I had the pleasure of teaching as the lead instructor alongside a team of incredible creative thinkers for the UCLA Sci|Art Nanolab Summer Institute this year. Our theme was Systems Thinking and to get the students started off on the first day I conducted the workshop “Thinking Geometrically” based on the designs and philosophy of Buckminster Fuller, a master in systems thinking who introduced the concept of “Spaceship Earth,” instilling the awareness of the whole planet as our home that requires a whole-systems understanding to make sure that we maintain it in full life-supporting conditions. Building geometric forms helped us conceptualize systems and structures from the nano scale to the macro scale.

Throughout the course the instructors and I mentored the students in the development of prototypes and in imagining the impossible, using hands on knowledge and lectures as points of departure for their ideation processes.