Caring Communities, launched in the North of Singapore in 2011, mobilise the power of community solutions to create connected neighbourhoods and strengthen residents’ natural capabilities to actively produce health, wellbeing and care, individually and collectively. Residents meet regularly at 39 community nodes to enjoy group activities. Health is explored opportunistically and stealthily in these activities, guided by salutogenic, place-based and asset-based approaches, and drawing on local culture and wisdom for adoption. By linking health with its wider determinants, Caring Communities reimagine how wellbeing can be experienced, and nurture a more sustainable, people-powered health ecosystem over time. Over 10,000 active residents demonstrate that they can take ownership of health with dignity and purpose, while professional healthcare expertise serves as a supportive safety net when necessary. These health-creating communities significantly improve quality of life and reduce healthcare utilisation and costs, showing the transformative power of community-led health.

Group Members

Dr Wong Sweet Fun, Overall Project Lead
Dr Ang Yan Hoon, Sub-Lead, post-discharge support
Dr James Low, Sub-Lead, end-of-life support
Dr Laurence Lean, Sub-Lead, end-of-life support

Social Media

https://www.ktph.com.sg/

Country

Singapore
Yishun and Sembawang

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New York City is a vibrant mosaic with over 800 languages being spoken, yet immigrant communities face significant language barriers as they navigate social, economic, and cultural life, with impacts reaching far beyond basic communication translating into lost benefits, reduced incomes, and worsening feelings of loneliness and mental health challenges.

The isolation caused by language gaps creates intense pressure on immigrants to learn English quickly. Many immigrant adult learners enter English classes hoping to overcome these challenges, but struggle to balance busy domestic and economic responsibilities, leading to low engagement, slow learning, and high dropout rates. Instead of focusing solely on what holds learners back, this project shifts focus to the incredible strengths learners already bring. For many Bangladeshi immigrant women in the Bronx, NYC, the Bangla language and food are vibrant cultural touchstones, a source of confidence, innovation, and history passed down through generations.

The Sapna Rannaghor Cookbook Project, co-designed in the English for Speakers of Other Language (ESOL) classes at Sapna NYC with emergent bilingual Bangladeshi immigrant women, centers these cultural assets and native Bangla language skills, using food and recipes as vehicles for building English proficiency and community. This scaffolded, strength-based learning approach emerged as a bilingual community cookbook with higher engagement and renewed pride among participants, demonstrating how care-driven, community-led design can transform adult education while honoring the fullness of immigrant identities.

Group Members

• 01. Co-designers
  Tahmina, Monzura, Niju, Bibi Mariom, Firoja, Sheule, Kowser, Shahinara, Shalufa, Shuratan, Sufia, Nadira. A collective of 13 Bangladeshi immigrant mothers (referenced here by their first names) who are homemakers and attending English for Speakers of Other Language (ESOL) classes at Sapna NYC. This is their first project engaging with any design thinking frameworks. They participated in the activities, shaped the designs, and developed recipes through the course of a year. The recipes represent the community’s cultural histories from across regions of Bangladesh. Through this process of building the Sapna Rannaghor cookbook, they are not just co-designers but also cookbook authors.
• 02. Educator
  Priyanka is an educator and community worker at Sapna NYC, a community organization transforming communities in the Bronx. Priyanka is the lead instructor of the English classes and is the facilitation and monitoring lead on this project set among beginner learners. Priyanka identified challenges with retention, attendance, and enrollment and set the questions for the collective.
• 03. Case Manager
  Shanaz is a case manager and community worker at Sapna NYC. Shanaz engages deeply with the community and supports Priyanka with managing the classes where there are students of different literacy levels within the same class. Shanaz was once a student at the ESOL classes and is a now a staff member at Sapna NYC currently supporting with survey and data collection projects.
• 04. Facilitator
  Susanti Vijaykumar is a graduate student from the MFA Design for Social Innovation program with a background in behavioral science. Susanti is the project manager and facilitator on this project, who established the collective and moderates co-design sessions with the community members.
• 05. Visual Designer
  Ananya Roche, is a designer based in India. Ananya helped identify the visual identity for the cookbook and was part of multiple iterations to ensure that the graphic identity of the cookbook mirrored the community design process.

Social Media

Country

USA
New York City

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BioBrew is a low-cost, open-source system that helps small coffee farms treat wastewater sustainably. It uses vermifiltration, a natural process where earthworms and microbes turn coffee pulp and acidic water into compost and liquid fertiliser. Co-developed with farmers in the Cauca region of Colombia, BioBrew addresses the issue of pollution from untreated coffee waste, which harms rivers and degrades soil. The system is modular, solar-powered, and made from locally available, affordable materials like PVC pipes and recycled coffee fermentation tanks. It’s easy to build, maintain, and scale according to farm size. Field testing showed that BioBrew reduces odour and improves water quality. By turning waste into a valuable resource, BioBrew supports sustainable farming and helps small coffee producers improve their land, income, and surrounding ecosystems.

Group Members

Felix Ke Chen, Lead Designer and Project Initiator

Social Media

https://felixchen.net/

Country

Colombia
Pescador, Caldono, Cauca

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Ruang2Gather advocates for collaborative efforts to transform underutilised school ruangs (Malay for “spaces”) into inclusive, innovative learning environments. Grounded in justice, empathy, and the belief that well-designed spaces should be accessible to all; this community-driven, volunteer-led initiative pilots a replicable co-design framework with teachers, students, and surrounding communities.

The initiative addresses the gap between national aspirations for 21st-century learning in Malaysia and the reality of constrained infrastructure funding, especially in underserved areas. Ruang2Gather aims to demonstrate how small-scale, high-empathy redesigns can spark meaningful change despite, or because of, limited resources.

Through its four-phase participatory process, the initiative empowers communities within and around schools as co-designers of their learning environments. At its core, Ruang2Gather makes people feel they had a hand not just in painting walls, but in shaping futures, together.

