Hasso Plattner Institute of Design

At the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the “d.school”) we challenge students to tackle some of the world’s most urgent problems.

We work with nonprofit, corporate and public entities to develop projects that address real‐world problems. Your gift enables the d.school to advance its big‐picture vision: a fundamental shift in how people teach, practice and think about creativity and innovation.

$5 million

Directorship

Demonstrating confidence in the impact that outstanding leadership will have on the d.school, your endowed gift provides the director with regular income and flexibility to support d.school teaching, research and programming as opportunities arise.

$2 million per fellow

Fellows

Fellows are talented professionals at points in their career when they seek new ways to influence their fields. They learn design thinking inside the d.school as they advance an ambitious project from the real world. Then they relaunch themselves and create change, with the added benefit of a new set of skills they can teach others.

K‐12 Lab

Existing K‐12 classroom and pedagogical models are in need of change. The d.school will apply its techniques to envision and create powerful models for teaching and learning. Gifts of any size may be directed to the d.school’s K‐12 work through this expendable fund. The goal is to put design thinking in the hands of K‐12 teachers and bring innovation practices to secondary school leaders.

Student in the front with kids in strollers behind her.

Innovation Fund

The d.school is a place to ask bold questions. And there are many bold questions yet to be asked about advancing the teaching and practice of creativity and sparking interdisciplinary collaboration. Gifts of any size may be directed to the d.school’s mission through this expendable fund for real‐time, critical operational support.

Why Giving Matters

“I can feel it when I walk in. There is so much energy here. People are crazy about the ideas they are coming up with and they want to make them into a reality. There’s something so special about the d.school and the type of people that it brings together and the type of work that people are able to accomplish together in this space.”

Katie Kirsch, BS ’16, Product Design