Equal opportunities through design

As part of the inclusion conference, the district of Hildesheim awarded prizes for remarkable examples of successful inclusion in the education sector for the first time. Sparkasse Hildesheim Goslar Peine provided a total of 6,000 euros. An additional honorary prize and 500 euros were given for the publication "Inclusion design" of the HAWK Faculty of Design. The first 3 places were occupied from place 1 to 3 by the primary school Alter Markt, the Gudrun-Pausewang-Schule and the Oskar-Schindler-Gesamtschule for their commitment to inclusion.

“Inclusion means that all people have the same opportunities – especially in education. That is why, together with the Sparkasse Hildesheim Goslar Peine, we are honouring outstanding projects that enable joint learning and shared participation," explained district administrator Bernd Lynack before he presented the prizes. After the 3 prizes there was a surprise. There was one more thing that caught the jury's eye: Over several semesters, an interdisciplinary team of the Faculty of Design has dealt with which framework conditions projects need so that they are designed and made inclusively. In addition, the students wondered which didactic formats and methods are useful to make design theory inclusive," explains Bernd Lynack. In close consultation with Roland Redetzke from Sparkasse Hildesheim Goslar Peine, an honorary prize was created to honour this special work.

This publication contains the work of countless students who have worked over several semesters on what is to be understood by the term inclusion. Thanks to the funding from the state of Lower Saxony, we had the opportunity to start the work with a symposium in which various interest groups were also involved, which always accompanied our work with constructive criticism," explained Prof. Andreas Schulz, who together with Barbara Kotte, Prof. Günter Weber, Tobias Witt and Mona Brants had taken over the project management.