because their lives necessarily depend on getting access to composition books, to thesauruses, and to copies of 50 Shades of Gray, but because they are, like any of us, trying to find meaningful ways to spend the time that is given to them. Those of us who live outside of prison walls say that we are lucky to not know what life in prison would be like, but I think we get a glimpse of it everyday when we are angry, when we are frustrated, and when we are lonely. Access to things in our lives—to music, to movies, to books, to exercise, to greenery, to health, to fulfilling relationships with people—is what prevents us from acting out. What are we left with when those luxuries are taken away from us?

***

Maybe I can explain this with an anecdote:

On my second day, as I was talking to Michelle, we were interrupted by four heads poking in the doorway.

“Hey—is this Books to Prisoners?”

Four tan, eager-eyed and hunky college boys entered the basement with their pastel-colored shorts and fraternity T-shirts. They had come on the referral of a brother who recommended the program as “a good way to get their service hours in.” (Books to Prisoners outreaches in order to get enough volunteers to run its operations; many of them come from general community service groups.) Michelle swiftly gave them a forty-five minute orientation on what they were supposed to do for the day.

As they nestled themselves into the stacks with a letter in each of their hands, I strained my ears to overhear their conversation. What would they make of experience after reading the letters? One of them says, “Dude, the fucked up thing is that a lot of them are in prison for like, one mistake that they made.” It’s poignant, and I was struck by this moment of compassion.

“Yeah,” says another in response. “I mean, maybe, but the majority of them… like, they probably deserve to be there…”

I stayed silent because the comment made me sad. People might tell me that it didn’t matter, that they still packed the books and did their service time and, effectively, made some inmates somewhere across the country happy with the selection that they were able to make. But no matter how efficient we get at book packing, at fundraising, at getting more volunteers working in the basement—if we continue to distance ourselves by looking at systems and situations rather than listening to individuals and hearing stories, than our efforts don’t really get anywhere. The narrative doesn’t change; people in prison are there because they are bad people, not because of decisions that they make or circumstances that they find themselves in.

***
(Photos have been manipulated to preserve anonymity of its subjects.)