Group Members

Syaza Suraini, Project & Design Lead
Laila Razip, Community Engagement Lead
Shawn Stanly, Community Co-Lead & Teacher

Social Media

https://sites.google.com/view/malaysianlearningspaces

Country

Malaysia
Multiple locations

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Community health cadres (kader) are the frontline of Indonesia’s community-based primary healthcare, responsible for collecting data and delivering comprehensive care through preventive and promotive actions.

To support their vital role, the KaderKita project provides a digital decision support tool, co-designed directly with them. The tools enable cadres to record and track community health data across all life stages, even in low-connectivity areas. A connected dashboard empowers health offices and local leaders to supervise, validate, and plan more effectively.

Since its launch in April 2025, KaderKita has been embraced by thousands of cadres in rural Keerom (Papua) and urban Surabaya (Est Java), demonstrating how technology and co-design can transform frontline services and help Indonesia achieve its health-related Sustainable Development Goals.

Group Members

Bhagaskara Setiawan, Design Researcher, Somia CX
Gilang Nur Aidi, Interaction Designer, Somia CX
Ryan Nugraha, Project & Relationship Manager, Somia CX
Rispan Kendek, District Coordinator in Keerom, PATH
Yuhri Ikhsan, District Coordinator in Surabaya, PATH
Yoni Oktaviana Panjaitan, Program Associate in Keerom, PATH
Rizki Maulana, IT Project Manager, Rolling Glory

Country

Indonesia
Multiple locations

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Wâhkôhtowin is a Cree word meaning the kinship interwoven in relationships, communities, and natural systems. From an Indigenous perspective, wâhkôhtowin establishes a road map for guiding human actions and connections. The Exploring wâhkôhtowin board game aspires to spark Non-Indigenous people to start thinking about the meaning and impact of Treaty and how can we better our relations. It is a cooperative board game for 2 – 4 players which is played in rounds moving through the four seasons of the year. Each player represents an Indigenous family possessing the knowledge, skills, and resources for survival. As players move through the rounds, the event cards guide them through major events in the history of our shared territories. The Exploring wâhkôhtowin board game was created by The Edmonton Shift Lab, nurtured by the Yellowhead Indigenous Education Foundation and now resides with the Indigenous Knowledge & Wisdom Centre.

Group Members

Liam Burns, Digital game tester
Rabia Naseer, Project Manager
Shauntee Fryingpan, Resource Developer
James Knibb-Lamouche, Context Editor
Sameer Singh, Project Promoter
Roberta Taylor , Game Designer

Social Media

https://www.ikwc.org/

Country

Canada
Edmonton, Alberta

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The project empowers youth in remote Mongolian communities with Humanity-Centered Design principles to address local challenges. Through adaptable educational programs delivered directly to underserved regions, it cultivates a growth mindset and equips learners to design and lead community-driven sustainability initiatives. This approach not only strengthens their skills but also engages the wider community, creating lasting, positive impact.

Group Members

Anuujin Tsedenbal, Project Lead
Batsaikhan Byambadorj, Resource/Project Manager
Altangerel Tsedenbal, Support Staff/Project Assistant

While some team members have prior work experience, their contributions have not centered on developing and leading societal projects of this scale. This project represents a significant step in their early careers, allowing them to learn, grow, and make meaningful contributions to societal changes in Mongolia.

Social Media

Country

Mongolia
Multiple locations

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Aspergeronline ETS is a nonprofit initiative supporting autistic individuals, particularly those underserved by traditional systems. It provides a multilingual, neurodiversity-affirming digital platform offering peer support, educational content, and self-assessment tools. Designed for accessibility and cognitive comfort, the platform fosters inclusive community building, self-awareness, and advocacy through user-led initiatives, online training, and in-person events.

Group Members

Simone Favarin, President and Founder and Design Lead of Aspergeronline.org
Alessandra Carmen Maria Clerici, VP and Co-Founder of Aspergeronline.org
Danilo Dan Bonta, member of the board and development of Aspergeronline.org
Dott.sa Elisa Canavese, Co-Founder of Aspergeronline.org Scientific

Committee complete people list here: https://aspergeronline.org/associazione/

Country

Italy
Torino (Turin)

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SEED (Sparking Education and Empowerment for Development) is a student-led initiative born in collaboration between the Industrial University of Santander and Dautom, a digital transformation company from Colombia. It is a modular IIoT learning platform that empowers low-income students through hands-on educational experiences. By combining advanced technologies with community-driven design, SEED bridges the gap between academia and industry, equipping students with the skills needed to thrive in modern economies. The platform includes three case studies supported by portable learning modules, making complex industrial environments accessible and engaging for students. Rooted in inclusivity and open design, SEED is not only a tool for learning but also a catalyst for equity, collaboration, and empowerment, helping shape a new generation of professionals ready to drive social and technological transformation.

Group Members

Mariana Gómez, UX/UI and product designer
Juan Pablo Díaz, Electronical design and implementation
Juliam Diaz, UNS developer
Felipe Rubio, Radio Astronomy station design and implementation
Jhonatan Gomez, Microgrid IoT design and implementation

Country

Colombia
Bucaramanga, Santander

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The Conservation Coalition by Tech4Good Community is shaping a bold new infrastructure for ecological restoration in India by building an open, digital backbone for conservation intelligence. By weaving together diverse knowledge systems and grounding them in digital resilience, it is laying the foundation for long-term ecological stewardship, equipping communities to conserve and support the restoration of the living systems we all depend on.

It is an initiative anchored in trust, shaped by a listening-first approach, driving interoperability across data, technology, and people. Technology is co-created in collaboration with ecologists, field practitioners, technologists & funders, grounded in scientific approaches and community interactions to drive insightful, data-driven conservation efforts while preserving the local and traditional knowledge that sustains complex ecosystems.

