2018 CIDA Award for Excellence Winners Announced

CIDA Award for Excellence Winners Announced

The Council for Interior Design Accreditation (CIDA) is pleased to announce the winners of the 2018 Award for Excellence. This award recognizes and celebrates outstanding practices that advance the cause of excellence in interior design education.

The first place winner is Sarah Strauss, Visiting Professor at Pratt Institute. Professor Strauss’s entry, “Music, Media, Feminism,” demonstrates a rich, multi-layered approach to engaging students in content investigation, discovery, and analysis that resulted in creative and high quality learning outcomes. “The CIDA Board congratulates Professor Strauss on this creative and well-crafted teaching methodology that progressively evolves and integrates students learning to achieve excellent results. This is Professor Strauss’ third such honor for outstanding work, having been a first place Award for Excellence winner in 2015 and a first place winner in the Innovative Interior Design Education Awards in 2012. We applaud her exceptional achievements in the field of interior design education.” states CIDA Board Chair Jan Johnson, FIIDA. Professor Strauss received a $5,000 award in recognition of this honor.

Two entries were recognized with a $2,000 merit award. Erik Johan Granberg, Ph.D., Associate Professor in Interior Design at the Virginia Commonwealth University Qatar, along with team members Mohammad Nabil Suleiman and Haithem El Hammali, Ph.D., received a merit award for his entry, “Meta Studio”. Jason Meneely, Associate Professor at the University of Florida also received a merit award for his entry, “Finding Virtue in the Virtual: A Value Driven Approach for VR in Design Education.” Carl Matthews, Professor and Department Head at University of Arkansas, along with team members Alison Turner and Peter MacKeith, received an honorable mention for their submission, “Housing Northwest Arkansas.” All of these design educators also are previous CIDA Award winners, demonstrating their continued commitment to excellence and innovation. CIDA is proud to honor these design educators and collaborative partners for their inspiring work.

Winning entries of the 2018 CIDA Award for Excellence are available for viewing on our website here.

The Council for Interior Design Accreditation is an independent, non-profit, accrediting organization responsible for setting standards and evaluating degree-granting interior design programs. There are 179 CIDA-accredited programs in the U.S., Canada, Qatar, and the UAE.

For additional information:  Holly Mattson, Executive Director
616.458.0400 or holly@accredit-id.org