Apply Now School of Visual Arts MFA Design for Social Innovation Second Deadline: March 1 with image of the studion and a pink overlay on left side.

Future thinking, today.

Apply to MFA DSI to learn the design mindsets and capabilities to support people and the planet.

How can design shift us towards more healthy, caring systems?
What conditions and collaborations enable communities, systems, and ecosystems to thrive?
How can eco-social design increase innovation and our capacities for change?

Social design
works with communities, organizations, governments, businesses, and the planet through:

Strengthening Relationships + Care

Advocating for health, access, ecologies, restoration, joy, and healing. Supporting shared values and interdependence while honoring nature’s wisdom.
Social Design asks good questions and deepens connections, with care.

Co-Creating Intentionally.

Collaborating with communities, advocating for mutual benefit, accountability, and abundance. Centering lived experience and responsibility, while reducing harm.
Social Design can shift power while building leadership and creatively responding.

Embracing Complexities

Breaking from things that no longer serve us. Recognizing the continuum and pluralities, and making the invisible visible.
Social Design supports new thinking over more things, to imagine possibilities and lead with vision.

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APPLY NOW

MFA DSI Scholarships have increased!

Second Deadline - March 1 for earliest consideration

Our DSI Scholarships have increased. We are now offering two departmental scholarships of $28,000 each. These are two-year awards (distributed $14,000 per year) offered to two applicants for Fall 2026.

START YOUR APPLICATION

EVENTS

Attend our Virtual Info Session: February 24

Whether you’ve started your application or you have just learned about DSI – REGISTER TODAY! In this information session, meet DSI Alum, Josh Treuhaft (MFA DSI ’14) and find out more about what a degree in social design can do for you!

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Read Corwin Green's Summer 2025 IPAxSVA Ecology Fellowship reflections

MFA DSI Communication Design faculty, Corwin Green, reflects on his Summer 2025 experience as MFA DSI as the Institute for Public Architecture’s inaugural IPAxSVA Ecology Fellow on Governor’s Island NYC.

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Three New Social Design Blogs by MFA DSI Alum

Social design is an ever-evolving practice. Writing, speaking, and sharing are also essential aspects of our work, contributing to the growing and changing field of social innovation. Read more from Grace Kwon, Brielle Mariucci, and Edwin Mauricio Olivera, DSI alum who keep asking the necessary questions.

Thesis 2018

Thesis 2018

Moms Make Books

Pilar Finuccio (MFA DSI ’18)

Moms Make Books is a bookmaking workshop for mothers with children between the ages of 4 and 12 who want sexual health development to begin at home – and include the messages and values they want to impart to their children.