Group Members

Rinju Rajan, Funding & Design Strategy Lead
Anusha Bhargava, Program Manager & Narrative Lead
Prashanth Balasubramanian, Engineering & Platform Development Lead Prashanth
Vidya Sridhar, Community Engagement & Impact Lead

Social Media

https://www.tech4goodcommunity.com/

Country

India
Multiple locations

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Sanskruti Shukla is an Indian systems designer and researcher whose work explores how participatory craft can revitalise endangered knowledge systems and enable regenerative futures. Educated at the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad with a focus on textile design , she facilitates co-creation workshops where communities learn directly from their environment, treating the landscape as an open design school. Her practice engages with rural and indigenous groups, including communities without a historical craft lineage, to develop practical frameworks that allow them to record, adapt, and share knowledge that might otherwise disappear. Through her projects, she helps communities create not just objects but living archives that link memory, making, market, and resource stewardship to strengthen local economies and difficult ecologies and foster inter-community exchange. Her work has been presented at Desi Oon, Travancore Palace, and Bharat Textiles, and published in the Global InCH Journal of Living Heritage and the Surface Design Association. Recognition by the Don Norman Design Award affirms her commitment to design as a catalyst for regenerative, community-led change. She is currently a resident artist for Goethe Institute and Alliance Francaise Madras in Chennai, India.

Group Members

Sanskruti Shukla, Systems Designer
Junu Gurung, Tanuja Gurung, Shanti Gurung, Bishnu, Sarla Gurung, Deepika Gurung, Naina Gurung, Primary participants and co-authors of the project

Social Media

Country

India
Chuba village, Sikkim

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Program: Bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design

This design program integrates Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) across its curriculum, emphasizing dignity, ethics, and social responsibility. Students engage with real-world challenges through courses such as:

• Projects I–III: Exploring well-being, sustainability, identity, inclusion, and community-based design through hands-on projects and ethnographic research.
• Ethnography: Training in fieldwork and empathy-driven methods to understand people in context.
• Person and Transcendence & Ethics: Philosophical and ethical foundations of design practice.
• Design Experience: Examining design’s role in shaping relationships, identity, and social change.
• Design Research Seminars I & II: Applied research aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
• Social Responsibility and Sustainability: Addressing design’s systemic, cultural, and political impacts.

Complemented by core courses in anthropology, humanism, leadership, and ethics, the program prepares designers to act as transformative agents—combining critical thinking, empathy, and creativity to co-create inclusive and sustainable solutions.

Students

Since 2017, the design program has integrated Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+), reshaping its long-standing curriculum around empathy, ethics, and social responsibility. This shift, applied across core courses like Projects I–III, has involved about 440 students, with 280 graduating under the HCD+ framework. Overall, the program has produced over 1,100 graduates, with recent cohorts increasingly focused on social and environmental issues. Guided by the methodological framework “Social Experience Design for the Common Good”, developed through doctoral research, HCD+ now permeates the curriculum, positioning design as a tool for social transformation and critical, human-centered practice.

Country

Mexico
México

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Program: Design Leaders Programme

Executive Programme for Design by Future London Academy is the only MBA-equivalent made specifically for Creative Directors and Design Leaders with 15+ years of experience who want to get a better understanding of business processes, become greater leaders, and take their careers and business internationally. The programme is broken into five intensive modules in London and California and is taught by the industry’s top CEOs, CFOs, Investors and Design Leaders from companies like AKQA, Zaha Hadid Architects, Google and Saatchi & Saatchi.

Inspired by Bauhaus principles, the five modules are focused around five layers: Being a Better Human, Building Better Products, Building Better Teams, Building Better Companies and Building a Better World. With topics including Business Strategy, Finance, Operations, Leadership, Culture and Team Management, the programme helps design leaders to navigate every aspect of modern business while maintaining a purpose-driven and human-centred approach.

Students

The Design Leaders programme currently hosts 30 delegates in its latest cohort. Since its launch in 2020, Humanity-Centered Design has served as the philosophical foundation of the curriculum, shaping all five modules with “Human” topics at their core. This structure ensures participants develop the skills to lead with empathy, responsibility, and humanity-centered values at the heart of their decision-making. To date, 63 graduates have successfully completed the programme and are now applying these principles within organizations worldwide.

Social Media

Country

UK
London

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Program: Florence

The Florence Project, located at the Bezalel Design and Innovation Lab at Soroka Hospital, represents a pioneering model of human-centered education rooted in real-world challenges. This collaboration immerses design and architecture students directly into the daily realities of a working hospital, empowering them to co-design meaningful, sustainable solutions alongside medical staff and patients.

At the heart of the project lies a commitment to human-centered design—an approach that places empathy, user needs, and lived experience at the core of every design decision. Students relocate to Be’er Sheva for an entire semester, embedding themselves in hospital wards to observe and interact with the people most affected by systemic healthcare challenges. Through direct engagement with hospital staff, patients, and caregivers, they gain an intimate understanding of the physical, emotional, and logistical dimensions of care environments.

Guided by an interdisciplinary team of Bezalel faculty and hospital mentors, students use design thinking methods—empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test—to develop solutions tailored to real human needs. This process is not hypothetical or confined to the classroom. It is deeply experiential, requiring students to respond to the constraints, urgencies, and sensitivities of the healthcare system in real time.

Ultimately, the Florence Project redefines what it means to learn design. It offers a human-centered learning environment where students don’t just study systems—they inhabit them, question them, and work to improve them. In doing so, it bridges the gap between academic knowledge and human impact, preparing a new generation of designers to engage with the world not just as problem solvers, but as compassionate, informed partners in change.

The Florence Project demonstrates the power of field-based, human-centered design education. It equips students not just with technical skills, but with empathy, resilience, and the ability to navigate complexity. Many alumni have since pursued careers in healthcare design or selected final projects aligned with healthcare innovation, attesting to the lasting impact of this intensive, immersive experience.

