Mayor Rahm Emanuel Announces Academic Partnership Between Illinois Institute Of Technology and Politecnico Di Milano University

News – Illinois Tech Today

Mayor Rahm Emanuel has announced a new partnership between Illinois Institute of Technology’s Institute of Design (IIT-ID) and Politecnico di Milano University’s School of Design (Polimi-Design) that will increase international academic cooperation and drive research on the role of design as agent of development and transformation for urban communities and a sustainable economy. The agreement was signed during the Mayor’s official visit to Milan, which followed stops in Berlin and London.
“This partnership will keep Chicago and Milan at the global forefront of the search for sustainable solutions for urban challenges,” Mayor Emanuel said. “Together, our cooperation can develop and deploy designs for 21st century global cities.”
The partnership is through a Memorandum of Understanding signed today by IIT and Politecnico. Through the agreement the universities will work together to plan and develop research activities focused on the role of design as agent of development and transformation for new urban communities and sustainable economy – from commerce, to industry and advanced services.
“At the IIT Institute of Design we focus on using design to help address global complex challenges with the goal of enriching the human experience,” IIT Institute of Design Dean Denis Weil said. “This partnership will bring together two of the world’s premier design schools to offer new ways of thinking and new system-level solution concepts for urban challenges and opportunities using the two cities as learning platforms. I am grateful to our colleagues at Polimi-Design and Mayor Rahm Emanuel for their support and leadership in making this collaboration possible.”
“The design schools at Politecnico and IIT have strong roots and tradition in design, and at the same time have always been able to evolve and to lead the exploration of new frontiers of design- from system design to service design, from strategic design to design for social innovation,” Polimi-Design Dean Luisa Collina said. “This ...

Read More