Designing Your Research Agenda (DYRA) 4.2
Friday, March 7, 2025
2:00PM EST
Virtual Event

Designing Your Research Agenda (DYRA) is a panel discussion and open forum for design scholars and researchers to discuss aspects of their research agendas. We aim to open a dialog regarding the challenges of discovering one’s design research inquiry. DYRA is a design research webinar series.

This event focuses on Fulbright scholars in our Communication Design community. 

Panelists

Sarah Edmands Martin
Assistant Professor
University of Notre Dame

Natalia Ilyin 
Professor
Cornish College of the Arts and VCFA

Natacha Poggio
Associate Professor
University of Houston–Downtown

Some of the questions we will discuss with panelists include:

• How did you determine your research agenda (high-level timeline of your career/trajectory)?
• If you were going to position your work within a category, would you say your research addresses: design theory, design history, design practice, design research (traditional graphic design, speculative design, UX, UI, typography, AR, VR, creative computing, design solutions, etc.), design pedagogy, or something else?
• What led you to pursue a Fulbright? 
• What are some highlights from your Fulbright experience?
• How has the Fulbright affected your creative/research trajectory?

Moderators

Jessica Barness
Kent State University

Heather Snyder Quinn
DePaul University

Biographies

Sarah Edmands Martin

Sarah Edmands Martin is Assistant Professor of Visual Communication Design at the University of Notre Dame where her practice unfolds at the intersections of speculative design, digital storytelling, and media aesthetics. She has received fellowships that include a 2024 Fulbright, a 2023 Design Writing Fellowship at Chicago’s Writing Space, and a 2021–22 Research Fellowship at the Institute for Digital Arts + Humanities. She has published in books and journals such as CounterText, Ethics in Design and Communication: New Critical Perspectives, Digital Transformation in Design: Processes and Practices, and AIGA’s Eye on Design. Her current book projects include Beautiful Bureaucracy: A Design Brief for Civic Life (MIT Press, 2025) and Otherworldly Games: An Atlas of Playable Realities. Her design work has been recognized and published by PRINT, Graphis, the Paris Design Awards, London International Creative, and the Creative Communication Awards. Her industry-facing work spans clients from Citibank to AMC’s The Walking Dead.

Fulbright Scholar to the Center for Digital Narrative, University of Bergen in Bergen, Norway.

Natalia Ilyin 

Natalia Ilyin teaches design history and criticism, design for social activism, and transition design at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, Washington. She and her former co-teacher Liz Patterson created the Parallel Narratives curriculum and published the Parallel Narratives anthology. These are extensive annotated historical bibliographies created by third-year undergraduate students on topics not covered in the contemporary canon of design history. A second volume is in production. Natalia is also Founding Faculty for the MFA in Graphic Design at Vermont College of Fine Arts, where she advises candidates in histories, criticism, and critical writing. She has taught at Rhode Island School of Design, Yale University, The Cooper Union and the University of Washington, and has acted as Critic for the MFA in Graphic Design at Yale University and at Rhode Island School of Design. Her most recent book, Writing for the Design Mind, is available from Bloomsbury Publishing. Her new book will be available in 2027 from the same publisher, should no new thing arise.

Fulbright Scholar to the Brno University of Technology Architecture Program in Czech Republic. 

Natacha Poggio

Natacha Poggio is an Associate Professor of Design at the University of Houston-Downtown, inspiring socially responsible citizens through design. In 2008, she founded Design Global Change, a collaborative focused on planet-centered solutions for global health, environmental, and social justice issues, impacting communities across Latin America, Africa, and Asia. A three-time recipient of Sappi’s Ideas that Matter award, she has secured over $76,000 in funding to support design for social good. In 2022, she was awarded a prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholarship for a marine conservation project in Ecuador. A 2013 TEDx speaker and advocate for social impact design, she lectures internationally, judges competitions, and volunteers with the Winterhouse Institute Council. She holds an M.F.A. in Experience Design from the University of Texas at Austin and a B.F.A. in Graphic Design from the University of Buenos Aires. Originally from Argentina, Natacha considers herself a global citizen.

Fulbright Scholar to the Universidad de las Artes del Ecuador, in Guayaquil, Ecuador.