Generation WhY not?

The world is changing, and fast. For some students, this means the jobs they will work in haven’t even been invented yet. So how do you prepare for an exciting yet uncertain future? Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation student Dominica Ingui reveals one way forward.

I chose UTS’s Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation (BCII) because it sounded exciting; plain and simple.


When you’re young, decision-making can be an exhilarating and empowering experience, but eventually you need to make a choice. You are confronted by a harsh reality; choosing your degree path is not exciting. You need to navigate ATAR points, gauge reputations, think about what you’re good at and somewhere along the way you need to remember all of your hopes and dreams.

Someone once gifted me with the advice that “your future job probably doesn’t exist yet”. Thanks. That really helps me, doesn’t it?

Nor does the fact that I’m not one to make plans – I hate to burn bridges, narrow my vision or close doors. I need options and alternative paths; I dislike locking myself into choices. I just didn’t know what I would need in order to prepare for my non-existent job.

All of that changed when I first encountered the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation – a degree name so long, so unknown, so curious.

I fondly remember the first UTS Open Day I went to in 2013 – when I heard one of our many clever and creative academics, Kees Dorst, present so passionately about BCII. He spoke of possibilities, innovation, state-of-the-art design, and spun stories of entrepreneurs and creative successes. It was magnetic, the way his descriptions captured my imagination.

BCII students during the Visa weekend discovery project. Photo by: Louise McWhinnie

Like so many other people, I had no idea what BCII was, but I knew I needed to be part of it. Most importantly, I figured it would open doors for me, not close them.

So, my journey began in 2014 as part of the first cohort of BCII students. With no educational precedent, our first lesson was to admit that while we had no idea what we were doing, we had the confidence to find out.

Simply put, BCII is a degree that floods your mind with the intelligence, tools and methods that drive each of the disciplines across UTS. We use these lessons to inform our thinking and framing as we tackle real briefs from real clients such as the City of Sydney council who asked us to examine the social issues surrounding Kings Cross. Just weeks after the announced 2014 federal budget cuts, we also worked in conjunction with the ABC International to explore diverse solutions for the many challenges they face, including the challenge of remaining relevant in the region, delivering on charter and addressing the opportunities of media convergence.

Most notably, we received a brief from Google where we had to discover ways to foster the adoption of their products in parts of the world, such as regions of Asia, that were untouched by the internet. As extracurricular activities, we’ve also been involved in a weekend discovery process with Visa, exploring the future of global transactions and payment devices, as well as a two-day hack-a-thon with Accenture.

From day one of Winter school I was thrown into an environment filled with students from law, design, business, engineering, health, science and communications. In a BCII classroom we receive workshops from passionate academics from across the university, which teaches us to be fluid and accepting in our thinking. It is when collaborating with each other that our talents were realised and recognised. What a beautiful and humbling experience it is to feel valued by your peers for your strengths, skills and passions.

Together we harness our collective knowledge and skill sets to inform our approach to these sophisticated and challenging problems so that we develop meaningful, comprehensive solutions that are truly innovative. While most university students shy away from group work, this unique opportunity to function as a part of a transdisciplinary team is truly a gift, and one not often given.

Entering my second year, I’ve come to appreciate how framing a question or scenario is the most important segment of innovative thinking. True genius comes from the approach a team takes which gives a frame for the generation of ideas. These problems are often complex, open, highly networked and do not have a right or wrong answer. These briefs cannot be solved using one perspective, they require a multi-disciplinary team to break down, re-frame and re-think these dynamic issues.

But this style of working should not be romanticised. The role of an entrepreneur is not a glamorous one. The media has embedded the image that all great innovators are college drop-outs who overcame all odds to bring technology to the world. Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are all case studies who demonstrate there is space in the world to make meaningful and socially relevant changes. So UTS has taken responsibility to find a method to the madness and engage with the knowledge behind innovation.

It’s so easy for people to become afraid of the future, it’s easy to latch onto tradition and it’s hard to ponder the wicked problems of today and tomorrow. The concept of change plagues individuals who lack the confidence to see themselves and the world around them differently. But during BCII we explore these problems every day and we’re finding new ways of understanding the complexities our world faces.

“I can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas, I’m frightened of the old ones,” is a mantra given by John Cage. I revel in the uncertainty of the future, I see it as a limitless opportunity for young people to make a mark and make a change.

My experience is that BCII is setting new standards for university graduates; I am growing more confident, resilient, adaptable and comfortable to take on the most curious and challenging tasks. We mine our failures for lessons and use them to shape our successes. My skills cannot be outsourced; my talents will not be overshadowed by robotics or artificial intelligence and I will evolve with the world I travel.

When I graduate these will be robust qualities of differentiation that will carry me through any situation regardless of my team, my industry or my country.

Those are attributes that no other university will be able to give us and a gift that our future employers will value us for. And that gives me a sense of security, imagination and trust in the degree and path that I have chosen.