Design for Extreme Affordability

Design for Extreme Affordability (Extreme) is for students who have a passion for social impact, and want to experience designing products and services that address issues of global poverty, through tackling real world challenges in collaboration with low-resource communities. Extreme is a two-quarter graduate level sequence cross listed by the Graduate School of Business (OIT333/334) and the School of Engineering (ME206A/B). The program is hosted by the d.school and open to students from all Stanford schools. This multidisciplinary team, fast paced, project based experience creates an enabling environment in which students learn to design products and services that will change the lives of the world's poorest citizens. Students work directly with course partners, and the communities they serve, on real world problems, the culmination of which is actual implementation and real impact. Topics include design thinking, product and service design, rapid prototype engineering and testing, business modeling, social entrepreneurship, team dynamics, impact measurement, operations planning and ethics. Products and services designed in the class have impacted well over 150 million people worldwide. Limited enrollment by application. Must sign up for both OIT333/ME206A (Winter) and OIT334/ME206B (Spring). See extreme.stanford.edu for more details and application process which opens in October. Cardinal Course certified by the Haas Center for Public Service.