Speculative Design Workshops

University campus with streets and sidewalks — **Image Description:** View from above of a university campus with streets and sidewalks leading between the buildings up a hill.

Disability, Critical Design, and Collective Access, SUNY Upstate Medical University, April 19, 2017

Concrete ramp spiraling down a hillside, with stairs — **Image Description:** View from above of a concrete ramp spiraling down a hillside, with stairs on the left side. In the distance are trees, buildings, and pedestrians walking on a path away from the camera. Parked bicycles are visible at the bottom of the hill.

This workshop convened students, faculty, and staff from Syracuse University and SUNY Upstate Medical School to strategize approaches to collective access on university campuses. Universities are spaces in which power and social norms often coalesce in the structures of built environments. While "accessibility" may often appear as a value in planning decisions, questions remain of what types of bodies and minds appear qualified to be university citizens. This interactive workshop considered medical, social, and cultural approaches to disability and design.

It examined the concept of "accessibility" as it manifests in built environments, social relations, and medical encounters. Then, participants engaged in speculative design projects to re-imagine particular design problems, drawing upon their lived experiences and knowledge of built environments to identify methods for world-building based in collective, participatory, and sustainable action.