Students

Social Media

Country

Israel
Jerusalem

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Program: Accelerate Impact Guide: Human-Centered Design for Social Innovation

At its best, Human-Centered Design empowers those closest to a problem to create innovative and sustainable solutions. However, those facing some of the world’s greatest areas of need are often least able to access tools like HCD – even outside acute crises, international development work traditionally relies upon outside funders and local elites who have little understanding of on-the-ground needs, especially when it affects people like women and children who are less likely to access systems of power.

The Aga Khan Foundation (AKF)—an international development organization and agency of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) and one of the world’s largest NGOs—wanted to change this dynamic. A team at AKF sought to create an innovation process rooted in HCD. This initiative aimed to equip teams working in some of the world’s most marginalized communities with structured, accessible tools to drive social innovation.

Five years in the making, the Accelerate Impact Guide to Human-Centered Design for Social Innovation is a comprehensive set of resources designed to democratize design methods for those tackling entrenched social challenges. Developed in collaboration with AKF’s Accelerate Impact team, this initiative is a cornerstone of AKF’s global efforts to co-create innovative solutions with communities, amplifying their voices and increasing the organization’s collective impact.

The process and tools developed democratizes design methods in an ethical, rigorous way. This process centers the ethics and consequences of a solution as well. The co-design tools ask leaders to rethink their relationship to the community in order to engage those closest to the problem in authentic collaboration. Our approachable, open-source tools will help teams working in the social impact space to take on the complexity of challenging the status quo, reducing suffering and making the world a more equitable and more humane place.

Students

More than 100 participants have been formally trained on these tools. Because they have been published for free on the website, we hope to reach many hundreds if not thousands more.

Social Media

Country

USA
Multiple locations

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Program: Design for Social Innovation

The HCD+ program offers courses including Whakapapa Design I–III, Design Justice, and Service Design, grounded in Mauri Ora, a holistic approach to individual, social, and environmental well-being. The methodology draws on Māori tikanga (values) and matauranga Māori (knowledge), emphasizing intergenerational experiences, justice, equity, sustainability, and wellbeing. Students explore local communities through stories, whakapapa (legacy), and place-based methods, fostering whanaungatanga (relationships), manaakitanga (care), ngā manakura (empathy), turangawaewae (belonging), and kaitiakitanga (stewardship). The program centers on collaborative projects with community leaders, iwi elders, and industry partners. Students learn wānanga and talanoa methods to conduct research as a reciprocal relationship and participate in field trips to deepen contextual understanding. Projects prioritize rangatiratanga (self-determination), ensuring impacted communities are actively involved in equitable and sustainable solutions. Indigenous academics and tutors are integral to teaching.

The curriculum follows the Māori adage Ko Au, Ko Koe, Ko Tatau:

• First-year (Ko Au – I Am): Focus on self-awareness and positionality.
• Second-year (Ko Koe – You Are): Build authentic, reciprocal relationships emphasizing co-design and equity.
• Third-year (Ko Tatau – We Are): Foster stewardship and co-creation, supporting communities’ autonomy in implementing solutions.

The program’s staff have received awards for innovative, relational, equitable, and co-design teaching approaches.

Students

The DSI program, now nine years old, embeds HCD+ principles through matauranga Māori at its core. It currently enrolls 40 undergraduate students, 6 Master’s, and 9 PhD candidates, with around 80 students having completed HCD+ as a minor. Three DSI courses are now core to the BDI degree, reaching 150–200 non-DSI undergraduates per year. All Master’s students take courses incorporating HCD+, totaling 60–65 students annually.

The program is highly interdisciplinary, attracting students from Health, Architecture, Psychology, Anthropology, Communication, UX, Service, Industrial, and Interaction Design, and requires DSI students to take a minor outside their program. DSI has contributed to two new interdisciplinary degrees at Victoria University, launched in 2023–2024, further expanding HCD+ principles in industry and practice.

Postgraduate research focuses on co-design and social impact, including:

• Design Us In – addressing teenage isolation through third spaces.
• Pathways to Pākehā/Tauiwi self-reflection – exploring racism in public sector systems and using board games to shift understanding and behaviour.
• Compassion Informed Co-Design – examining how compassion skills support designers to address inequity and promote well-being.

Country

New Zealand
Wellington

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Program: Bachelors in Design and Masters in Design

The Systems Design program at Institute of Design, JKLU (India) is an educational project rooted in HCD+ principles, integrated into the BDes and MDes courses. The pedagogy addresses big picture systemic challenges, including education, healthcare, public policy, sustainability, manufacturing and disaster management, contextually rooted in India and lensed from a co-design perspective. The program enables students to approach systemic issues by developing capabilities of understanding deep complexities and contextualities, identifying leverage points for interventions and delivering collaborative, responsible systemic design solutions. The students work in a hybrid embedded model – within the studio at the design school and embedded in the community – creating an immersive, collaborative context. The program has so far collaborated with communities and organisations, ranging from state-owned public transport companies, public policy thinktanks, rural government at the grassroots level, award-winning NGOs working in road safety and disaster management, experimental sustainable community housing projects to private for-profit manufacturing companies. The program resulted in impactful systemic solutions in the areas of rural community healthcare, education, worker well-being, sustainability, public transport experience, accessibility, dignity in mobility for differently abled, manufacturing processes innovation, and many more.

Students

Currently, 242 students are enrolled in the HCD+ program, which has been running for six years. Since its inception, 60 students have successfully graduated. Students earn degree certifications in Design, with a Bachelor’s program typically taking four years and a Master’s program two years to complete. Proficiency is assessed through a combination of coursework, written examinations, design project outcomes, and juried presentations that include faculty, industry experts, and community representatives. Professional experience is built into the curriculum through a two-month internship and a six-month graduation design project, ensuring graduates are well prepared for real-world practice.

