Academic Forum – Design Thinking Method

The session was conceptualised to introduce faculty members to innovative, solution-oriented approaches that enhance teaching effectiveness, research productivity, and curriculum development within legal education, with Design Thinking — as a structured yet creative methodology — promoting empathy-driven problem solving, collaboration, experimentation, and learner-centric innovation. Dr. Tiwari structured the discussion around the five key stages of the Design Thinking process: Empathize (understanding learner needs and stakeholder perspectives), Define (clearly identifying academic or institutional challenges), Ideate (generating creative and diverse solutions), Prototype (developing workable models or pilot initiatives), and Test (evaluating solutions and refining them based on feedback). The session emphasised the shift from traditional lecture-based pedagogy to interactive and experiential learning models, integration of real-world legal problems into classroom discussions, encouraging collaborative assignments and interdisciplinary projects, and using Design Thinking to redesign course structures and assessment strategies. Design Thinking offers faculty members a framework to address classroom challenges more effectively, enhance research ideation and proposal development, foster innovation in curriculum planning, and build stronger engagement between faculty and students. Faculty members expressed interest in further workshops and hands-on sessions focusing on implementing Design Thinking in curriculum redesign and academic research projects, and the session reinforced the importance of creativity, adaptability, and empathy in academic leadership and institutional development.