Bachelor of Industrial Design (Honours)
Student type:
Quick facts
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Duration
Full-time 4 years -
Location
Melbourne City -
Fees
Next intake
February, July
Entry score
Range of criteria
Duration
Full-time 4 years Location
Melbourne City Fees
AU$36,480 (2019 annual)
Next intake
February, July
Overview
Are you interested in industrial design? Would you like to affect change? This discipline shapes the world we live in. Industrial designers have the ability to affect change and create powerful solutions that improve both human and environmental health and wellbeing.
Exploring the trans-disciplinary nature of contemporary industrial design. You'll engage in practical learning through our practice-based design studios, co-creating solutions through a human centred approach to product, service and experience design contexts.
For over 70 year’s industrial design at RMIT has offered aspiring designers ground breaking experiences through technical, theoretical and applied immersions into the diverse and dynamic fields of industrial design practice. Working on real-world problems in industry and community contexts, this hands on educational experience culminates in a year-long honours design research project.
You will develop a design practice through:
- the design of sustainable products, services and systems
- design as a mechanism for enabling social reform and cultural enrichment
- commercial and aesthetically-focused approaches to product, transportation and furniture design
- technologically and materially mediated interactions and experiences
- the possibilities of form, process and material in response to rapid technological advances
- operating at the intersections of our digital and material worlds
- using design as a conduit to address social sustainability, cultural awareness and the wellbeing of clients, users and communities
Centred around a design studio model, you are equipped with unique ways to explore ideas. You'll also challenge conventional paradigms through engaging with local and international design practitioners and build industry networks throughout your studies. These life-changing educational experiences culminate in both social and entrepreneurial approaches to design. You'll gain an adaptive knowledge of making, materials, process, technology, culture and the environment.
Details
Design studios are at the core of your studies
Throughout all levels of this course you will engage in creative, industry partnered and research-led learning through design studio projects.
What is a design studio?
Design studios provide a unique way of exploring ideas by challenging designers. They are run by academics and practicing leaders from architectural and design firms. The design studio model emulates the best practice of design firms. They allow you to explore design, and connect with your peers, industry and integrate with other disciplines.
You will choose your studios from a range of options offered each semester. Studio offerings have the following orientations:
Service orientation, where the focus is sustainability, social innovation, health, transport, and community engagement.
Technology orientation where the focus is universal design and ergonomics, manufacturing, technical innovation and prototyping.
Object orientation, where the focus is furniture, lighting and objects for the home.
Digital orientation, where the focus is on emerging digital technologies, computer-aided design (AutoCAD), and coding and interaction design.
Final honours year project
Using your studio experiences, you’ll undertake a complex design research project in your final year. Your project will be showcased to the design industry and community at the Graduate Exhibition, which celebrates the industrial design discipline and its future through the work of emerging designers.
Learn from local and international design practitioners
You’ll learn from academics and lecturers who are practising designers connected with the design industry and community. The teaching staff are engaged in areas of research and offer expertise in different fields, and this knowledge will help to shape your design journey.
Ongoing assessment throughout the semester includes examinations, essays, reports, oral classes, presentations, group projects, research projects, laboratory projects and practical assignments.
Build industry networks throughout your studies
This course provides scope for you to engage in real world projects within industry and community organisations. It focuses on developing innovative designers to practice in emerging technological, sustainable and social domains of industrial design.
Past students have partnered in the design and research departments of the following industries:
Automotive (Ford, Toyota and GM Holden)
Technology (Philips, Spatial Architecture)
Information Laboratory
Industrial design (Charlwood Design, Catalyst,Buro North)
Manufacturing (Crumpler, Knog, Planex, BlackMagic)
Service design (Deloitte, Victorian Legal Aid, Vic Roads, Australian Taxation Office)
Year 1
Provides foundational exposures to the methods and nature of the designed form, and the socio-cultural factors of design and designing.
Year 2
Sees an increase of the technical, technological and contextual complexity by which design activity is to be considered, and provides avenues of choice in industrial design practice.
Year 3
Significantly defines individual design capabilities and interests by providing a variety of design studio and elective topics.