Social Media

Country

India
Jaipur, Rajasthan

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Program: Design Research: Community-Based Design Education and Social Transform

The Design Research course in the Bachelor of Design program at the University of Fortaleza positions design as a practice of social transformation in the Global South, preparing designers to work in territories marked by social vulnerability while fostering community autonomy and systemic impact. Grounded in Paulo Freire’s pedagogy and the principles of Humanity-Centered Design, it is based on the understanding that designing is a social act of freedom – collective, solidarity-based, and oriented toward alterity. To this end, it weaves together design research and community work in a replicable, scalable model that places community practice at the core of design education. Structured in three cycles – attentive listening, co-creation, and community ownership – since 2023 it has engaged more than 150 students in co-creating 21 solutions with partner communities. This trajectory has generated epistemic, ethical, and community transformations within the program, repositioning its social role across local territories and graduating professionals equipped to face real, complex, and systemic challenges.

Students

Since 2023, the Design Research course has embedded Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) as its foundation, training about 150 students across four semesters. Open to Design majors and students from diverse fields, the course emphasizes interdisciplinary and socially diverse cohorts, which strengthens students’ ability to listen, co-create, and prototype with communities. Current projects include training community health agents, developing self-care learning tools, designing community health education materials, and improving children’s experiences in medical procedures through creative storytelling. By 2027, the program expects to train around 300 students equipped to drive socially transformative design in vulnerable territories.

Social Media

Country

Brazil
Fortaleza, Ceará

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Program: Non-Bionormative Prosthesis Design

Exploring Non-Bionormative Prosthesis Design at Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (MOME), Budapest reimagines design education through humanity-centered practice and lived, situative experience. Led by Renata Dezso in collaboration with artist Luca Szabados, the program integrates critical disability studies with Research through Design. With Luca as co-educator, students engage in co-Ability frameworks that move beyond human-centered processes toward situated co-creation. Prosthetic prototypes become discursive tools, continually refined through practice. This approach engages the complex ecosystem of people, living beings, and the physical environment. Students carry these experiences forward into their own projects, fostering solutions that address root issues rather than surface problems, and shaping futures grounded in humanity and shared responsibility.

Students

The HCD+ program has offered a series of evolving courses since 2019, beginning with Design for Care and later expanding into more interdisciplinary and co-Ability–focused approaches. Enrollment has included 36 students across the early Design for Care courses (7 + 17 + 12) and 22 students in the Non-Bionormative Prosthesis Design course (14 + 8), for a total of 58 students. All participants have successfully graduated, with the exception of those currently completing the most recent Non-Bionormative Prosthesis Design course.

Social Media

Country

Hungary
Budapest

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Chalkpiece is a design-led learning initiative dedicated to reimagining education for children from underserved communities. Through storytelling, design thinking, and hands-on workshops, Chalkpiece creates joyful spaces where young minds can explore creativity, imagination, and problem-solving. We work closely with schools to build classroom libraries, introduce design education, and empower children with skills that go beyond textbooks. Our vision is to nurture curiosity, confidence, and creativity in every child, giving them the tools to dream bigger and build brighter futures. By blending design with education, Chalkpiece strives to create meaningful learning experiences that are inclusive, playful, and impactful.

Group Members

Ramya Sreenivasan – President
Kavya Jyothi P S – Secretary
Siva Malathi – Treasurer
Nandhini – Fundraising Coordinator
Hariharan – Technical Head
Dypali – UX/UI Consultant
Sri Hari – UX/UI design Mentor
Gomathi – UX/UI Designer
Mukesh – Managing Coordinator

Social Media

Country

India
Chennai, Tamilnadu

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Building on over two decades of Goonj’s work in addressing menstrual health and hygiene in India, this initiative is rooted in the belief that dignity must never be compromised by silence or stigma. In rural India, millions of women continue to experience menstruation in secrecy, with limited access to safe products and entrenched cultural taboos. This initiative seeks to change that reality by combining access, awareness, affordability and action. Through MY Pads — affordable, reusable cloth pads made from recycled cotton — Goonj offers a sustainable solution, while Chuppi Todo Baithaks (Break the Silence meetings) create safe platforms for dialogue, knowledge sharing, and dismantling of myths. Each kit represents more than hygiene — it stands for dignity, resilience, and recognition of women’s rights. Linked with community-led water, sanitation, and hygiene efforts, the initiative promotes holistic well-being while reducing waste. By reaching 8,650 women with 17,300 MY Pad kits across India, Goonj transforms menstrual health into empowerment, equity, and lasting rural change.

Group Members

Garima Singh (Team Member): Garima leads the management of urban partnerships and collection drives, playing a crucial role in mobilizing material resources and raising urban awareness around menstrual health. She is responsible for organizing and overseeing urban collection camps, where surplus materials are gathered, sorted, and channeled toward rural production units. Garima also ensures timely and comprehensive project reporting for urban activities, maintaining accountability and transparency in donor communication and project evaluations. Khushboo Chaurasiya (Team Member): Khushboo provides overall project supervision across both urban and rural geographies. She ensures the seamless integration of operational activities between material collection in urban areas and grassroots implementation in rural regions. Her role involves stakeholder coordination, and capacity-building support to rural communities, ensuring that the project remains aligned with its dignity-led, community-powered model.

Sreya Basu (Team Member): Sreya plays a pivotal role in project documentation and reporting, capturing both qualitative and quantitative outcomes of the initiative. She is responsible for curating field narratives, impact stories, and case studies, which not only support internal learning but also form an essential part of external communications to partners, donors, and wider audiences. Priya Shukla (Team Member): Priya supports the team through comprehensive documentation and reporting efforts, focusing on maintaining a structured record of activities, beneficiary feedback, and field-level changes. Her work helps create evidence-based reports that highlight the impact of the project on menstrual health outcomes, community behavior change, and overall progress toward Sustainable Development Goals.

