Broadsides Featuring Project Overview 24"x32"
Legal Resource Booklet 5"x15"
Would be given out to Marshallese people in order to prepare them for any interaction with the United States' legal system. It provides information on their rights and what normally happens when somebody is arrested.
Officer Exchange Program Mailer
After establishing the program, this would be sent out to police departments which could participate in the program. Even if they do not participate, it contains informational cards which will at least inform officers about who the Marshallese are and the history of their movement into the United States.
Aside from the Marshall Islands and Hawaii, Northwest Arkansas is home to the largest population of Marshallese in the world; this population growth is mainly due to the Compact of Free Association (CoFA) established between the United States and the Marshall Islands. The CoFA basically means that both groups may travel freely between both territories without a visa. This compact came about due to the United States testing bombs on a and near the Marshall Islands and their establishment of military bases.
Though many Marshallese people live in Northwest Arkansas, life for them here is certainly not easy. How the Marshallese came to be here is not well understood in existing NWA populations, the Marshallese and the United States cultures are vastly different, and there is a major language barrier. It was clear that some of these problems could be alleviated with effective design.
Myself and my partner form the class chose to target the relations between local law enforcement workers and the Marshallese population as our area of focus for our design solutions; specifically, the ways in which local law enforcement workers can be better prepared and more facilitative of the Marshallese and the issues they face.
We did our design work through a Human-Centered approach which involved research (interviews, affinity diagrams, personas, visual and verbal audits, and task analysis’), prototyping and development of solutions, and finally the creation of four separate solution artifacts. Of these four artifacts, I led the design and production of two; a legal resource booklet handout for Marshallese in custody, and the materials to establish a Marshallese/United States Officer Exchange Program. My goal for these artifacts is to facilitate a cultural understanding between United States citizens and the Marshallese, particularly as it relates to law enforcement practices.
