About
Marie Moran is a mechanical engineer who spent many years working with companies to implement design thinking methodologies to understand their users’ needs, brainstorm and design innovative solutions to those needs, and then manufacture their products as efficiently as possible using lean manufacturing. She has worked predominantly in aircraft, automotive, and construction equipment, but has also consulted in a wide variety of industries including health care, nonprofits, government organizations, and start-ups.
Since joining The University of Tulsa, Moran has created new design courses including Design Academy, a hands-on engineering course where the lectures take place on campus and the labs take place nearby at Fab Lab Tulsa, one of the largest community makerspaces on earth.
She has also partnered with faculty from across the university to create the Center for Applied Design Thinking, an organization made up of classes, student organizations, and an advisory board of world-class industry design experts that give students opportunities to learn and practice design thinking. Students from any major can now pursue an interdisciplinary minor in applied design thinking.
Awards and Honors
- Tau Beta Pi Teaching Excellence Award, 2020
Education
- M.S., Engineering Product Design, Stanford University, 2007
- B.S., Mechanical Engineering, The University of Tulsa, 2002
- B.A., Art, The University of Tulsa, 2002
Research interests and areas of expertise
- Design thinking
- Human centered design
- Innovation
- Need-finding
- Brainstorming
- Prototyping
- Health care design