1. Design Corps
of Rural America
• Forgotten Legacy
• Missing Link
• The X Factors

2. Rural Legacy
In the first half of the
20th century, the Midwest
was a center of innovation
and a creator of industries
many in rural towns.
In the second half of the
20th century, the Midwest
became a culture of
mastery.

3. Design Corps Goals
• Locally Owned Headquarters (3-5)
• High Paying Professional Jobs
• Local Design Studios Networked
• quot;Gifted & Talentedquot; (3% to 5% )

4. A Design Studio is:
• A self-sustaining nonprofit
• Organized and led by the “gifted and talentedquot;
• Networked regionally and nationally
• To identify technology and inventions
• Bring home those ideas for niche markets
• Add value by redesigning the inventions
• Patents are then sold to their HOMETOWN or
other towns in return for a royalty and/or cash
Michigan Public Act 444

5. Missing Link
Entrepreneurs
Inventors &
& Companies
Researchers (Private & Public)
“Crash and Burn”
Inventions are seldom commercialized because
the connection is often never made!

6. Missing Link
Design Studios
Entrepreneurs
Inventors
&
&
Bridge to: Companies
Researchers
(Private & Public)
Identify Inventors
Market Analysis
Redesign & Add Value
(Ketchup Bottle)
Sell Patented Idea to Hometowns

7. A Competitive-Edge
• Designing products within a system
• For national markets: $10-$100
million
• With higher than normal profits
• Where the profits come back
home
• Creating higher paying jobs in a
• Local but publicly controlled

8. Screening Criteria
Headquarters
Niches are
limited to the
intersection of
the three
circles

9. The X Factors
Gifted & Talented
• Most creative & underutilized
resource
• Most likely (3%-5%) to think outside
the box
• Most likely resource to create
jobs/companies
• Most of them have gone underground
• Towns export them and they do not
return

10. Design Studio Process
• 2-6 “G&T” staff within six months in
• Virtual teams of 3 to 4 on several
projects will
• Design and redesign products and
services
• Around the passion of a “champion”
• Collaborate with other design studios as
well as
• On-line collaboration with teens in the
U.S.

11. Design Studio
• It is not a simulation
• It is not a volunteer
program
• It is about a solution…
the destiny of their
hometown

12. Design Corps Staff
Role
• Identify teens & adults
– Creatively gifted
– Organizationally talented
• Town representatives meet together monthly
• Three objectives (teach--challenge—ignite):
1. Functioning Design Studio in 4-6 months
2. Train staff to find serial inventors &
create database
3. Re-design inventions and prepare marketing
plan

13. Ten Design
Studios
1
2
3
4
5
Virtual
Design
6
Network
20 Teens 4-8 Teens
7
10
Design
8
Studio
9

14. Where do towns fit
in?
• Privately funded: $200,000/county/year
– ($25,000 for the Design Corps Network)
• 3-4 town leaders introduce the project
to:
– Teens, Parents, leaders and Public
Educators
• Be available to problem solve…and mentor
• Allow teams to selectively access your

15. Does it make sense to you?
Can it work?
Would you actively
support this idea with
teens and adults?

16. Design Corps
• Forgotten Legacy
• Missing Link
• The X Factors

17. Dr. William R. Wilkie
471 West Long Lake Drive
Harrison, Michigan 48625
989.339.4998 or
989.539.1928
wwilkie@design-corps.org
www.design-corps.org
Reference: Dr. Emmett Lippe
Former Superintendent
Novi Public Schools
Currently: CEO, Lippe
Consulting