WHAT WE DO
Design Thinking is an amazingly useful framework which helps turn ideas into tangible prototypes. Everyone has ideas, but not everyone knows how to take those ideas and share them with the world.
Whether it’s through our Workshops or the Summer Program for students, Project Incubator will introduce participants to a powerful methodology used by the best design firms and corporations in the world to discover problems and find creative and innovative solutions. Our aim is to provide you with the tools to approach entrepreneurship and innovation with creative confidence.
Whether you’re an established company, a nonprofit, a small startup, or a budding entrepreneur, Design Thinking provides you with a structure to elevate how you discover and understand problems, and how to go about finding the right solutions to them. With Design Thinking you’ll learn how to:
Empathize with your end users
Correctly define the real problem(s)
Effectively ideate to generate a large quantity of quality ideas
Rapidly prototype your ideas so you can share and learn
Test your ideas and prototypes and collect actionable feedback
DESIGN THINKING
A Human-Centered Approach to Discovering Problems & Innovative Solutions
ENTREPRENEURSHIP
CRITICAL THINKING
Take a Thought From Idea to Prototype
Peaking Curiosity, Creativity & the Ability to Question Through Reason & Reflection
WORKSHOPS
BREAKTHROUGH SACRAMENTO
WHAT
A pair of Design Thinking workshops for high-school students with a local non profit, Breakthrough Sacramento, whose mission is to motivate and enable students from under-resourced communities to pursue access to a college education.
WHY
To address the challenge of reimagining both the communication and clinical aspects pertaining to COVID vaccinations among the Sacramento region’s Latino community.
FUN FACT
From beginning to end, the students participating in these workshops brought their curious minds and creative spirit. When asked by their advisor on what they enjoyed the most from the sessions, they said;
“We like active learning, rather than just listening!”
“We like the idea that failing is actually a good thing.”
Participants from the Breakthrough Sacramento workshop.
Arjin Claire gives advice on prototyping.
Students build their prototypes.
Students practice their prototyping skills.
Participants' ideas from their ideation session.
Students practice their prototyping skills.
WORKSHOPS
UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO
ANSCHUTZ MEDICAL CAMPUS
WHAT
Design Thinking workshop for the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus with patients, caregivers, doctors, nurses, social workers, hospital administrators and researchers.
WHY
To tackle the challenge, "How might we reimagine treatment decisions for people who have heart failure?".
FUN FACT
This was the first virtual design thinking session conducted by Project Incubator, and the participation and engagement was inspiring! We created Zoom breakout rooms to ideate and prototype, and the creative ideas and prototypes the participants came up with were incredible. Project Incubator is excited to continue its relationship with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus on some very intriguing upcoming challenges.
Participants used Zoom to contribute ideas and potential solutions.
WORKSHOPS
SHRINER'S HOSPITALS FOR CHILDREN, I
WHAT
Two Design Thinking workshops at Shriner's Hospitals for Children - Northern California with nurses, doctors and hospital management.
WHY
To tackle the challenge, "How might we reimagine handoff at shift change to ensure the exchange of information is always relevant and accurate".
FUN FACT
Clinicians and hospital management attending the workshops were excited to incorporate Design Thinking into their daily workflow and continue to collaborate with Project Incubator in order to improve patient outcomes.
Arjin Claire presents the rules for ideation.
One participant shares her group's prototype with others for feedback.
Participants work to build idea prototypes.
Arjin Claire presents the rules for ideation.
Participants work to build idea prototypes.
A finished prototype created by one of the participant groups.
WORKSHOPS
SHRINER'S HOSPITALS FOR CHILDREN, II
WHAT
Design Thinking workshop at Shriner's Hospitals for Children - Northern California with clinicians, management, parents, and children.
WHY
To tackle the challenge, "How might we reimagine the shot (vaccination, etc.) experience for children?".
FUN FACT
After half the workshop attendees were children and teens who had fantastic ideas, Shriner's has partnered with Project Incubator to carry forward the conversation of reimagining a child's shot experience and effect change at their Northern California location.