Year 4
Provides the challenge of defining and demonstrating an area of professional engagement through a year-long, research-led and industry-engaged design project. This experience acts as a scaffold for entry into the profession, and opens up opportunities beyond graduation.
Choose a program structure
| Title | Location | Duration | Plan code | CRICOS |
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Choose a program structure
Program code: BH104
Career
Graduates work in a broad range of contexts and settings relevant to new enterprise development, design innovation and the development of contemporary cities.
They can find work in product and manufacturing companies, in consultancy, entertainment, education, cultural and services sectors, and for research institutions.
Cross-disciplinary designers work in emerging fields of design practice, others start and run their own design or product-producing businesses.
The course prepares graduates to undertake Masters by Research or PhD after successful completion of this degree.
Graduate successes
Below are some examples of industrial design graduates shaping the design world:
Mike Simcoe
Vice President of Global Design General Motors, USALaura Morrison and Jaide-Scarlet Begg
Service Design Analysts at Deloitte DigitalKyle Armstrong
Industrial Designer at Katapult DesignAdrian Spagnuolo
Product Designer at Colorific, a toy design and development distributorJiazhen Chen
Industrial Designer at Wild Design, Shanghai, ChinaLuca Abate
Industrial Designer at Blackmagic Design
- Design Institute of Australia – students are eligible for student membership and graduates are eligible for full membership
- International Interaction Designers Association (IxDA) – students and graduates are eligible for membership
- Association of Women Industrial Designers (AWID) – students and graduates are eligible for membership.
Graduates are also eligible for membership of the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand.
Admissions
You must have successfully completed an Australian Year 12 (or equivalent senior secondary school) qualification.
RMIT is committed to providing transparency to the admissions process. In line with this commitment, we provide you with information that will help in making informed choices about your undergraduate study options.
RMIT admits students from a range of educational pathways, including Year 12 results, previous higher education or vocational education study, work experience, and for some programs - interviews, auditions or portfolios.
Gain a better understanding of the Admission criteria for this program by viewing RMIT’s Admission information.
The highest level of education you have previously completed will determine which category applies to you.
Entry to this program is competitive. Applicants are ranked and selected in order of merit based on their academic achievement, e.g., ATAR or GPA (including any adjustments) and their pre-selection kit submission.
Applicants with recent secondary education (current or within the past two years)
Successful completion of an Australian Year 12 senior secondary certificate of education or equivalent in 2016, 2017 or 2018. If applicable, this includes equity access schemes and any other adjustment factors.
School Network Access Program (SNAP)
The SNAP access scheme is designed to increase tertiary access and participation of eligible students from SNAP partner schools.
Applicants with Vocational Education and Training study
Satisfactory completion of an Australian Certificate IV or above (or equivalent).
Applicants with Higher Education study
Satisfactory completion of at least two courses (subjects) at an Australian undergraduate level (or overseas equivalent).
Applicants with Work and Life Experience
Successful completion of an Australian Year 12 senior secondary certificate of education or equivalent.
Prerequisites: VCE Units 3 and 4: a study score of at least 30 in English (EAL) or at least 25 in English other than EAL (or equivalent) or achieve an overall score of at least 155 in the STAT multiple choice.
All applicants must complete the required Industrial Design pre-selection kit for this program.
VTAC applicants must register and submit the selection kit by the dates noted below for each VTAC round:
- Early round (Non year 12 only): 27 September 2018
- Main round (All applicants): 28 November 2018
- All subsequent rounds (if places are available): 15 February 2019
All applicants applying Direct to RMIT inlcuding current or recent students will receive the link to submit their pre-selection kit via the applicant's dashboard after submitting their application. All kits must be submitted by 6 March 2019 and will be assessed in the order they are received until this date unless places are filled prior.
Selection kit
The selection kit requires:
- A statement outlining your relevant experience, such as employment, voluntary work, etc., or a description of what you have done, over what periods and how it strengthens your application to this program (maximum 500 words).
