IntoActions selected to work with the Business School of the University of São Paulo (USP)

Building innovation capacity across the education enterprise and preparing the next-generation of innovators is a challenge that universities around the world are struggling with. IntoActions completed its first phase of working with administrators, professors and students at the Faculdade de Economia, Administração e Contabilidade at USP, the School of Business at the University of São Paulo, to introduce and apply Design Thinking as an innovation strategy.

During the first phase of the project, participants focused on understanding the key challenges the School of Business is facing in terms of improving the learning and teaching experience. They will then apply a set of tools and techniques introduced by IntoActions for gaining empathy around the challenges and contexts the key stake holders of the School of Business are facing.

The final phase of the three-month project will take place in November when project teams comprised of professors, administrators and students from the School of Business will generate and test various alternative prototypes for improving the learning and teaching experience at FEA.

The participants will be able to use FEA’s new flexible learning laboratory, the Design Lab, which was developed by students, administrators and professors as part of USP’s first Design Thinking program, the Laboratório de Design, Inovação e Criatividade (d-USPLeste). d-USPLeste was established at the Escola de Artes, Ciências e Humanidades (EACH), or USP Leste, the eastern campus of the Universidade de São Paulo/USP in 2011. It is the first academic program applying the Design Thinking methodology at a major university in Latin America.