Sahej Claire introduces Design Thinking to event participants.
Event participants ideate following their interviews with each other.
Groups test out their prototypes.
Groups test out their prototypes.
A virtual reality storybook prototype.
Groups test out their prototypes.
WORKSHOPS
GIRL SCOUTS HEART OF CENTRAL CALIFORNIA
WHAT
"Design Thinking for Girl Scouts" workshop at the annual GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) conference for Northern California Girl Scouts.
WHY
To encourage more young women to be confident creative thinkers who are unafraid to fail.
FUN FACT
The "Design Thinking for Girl Scouts" workshop was ranked by Girl Scout attendees in the top four of the 40 workshops offered by industry professionals at the conference.
Sahej Claire explains to 40 girl scouts the importance of empathetic interviewing.
Girl scouts prototype their partner's ideal carrying device.
A girl scout poses with Sahej Claire to show off her prototype.
WORKSHOPS
HACKER LAB + STREET SOCCER USA SACRAMENTO
WHAT
DECODE: Inclusivity + Homelessness hackathon working toward social rehabilitation of the homeless community in Sacramento.
WHY
To be a catalyst for change in the community without waiting for policy to affect bureaucracy.
FUN FACT
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg made an appearance to speak on how the city of Sacramento can be transformational. "We know a homeless individual is a person who, at one point, had a better life," Steinberg said. "It could be you. It could be me."
Innovators gain empathy by speaking with formerly homeless Sacramentans.
Windows become drawing boards as innovators use Post-it notes to ideate.
A compound-esque prototype designed to be all-inclusive and available for homeless community members.
Sahej Claire, second from the left, leads her group through a discussion on how they will iterate their prototype after receiving feedback.
One of six groups shares their prototype, the "Pop Up Provider," a mobile resource for homeless community members.
Innovators in attendance pose following their prototype presentations.
WORKSHOPS
COLLEGE ASSISTANCE MIGRANT PROGRAM
WHAT
Design Thinking workshop at the Migrant Student Leadership Institute (MSLI) Hack-a-Thon.
WHY
To educate and inspire students from migrant and seasonal farm
worker backgrounds.
FUN FACT
A student in this workshop holds the record for the smallest prototype we've ever seen!
Students prototype their partner's ideal carrying devices.
Sahej Claire explains the five steps of design thinking to students.
Students prototype their partner's ideal carrying devices.
SUMMER PROGRAM
Project Incubator’s summer sessions immerse middle- and high-school students in Design Thinking and entrepreneurship. Participants learn methodologies and entrepreneurial skills used by today's big-name companies, organizations and academia while honing their own skills as young innovators. They work in groups to take a thought from simple idea to prototype, discovering their inner entrepreneur in the process.
SPONSORS
Project Incubator
Summer Sessions
ABOUT
Arjin Claire
A freshman at Stanford University, Arjin is a certified and skilled Design Thinker who enjoys sharing his love of creativity, entrepreneurship, innovation and critical thinking. He has hosted workshops for Code for Hood, Shriners Hospitals for Children (Northern CA) to address staff shift changes, and co-facilitated a fully virtual Design Thinking session for the University of Colorado's Anschutz Medical Campus to assist them in reimagining treatment for patients with heart failure. Recently, he helped Breakthrough Sacramento students reimagine both the communication and clinical aspects pertaining to COVID vaccinations among the Latino community.
Sahej Claire
Stanford University graduate Sahej Claire is certified in Design Thinking by IDEO U and has hosted a number of workshops on her own as well as in partnership with local and national organizations. She worked with Girl Scouts Heart of Central California, her local chapter, to develop their STEM Center + MakerSpace: a one-of-a-kind collaborative innovation hub for girl scouts in the Northern California region. In addition, she collaborated with Shriners Hospitals for Children (Northern CA) to reimagine their patients' experience.
CONTACT
For more information about Project Incubator and what we do, contact us at:
PI Team