Prospective Students

The Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering (HCDE) offers seven different academic programs:

• Bachelor of Science in Human Centered Design & Engineering (BS in HCDE)
• Master of Science in Human Centered Design & Engineering (MS in HCDE)
• Doctor of Philosophy in Human Centered Design & Engineering
• Interdisciplinary Master of Science in Technical Japanese
• Certificate in User-Centered Design

These programs give students the opportunity to pursue areas of specialization, attend classes while working, or earn a degree in the evening. Since HCDE is part of the College of Engineering, students often start with a strong foundation in math and science which is increasingly important in industry.

The department itself offers a wide range of courses, some required and some elective. Class sizes are small, so students get to work closely with faculty members and with other students.

Human Centered Design & Engineering enhances course offerings with carefully selected joint listings with other departments across campus, and offers students specialized learning-through-design projects and internships, in which students work with a client to design and deliver a product. HCDE also offers a directed research program in which students work in small teams side by side with faculty to do hands-on research and often publish the results.

The main topics that students learn about are hypermedia and multimedia, human-computer interaction, publications management, rhetoric of technical discourse, and online support systems. Also, students design, write, edit, and evaluate technical and scientific materials.

All students at the University of Washington are held to the standards set forth in the Student Code of Conduct handbook. Students should familiarize themselves with the policies set forth in this publication.