Our early-career status brings fresh perspectives, adaptability, and an openness to co-creating with communities, which is at the heart of Goonj’s Human-Centered Design+ (HCD+) approach. As young professionals entrusted with significant responsibilities, we exemplify the role that emerging social leaders can play in shaping equitable and sustainable health solutions for underserved communities.

Social Media

Country

India
Multiple locations

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The Design to Action Networks (DANs), developed by the UC San Diego Design Lab, were designed by James White to activate World Design Capital 2024’s (WDC 2024) six thematic focus areas by connecting people, projects, and institutions through a shared commitment to community design-led change. The Design to Action Networks (DANs) supported and accelerated civic design in a binational, community-driven context. They treated design not as outside consultancy but as civic infrastructure: a process that communities could own, adapt, and sustain.

While the DANs were developed as a signature project of WDC 2024, they were not framed as “one-off” projects, but rather they aimed to seed long-term networks, across health, education, culture, and environment — networks capable of holding trust, aligning actors, and building confidence that communities could design their shared future.

For a deep dive into the DAN architecture, lessons and recommendations in applying design as a civic practice in their own contexts, download the white paper – Designing in Action.

Group Members

LEGACY DIRECTOR: James K. White
LEAD PROJECT MANAGER: Olivia Gale
ARTS & CULTURE LEADS: Susanna Peredo Swap & Rodolfo Argote
CLIMATE & SUSTAINABILITY LEADS: Lunna Pigatto & Hernando Dúran
HEALTH & WELLBEING LEADS: Jesse Rutherford & Angela Lucia Serrano Carrasco
PLANNING & PLACEMAKING LEADS: Bruce Appleyard & Dinorah Gonzalez
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LEADS: Bianca Alvarado & Maximo Matus Ruiz
YOUTH & EDUCATION LEADS: Jorge Francisco Sánchez & Joe Erpelding
STRATEGIC ADVISOR: Dr. Mai Nguyen

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https://designlab.ucsd.edu/education/white-papers/designing-in-action/index.html

Country

USA
San Diego Tijuana Binational Region

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Shraddha Maanu Foundation (SMF) is a grassroots nonprofit in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, working with marginalized graduate housewives and children to create lasting change in communities through education. Our dual-impact, human-centric model enables educated women to reclaim dignity and meaningful livelihoods through the UPASANA educator-training program, while improving foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN) for underserved children through VIPASANA.

Women are trained in pedagogy, teaching methodologies, classroom management, digital literacy and life skills, continually mentored and placed in schools part-time, close to their homes—building trust, ensuring retention and strengthening local ecosystems. Children experience joyful, activity-based learning that extends into families and communities, sparking intergenerational change.

Since 2018, SMF has trained over 500 women and impacted 5,000+ children across 28 districts. SMF is building scalable, community-led transformation by addressing the root causes of exclusion & learning gaps while aligning with SDG 4 (Quality Education for all) and SDG 5 (Gender Equality).

Group Members

Ms. Madhumati Narayanan – Founder & CEO
Ms. Meena Chidambaram – Head – Content & Curriculum
Mr. Yesu Raj A. – Head – Program Operations
Ms. Suchitra R. – Lead – Women Livelihood & Development Programs
Ms. Vidhya Gopalakrishnan – Head – VIPASANA Program Delivery
Mr. Ramesh Nagarajan – Head – Finance, Admin & Accounts

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Country

India
Chennai, Tamil Nadu

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Inclusion Champions & Century Square Prayer Room: Frasers Property Singapore implemented design-led initiatives to enhance accessibility and inclusion across its retail spaces. The Inclusion Champions Programme transformed malls into accessible hubs for persons with disabilities and elderly shoppers, training 120+ frontline staff, introducing “calm hours,” and establishing Dementia Go-To Points. The Century Square Muslim Prayer Room was co-designed with the community, providing a dignified, gender-separated space validated through user feedback. These initiatives improved daily experiences for diverse users, received strong community approval, and influenced wider adoption of inclusive, human-centered design practices across the company’s retail portfolio, supporting SDGs 10 (Reduced Inequalities), 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), and 17 (Partnerships for the Goals).

Group Members

Su Lin Soon – Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Frasers Property Singapore
Adrian Tan – Director, Head of Retail, Frasers Property Singapore

Country

Singapore

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Fundación IDEA is a Mexican non-profit think-and-do tank that strengthens public institutions through systemic, human-centered design. Our work focuses on transforming justice and security systems to prevent and respond more effectively to gender-based violence. We have co-designed over 120 tools and protocols with police, prosecutors, judges, and Women’s Justice Centers. These tools promote coordinated, victim-centered, and gender-sensitive responses to femicide and intimate partner violence.

Working across four Mexican states, Fundación IDEA has trained over 2,000 public officials and supported the institutional adoption of long-term reforms. Our approach embeds Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) principles—co-creation, systems thinking, and iterative learning—into public sector transformation.

We believe public systems can and must be reimagined to restore dignity, protection, and justice to the women they serve.

Group Members

Jessica Beitman-Maya, Partner and Chief of Party
Marco Antonio López-Silva, Partner and Chief of Party

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Country

Mexico
México

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EduWeave Foundation is dedicated to ensuring equitable learning opportunities for every child, starting from early childhood and continuing through their schooling years. 

‘Gadhbo Bachpan’ – Carving Childhood is an initiative by EduWeave Foundation, in collaboration with the Department of Women and Child Development, Chhattisgarh, transforming Anganwadis in Raipur district into vibrant centres of Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE). Anchored in the belief that the early years form the foundation for lifelong learning, the project strengthens foundational skills, improves school readiness, enhances classroom practices, builds system-wide capacity and engages communities as partners in children’s learning.

