FOCUS Student Magazine Focus March 2013 | Page 4

Mind The Gap

Mind the Gap – breaking the ice between cultures , backgrounds and systems ! No , it is not a catchy phrase from London underground staff warning passengers about an upcoming train . “ Mind the Gap ” is an international 10-day “ workshop ”, built around one central project challenge . There is often quite a big gap between creative personalities and technology that stands in the way to finding mind-blowing solutions . Therefore this project intends to mend the barrier by bringing together students from both sides . Can the cliché that designers and developers speak a different language be broken ? The idea is to develop a web-app prototyping project . Students work in teams and run through the complete process , starting from the generation of ideas , developing the application and presenting the final product . Sounds like a piece of cake ? In 2011 , 8 ICM students hit the road to Ghent , a lovely city in Belgium where Spanish , Danish and Belgium students joined their efforts to generate stunning projects . 24 people , 3 countries , one place and many individual expectations and feelings . The challenge was : “ how to boost the image of volunteering ”. Some might associate brainstorming with a boring technique that takes the users nowhere .
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