- A two part design ideas exercise including:
- Part 1: Visualisation - Select a product, service or system that you encounter in daily life that is ineffective and develop a visualization of your design response to change it. You may use illustration, diagrams, story boards, comic illustration, model making (submit photographs only), photomontage, collage, painting-any medium that you think will express these ideas most appropriately.
- Your vision may be informed by contemporary issues or may purely be a way of demonstrating your design ideas. Your design response does not necessarily need to be practical but it does need to be plausible in concept. Think broadly and imaginatively and ensure that what you communicate carries the design intentions of your response.
- Your Visualisation must be a single page/image and formatted as either JPEG or PDF (maximum file size 2MB).
- Part 2: Visualisation statement - Provide a written explanation of the design, its key aims and elements (maximum 200 words).
- a folio of 3 to 5 projects or activities that demonstrate the breadth and depth of your interests and experiences. This could include projects undertaken within formal study, hobbies, and volunteer or paid work, or indeed any relevant activity that gives an insight into your design capabilities. For each project/activity that you submit you will need to provide a short textual description of the project, its particular context of development and the key activities undertaken (maximum 200 words per project).
- Each project must be presented in a single page. This page can be a composite of multiple images or a single image. Files must be formatted as JPEG or PDF (maximum size 4MB).
- Part 1: Visualisation - Select a product, service or system that you encounter in daily life that is ineffective and develop a visualization of your design response to change it. You may use illustration, diagrams, story boards, comic illustration, model making (submit photographs only), photomontage, collage, painting-any medium that you think will express these ideas most appropriately.
If you have successfully completed tertiary study in product design, furniture design, architecture or industrial design you may be exempt from completing the Design ideas exercise. You will instead be required to upload a folio and supply your official academic transcript/s for your previous study in product design, furniture design, architecture or industrial design and a curriculum vitae (CV).
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples
The Indigenous Access Program will support your application into RMIT programs through an informal interview process with support from the Ngarara Willim Centre. Your relevant life, work, educational and training experience as preparation for study, in addition to any formal qualifications, are all considered.
Elite Athlete Program
The RMIT Elite Athlete Program (REAP) supports elite athlete and emerging athletes to achieve sporting and academic excellence.
You must have successfully completed an Australian Year 12 (or equivalent senior secondary school qualification) with a minimum 70% average (check calculator below).
Equivalent qualifications may also include completion of the RMIT Foundation Studies program or a recognised post-secondary diploma in the relevant discipline with the required grades.
Meeting the minimum academic requirements does not guarantee entry. Your application will still need to be assessed and accepted.
Selection tasks for international students completing year 12 in Australia and applying through VTAC
Folio: You must supply evidence of your creativity in the form of a folio that contains a variety of your personal work in art, design or media relevant to the program/s you are applying for. The folio should demonstrate your interests and creative thinking as well as your conceptual, design, problem solving and technical skills. You should include evidence of how ideas were developed as well as finished works.
Examples of work to include in your folio are drawings, paintings, graphic designs, photographs, digital images, models, sculpture, video, scripting, short stories, and/or 2D and 3D Flash animation.
We recommend you explain each work to help the Selection Officer understand the purpose and background of that work.
Folios should be submitted electronically with files in PDF, JPEG, SWF, DCR or QuickTime format suitable to be read on Mac OSX or later, unless otherwise specified. Each electronic file should be no larger than 10MB.
You must present your folio at an assessment session (if you are living outside Melbourne, this can be conducted via email, phone or video call).
To study this program you will need to complete one of the following English proficiency tests:
- IELTS (Academic): minimum overall band of 6.5 (with no individual band below 6.0)
- TOEFL (Paper Based Test): minimum score of 580 (TWE 4.5)
- TOEFL (Internet Based Test - IBT): minimum overall score of 79 (with minimum of 13 in Reading, 12 in Listening, 18 in Speaking and 21 in Writing)
- Pearson Test of English (Academic) (PTE (A)): minimum score of 58 (with no communication band less than 50)
- Cambridge English: Advanced (CAE): minimum of 176 with no less than 169 in any component.
For detailed information on English language requirements and other proficiency tests recognised by RMIT, visit English language requirements and equivalency information.