Implemented in phases, it began with 61 Anganwadis and has expanded to all 1,945 in Raipur, reaching nearly 62,400 children. Key achievements include:

• Increased “school-ready” children from 3.43% to 75.76% in the first phase.
• Extended instructional time from 30 minutes to 2 hours in 80% of Anganwadis.
• Trained 100% of facilitators and supervisors in ECCE.
• Engages 25,000 parents through ECCE Day regularly.

Gadhbo Bachpan demonstrates how systemically co-created and community-driven projects can create lasting impact in foundational education.

Group Members

Amita Kaushik – Project Director
Baitanik – Project Design
Abha – Capacity Building
Anuj – Project Manager
Bharti – Content Development

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Country

India
Bengaluru

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Mantra4Change enables quality education, reaching 2,50,000+ schools across nine states in India. Samartha, its School Leadership Development program, believes schools transform through people, not mandates. It empowers school leaders (SLs), teachers, parents, and students to lead change. Guided by HCD+ principles, Samartha nurtures leadership through collaborative problem-solving: identifying challenges, uncovering root causes, and co-designing solutions. District and Block mentors support SLs in establishing sustainable structures and processes. SLs create opportunities for children to lead initiatives that foster socio-emotional growth and 21st-century skills, encourage teachers to make classrooms engaging, and conduct effective PTMs to make parents active partners. Learning Circles provide SLs a platform to share best-practices, reflect, and solve problems collectively. Pragati Hejje showcases bring communities together to celebrate progress and reinforce shared ownership.

By embracing co-creation, iteration, and systemic thinking, Samartha transforms schools into ownership-driven ecosystems where collaboration and innovation enable enriching learning experiences for every child.

Group Members

Santosh More – Co-Founder & Director
Mohammad Rafi MT – Director, Programs
Praveen Rao – Senior Program Lead, Operations
Sindhushree Swamygowda – Senior Program Lead, Research and Development
Shama Kamble – Program Lead, Solutions Design

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Country

India
Bangalore, Karnataka

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Health District@Queenstown is a pioneering initiative creating an inclusive, future-ready community that supports healthy and active aging. By integrating government agencies, private partners, and community stakeholders, the project replaced fragmented senior services with a unified engagement platform focused on citizen needs. Immersive research included journey mapping for different senior personas, large-scale citizen engagement events, co-creation sessions, and observational community walks, ensuring solutions were deeply informed by seniors’ experiences. Key outcomes include the creation of Silver Zones for safer pedestrian access, Gym Tonic programs to combat frailty, integrated health outreach for screenings and vaccinations, and collaborative care models combining medical and social support. Systemic innovations span infrastructure, programs, and technology, including an anti-frailty health curriculum. Additionally, 24 government officers were trained in service design and qualitative research methods, building public sector capacity and fostering long-term improvements in citizen-centered service delivery.

Group Members

Teo Linyou, Principal Design Lead
Joleen Thang, Senior Design Lead
Yu Kexin, Design Lead
Yang XinHui, Associate Design Lead

Country

Singapore

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Involve puts students at the center of learning in India’s government schools. We train older students to mentor younger peers in small groups, helping them master foundational literacy and numeracy while the mentors practice communication, problem-solving, and care for their community. We also create opportunities for students to experience leadership in schools and communities. The approach works in the toughest contexts—multi-grade classrooms, single-teacher schools, and low-resource blocks—because it draws on the one asset every school has: its students.
Our team partners with district education departments in Karnataka, Bihar, and Uttar Pradesh to integrate peer teaching into teacher training, timetables, and monitoring so it lasts beyond projects. We complement this with student parliaments, reflection circles, and a WhatsApp-based teacher coach to keep classrooms student-led. Early studies show meaningful gains in learning and confidence, and girls are stepping forward as student leaders in large numbers. Our goal is simple: every child learns, leads, and believes their voice matters.

Group Members

Samyak Jain – Co-founder
Divanshu Kumar – Co-founder
Dr. Pratibha Narayanan – Co-founder
Ashwini Ramakrishnan – Director, People & Culture

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Country

India
Bengaluru, Karnataka

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Commenhers is a sustainability-driven creative studio that transforms textile waste into innovative upcycled products. Founded on the belief that fashion can be both stylish and environmentally responsible, we focus on circular design, community engagement, and education to inspire conscious consumption. Through our B2B upcycling solution, hands-on workshops, collaborations with local beneficiary makers, and sustainable production practices, we empower individuals and businesses to rethink waste and embrace upcycling as a meaningful solution to fashion’s environmental impact.

Group Members

Nuryanee Anishah (Co-Founder and CEO) combines a strong business foundation with a personal connection to the fashion industry and textile waste. Her passion for fashion and stitching fuels the company’s focus on sustainable practices. Linn (Co-Founder and CFO) brings financial expertise, ensuring the company remains financially sound and scalable with his background in business and accounting. Syakura (Head Designer and Product Manager), with a Material Science degree and fashion training, excels at valorizing textile waste and designing high-quality products. The interns (Aiman, Thi Han, Shermaine, Christina, Manashree) support various tasks across partnerships, media, finance, design, and production, contributing fresh perspectives and agility to the team. Together, the team’s combined expertise in business, design, finance, and operations allows Commenhers to make a meaningful impact on sustainable fashion.

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Country

Singapore

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Rooted in Wusong Paotaiwan National Wetland Park in Baoshan，Shanghai, and supported by the Baoshan Riverside Committee and the Park, the project employs systemic design methods to address the challenge of plastic bottles and fishing waste brought into rivers by tidal currents. Following the HCD+ principles, it emphasises inclusivity and community empowerment in building zero-waste communities. More than 70% of the regular volunteers are local women, many in transitional stages of life. Through training, they have grown into “Tidal Waste Navigators”, responsible for guiding on-site waste sorting.

