Over 700 students from across the globe participated this year’s Royal Society of Arts (RSA) Student Design Awards, responding to complex design challenges in the name of social good. Their proposals were judged by leading designers and industry experts in a rigorous process that included anonymous offline shortlisting, followed by face-to-face interviews.
Global Business and Digital Arts (GBDA) students Alex Mills, Casey Hargreaves, Liz Mirchan-Breckenridge, Katrina Schouten and Stephanie Donovan won top prize for Best Business Case in the category of wellbeing in the workplace for their project.
Hungryr is a grocery delivery platform for long haul truck drivers, responding to their lack of access to healthy meal options, despite the crucial need to maintain a nutritious and balanced diet. The program connects local car owners with truck drivers who are unable to access grocery stores on their route. On the Hungryr mobile application, truck drivers can browse a plethora of nutritionist-approved recipes and select the meals they would like to prepare in the upcoming days. A corresponding list of recipe ingredients is then translated into a customizable grocery list. Upon checkout, a local Hungryr driver is notified of the order and proceeds to shop for the groceries and deliver them to the truck driver at the designated truck stop.
As part of their 4th-year capstone course, the team dedicated months to researching the wellbeing of North American truck drivers, uncovering occupational hurdles and exploring imaginative yet practical solutions.
Hungryr and Schift team members and faculty just after they presented to the RSA judges. Top left to right: Leah Zang Kennedy (Lecturer) , Katrina Schouten (Hungryr), Casey Hargreaves (Hungryr), Laura Wells (Schift), Karin Schmidlin (Lecturer). Botton left to right: Liz Mirchan-Breckenridge and Alex Mills (Hungryr).
“Really getting to know our users and empathizing with their struggles allowed us to develop a solution that would have a true benefit in their lives,” said team Hungryr in their business case. “As we take on new projects, we are each inspired to develop the same level of empathy for our users, the problems that they face and the intricacies of their specific environment.”
GBDA students Portia Jones and Laura Wells also received RSA attention in the same category. Their project Schift was Highly Commended for Best Business Case.
Team Hungryr will accept the NatWest Award of £1000 on June 27 at the Royal Society of Arts headquarters in London, England.
About the Awards
The RSA’s Student Design Awards is the world’s longest running student design competition and aptly demonstrates the ways in which design thinking can benefit society. Students are encouraged to apply their skills for social good and forge networks of creative individuals, partnerships between emerging design and established industry giants that are leading the way in solving the world’s most critical problems through ingenious, playful and resourceful solutions. Previous winners include the Chief Executive of the Design Business Association Deborah Dawton, Apple Design Chief Sir Jonathan Ive and Founder/CEO of renewable energy company Pavegen Laurence Kemball-Cook.
“With previous RSA Student Design Award winners including Apple’s Jonathan Ive, we can predict that today’s winners will be tomorrow’s designers of the future,” said Rebecca Ford, Manager of the RSA Student Design Awards.