Recently, we celebrated incredible achievements by our graduating students at the annual ACIDO Rocket Show 2021 Design Competition. Humber students took home five awards, including First and Second place in the 2021 Rocket category. This is a tremendous accomplishment from our students among the elite design schools within Ontario.
Each year, the Association of Chartered Industrial Designers of Ontario (ACIDO) hosts “Rocket” – a design competition for Ontario’s graduating industrial designers. Graduates nominated at the top of their class from Carleton University, Humber College, OCAD University, and Sheridan College have the opportunity to pitch their final year thesis projects to a jury of select industry professionals with the top winners announced at the Rocket Awards Ceremony. This year, ACIDO moved the competition online to continue providing Ontario’s top graduates with the means to display their final year thesis projects and a chance to win awards and prizes. Through the ACIDO awards, student participants and award recipients received industry recognition for their work.
The 2021 Rocket awards are given to the student projects that represent the best in show.
The winners impressed the design jury through their design process including project definition, design research, concept development, implementation, final prototype, graphic presentation, and verbal pitches. These awards are sponsored and supported by Onshape, a PTC Business; Eventscape; CAD MicroSoultions Inc.; Forest City Casting, and Cortex Design Inc.
Congratulations to our Humber student winners:
- 1st Place Winner of 2021 ROCKET
Henry Boy for project Vagaboard
- 2nd Place Winner of 2021 ROCKET
Bradley Staite for project Neo Ink
- SPECIALTY ROCKET 2021 Prototyping Award
Stephen Bykowy for project Horizon / Sponsored by Eventscape
- SPECIALTY ROCKET 2021 Market Ready Award
Henry Boy for project Vagaboard / Sponsored by designforce
- SPECIALTY ROCKET 2021 Sustainability Award
Moriah Gonidis for project pakk / Sponsored by Inertia
About the Senior Level Thesis Projects and Virtual Thesis Show 2021
The Senior Level Thesis is the culmination of the Industrial Design student’s career here at Humber. It is the result of continuous development over the course of the academic year leading to this capstone project. The Senior Level Thesis projects encompass four essential criteria (four pillars) of human-centric design approach and the understanding of full-bodied, three-dimensional physical interaction of user, product and environment. The projects generate innovative solutions using research-driven, evidence-based designs which focus on the user experience.
The Senior Level Thesis projects are supervised by Professor Catherine Chong, and Professor Sandro Zaccolo, with Teaching Support Assistant, Reece Bennett. This year, our graduating students prevailed over the challenges and successfully completed their Thesis capstone projects despite the additional hardship of working under severe restrictions. They learned new skills and techniques. Ultimately, they re-imagined new ways of working, innovation came from thinking inside a literal “box”. On May 27, 2021, we celebrated their accomplishments at the graduate Virtual Thesis Show titled INSIDE THE BOX. This show represents the culmination of four years of dedication and commitment to design excellence, with recognitions and validations from design industry professionals.