As of October this year, the project has conducted 25 community actions, collecting and sorting a total of 956 kilograms of waste. It has mobilized over 616 participants and 43 organizations. Moving forward, the project plans to collaborate with more institutions along the Yangtze River’s main stem, aiming to establish cross-regional environmental partnerships.

The project will develop a citizen science database to record brand and plastic codes, enhancing public awareness of waste management. Beyond cleaning up the coastal environment, the project also fosters community leadership and explores a replicable and scalable pathway for sustainable coastal governance, showcasing the vast potential of HCD+ in driving social innovation and ecological protection.

The project was initiated by Yang Xin of the Yangtze Estuary Green Development Promotion Centre, with Wen Lu from the College of Design and Innovation, Tongji University, serving as co-initiator and chief planner, and Jing Chen from Shanghai University of Medicine and Health Sciences responsible for designing the project’s safety and emergency response plan as well as data processing. The execution team includes Peijian Zhong, Shile Shi, Weirong Wang, Yin Yang, and Lan Guo from the Yangtze Estuary Green Development Promotion Centre, together with youth assistant Gefei Han from Shanghai High School.

Group Members

Lu Wen, Chief Planner, Co-Initiator, Board Member of the Yangtze Estuary Green Development Promotion Center
Yang Xin, Project Initiator, Director of the Estuary Yangtze Green Development Promotion Centre
Chen Jing, Project safety & emergency planning, Data Processing
Zhong Peijian, Project Executive, Activity site coordinator
Shi Shile, Project Operation
Wang Weirong, Project Executive, Volunteer Trainer
Yang Yin, Project Executive, Volunteer Trainer
Guo Lan, Project Executive, Volunteer Trainer
Han Gefei, Youth Assistant
Lou Yongqi, Advisors
Silvia Barbero, Advisors
Amina Pereno, Advisors
Liu Long, Advisors

Social Media

Country

China
Shanghai

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From the National Design Office of Cuba, the VIAS Project – Friendly Design, tackles a demographic and social challenge: population ageing. It focuses on older women, and we investigate their real, physical, and emotional clothing needs. We reject stereotypes and propose clothing as a “second skin” that supports autonomy, comfort, and identity.

We employ participatory co-design methodologies, where the users are the protagonists. This has enabled us to define key principles of habitability: ergonomics, adaptation to bodily changes, materials, technologies, and economic accessibility.

Our work serves as a bridge between design and social wellbeing. The essence of the project honours the lives and dignity of older Cuban women, acknowledging their fundamental role in society. VIAS celebrates their wisdom and resilience – it is design with a human touch.

Group Members

Carmen Gómez Pozo / Directora de Registro y Desarrollo Profesional / Coordinador y líder del proyecto VIAS
Gisela De La C. Herrero García / Jefa De Oficina ONDi /Coordinaciones con las organizaciones nacionales e internacionales
Boris Luis León Valdivia /Vice Jefe ONDi /Coordinador de las tareas de Diseño Industrial
Yamilet Pino Nicó / Directora de Evaluación / Coordinadora Metodológica
Sandra Haug Morales / Experta en Evaluación y Diagnóstico / Coordinadora de las tareas de Diseño de Comunicación Visual
Isabella De La Caridad Cruz Santi / Especialista en Gestión de Diseño / Desarrolla la Comunicación Visual del Proyecto
Marian Cabrera Rondón / Especialista B en Diseño / Investigación y desarrollo en materia de Diseño Industrial
Gabriela Crespo Bustamante / Especialista B en Diseño / Investigación y desarrollo en materia de Diseño Industrial
Jenni Tamara Álvarez Pérez /Especialista B en Gestión Documental /Coordinadora de las acciones con la comunidad

Country

Cuba
La Habana

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TogetherNow is a nonprofit social care enterprise working to transform how people access services across healthcare, education, human services and the public sector. Our mission is to remove systemic barriers and help individuals receive coordinated, dignified support — without having to become experts in fragmented systems. TogetherNow’s model combines digital infrastructure and human-centered design to create inclusive, accountable systems that work with people, not on them.

Our flagship tool, MyWayfinder – https://my-wayfinder.org/home, helps people find and connect with services, track their needs, and build a care team of trusted providers. Beyond the technology, we lead cross-sector collaboratives, facilitate workflow redesign with frontline staff, and teach others in our community how to use Human-Centered Design (HCD) to improve service delivery.

TogetherNow advances SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions) by making public service systems more human-centered, coordinated, and accessible, particularly for communities affected by poverty and systemic inequities.

Group Members

Laura Gustin, President

Country

USA
New York

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In the forests of Indonesia, the highlands of India, and across communities throughout Asia and the majority world, skilled artisans, entrepreneurs, and innovators have spent generations developing solutions that are deeply rooted in their environment — handmade goods, natural ingredients, traditional foods, and sustainable practices that have stood the test of time. This knowledge is rare, deeply human, and increasingly hard to find. AHANA exists to change that as a sourcing and advisory platform that connects impact-driven small- and medium-size businesses, artisan communities, eco-focused brands, and grassroots innovators from across the “majority world” to businesses and partners globally. From traditional craftspeople to problem-solving entrepreneurs building sustainable solutions for modern challenges — if it creates genuine impact, AHANA is interested.

What makes AHANA different is simple: they don’t just facilitate transactions. They work directly on the ground with communities, brands, and entrepreneurs across Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Tibet, and beyond — building long-term relationships that ensure fair pay, preserve traditional knowledge, and create lasting economic opportunity where it matters most.

For businesses, this means access to verified, high-quality products and partners with a genuine story behind them. For the communities and enterprises we work with, it means visibility, stable income, and a seat at the global table.

AHANA is built on the belief that the best solutions to our biggest challenges — climate, inequality, broken supply chains — already exist in the majority world. They just need the right platform, the right partners, and the right support to reach their full potential.

Group Members

Aparna Bhatnagar Saxena – Founder & CEO

Social Media

Country

Indonesia
Jakarta

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