Don't meet the English language test scores? Complete an Advanced Plus Certificate at RMIT English Worldwide.
Pathways
RMIT graduates of the following programs may be eligible to apply for exemptions:
Fees
In 2019, the annual student contribution amount (tuition fee) you will pay for a standard year of full-time study is between AU$6,566 to AU$10,958*.
* Amounts quoted are indicative fees per annum, and are based on a standard year of full-time study (96 credit points). A proportionate fee applies for more or less than the full-time study load.
Additional expenses
Student services and amenities fee (SSAF): AU$303 maximum fee for 2019.
Other items related to your program, including field trips, textbooks and equipment.
Fees are adjusted on an annual basis and these fees should only be used as a guide.
Learn more about fees for undergraduate study.
Defer your payment
You may be eligible to apply for a HECS-HELP loan, which can be used to defer payment of up to the full amount of your student contribution fees. You may also be eligible to apply to defer payment of your SSAF through the SA-HELP loan scheme.
All undergraduate and honours degrees have Commonwealth supported places (CSP) available. In 2019, the annual student contribution amount (tuition fee) you will pay for a standard year of full-time study is between AU$6,566 to AU$10,958.
In a CSP, your tuition fees are subsidised by the Australian Government. Your share of the fee (student contribution) is set each year by the Australian Government and is determined by the discipline areas (bands) of the courses in which you enrol, not the overall program.
How much can I expect to pay for my Commonwealth supported place?
Courses (subjects) fall into one of three bands. The band determines the student contribution amount for the course.
Amounts listed in the table below are based on a standard, full-time study load (96 credit points per year) with all courses in the same band. A proportionate fee applies for more or less than the full-time study load or for enrolment in courses (subjects) from a combination of bands.
You can learn how to calculate your exact tuition fees for units from different bands at fees for Commonwealth supported students.
Maximum student contribution amount for Commonwealth supported places in 2019
Student contribution band by course (subject) |
Maximum annual student contribution amount in 2019 |
Band 1: humanities, behavioural science, social studies, clinical psychology, foreign languages, visual and performing arts, education, nursing |
$6,566 per standard year |
Band 2: mathematics, statistics, computing, built environment, other health, allied health, science, engineering, surveying, agriculture |
$9,359 per standard year |
|
$10,958 per standard year |
HECS-HELP Loans
The Australian Government provides financial assistance via the HECS-HELP loan scheme, which allows eligible students (such as Australian citizens or holders of an Australian permanent humanitarian visa) to defer payment of up to the full amount of their student contribution.
SA-HELP Loans
You may be eligible to apply to defer payment of the Student services and amenities fee (SSAF) through the SA-HELP loan scheme. If you use SA-HELP, the amount will be added to your accumulated HELP debt.
How does a HELP loan work?
If your HECS-HELP and/or SA-HELP loan application is successful, the Australian Government will pay RMIT, on your behalf, up to the full amount of your fees. This amount will become part of your accumulated HELP debt.
You will only start repaying your accumulated HELP debt to the Australian Government once you earn above the minimum income threshold for repayment, which is set each year by the Australian Government (this also applies if you are still studying).
The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) will calculate your compulsory repayment for the year and include this on your income tax notice.
For more information about loan repayment options see Commonwealth assistance (HELP loans) or Study Assist.
In addition to tuition fees, you will be charged an annual student services and amenities fee (SSAF), which is used to maintain and enhance services and amenities that improve your experience as an RMIT student.
The SSAF is calculated based on your enrolment load and the maximum fee for 2019 is $303.
For more information about calculating your actual SSAF see Paying SSAF.
You may also be required to purchase other items related to your program, including field trips, textbooks and equipment. These additional fees and expenses vary from program to program.
The annual tuition fee for 2019 is AU$36,480.
The total indicative tuition fee for 2019 commencement is AU$157,440.
In addition to tuition fees you also need to pay for:
- Student services and amenities fee (SSAF) in each calendar year.
- Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC) - Student visa holders must have cover for the total duration of their visa.
- Some programs incur additional expenses.
You also need to account for your living expenses. Estimate the cost of living ;in Melbourne.