Who: Design Defense Studio is an intensive10-week advanced graduate innovation leadership course where student teams of current serving military members from the US or Allied nations tackle strategically important, tactically relevant innovation challenges sourced from the US DoW. Applicants of any rank and from any service branch are welcome, so long as they have a strong desire to dramatically advance their real-world innovation leadership skills and a commitment to apply these new skills back at their home units after course completion.

Context: Design Defense Studio is the foundation course in the Duke Certificate for Defense Innovation, and may be taken alone (3 credit hours), or as part of the four-course certificate sequence (12 credit hours), at the discretion of the student.

What: Student teams create fundable solutions to their assigned DoW innovation challenges, ensuring mission, stakeholder and funding alignment along the way.  A final pitch to senior military and industry leaders is presented at the end of the course where clear next steps on the path to warfighter adoption are defined.

Where: Students spend 3 weeks in-residence at Duke, with the remaining 7 weeks done online. There is intensive team and individual work required throughout the course.  See the attached documents for schedule details.

How: Students learn and practice state of the art innovation skills in the context of Big, Successful Organizations. Our robust curriculum is focused on doing innovation and is constantly updated with learning from the toughest innovation environments in the world.

Requirements: Applicants must have an undergraduate degree from an accredited institution. Civilian DoW employees and military spouses may also apply. Step 1 is to obtain instructor permission, followed by application to the Duke Master of Engineering Management Program as either a non-degree student or a Duke Certificate for Defense Innovation student.

See the Design Defense Studio flyer and complete course description.

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