The first research article from our ongoing UX pedagogy project has just been published. “What do We Teach When We Say We Teach UX? A Study of the Practices of TPC Instructors” is now available in the most recent issue of the journal Programmatic Perspectives. Thank you to our participants, the Council for Programs in Technical and Scientific Communication for a research grant to support our work, Santa Clara University‘s Office of the Provost for funding the hiring of undergraduate research assistants (Jia Seow and Teresa Contino), and Jia and Teresa for getting deep in the data with us!
Abstract: Although programs in TPC are well positioned to prepare students for careers in user experience (UX), teaching UX can be challenging due to its breadth and complexity. Despite these challenges, many TPC instructors teach UX with little support or training. To understand and improve how TPC instructors teach UX, this article considers the research questions: 1) What do TPC teachers do when they say they teach UX? What are their definitions, approaches, and activities? 2) What are the structures or constraints that influence UX pedagogical choices? Triangulating data from 80
questionnaire responses, 22 interviews, and a corpus of 53 teaching artifacts, we respond to a long-standing call for pedagogical scholarship on UX with evidence-based practices for instructors and programs. Findings demonstrate the variability and flexibility of teaching practices including how instructors define UX, articulate their expertise, and embed UX into their assignments, courses, and programs. We also demonstrate and discuss the structures and constraints that influence UX pedagogical choices. We conclude with implications for instructors, programs, and the field.