Students sitting around a table with a GBDA water bottle on it.

Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business

The Stratford School is home to problem-solvers for complex times – human-centred designers with an ability to achieve business outcomes while balancing their the social, cultural and environmental impacts.

About the Stratford School

At the Stratford School we are proud to be training the next generation of leaders. By blending business, technology, and creativity, our programs drive innovation by preparing students to address real-world issues. Donor contributions are integral to our mission, enabling students to build solutions using leading-edge technologies, connect and network with leaders from across industries, and discover the ways that design impacts society, culture, and the economy. Your support helps students make technology more accessible, create equitable solutions, and design experiences that improve lives. As part of our commitment to building a more inclusive future, we also welcome donations to provide financial assistance for high-achieving applicants from lower income backgrounds to attend our programs. Together, we are creating a more inclusive, sustainable future.

Design innovation for a changing world

The Stratford School is a hub for innovative interdisciplinary research. Our faculty come from disciplines such as human-computer interaction, user-experience design and research, organizational behaviour, business, sociology, psychology, fine arts, and computer science. They research areas such as wearable technologies, game studies, disability studies, extended reality (AR/VR) environments, Artificial Intelliegence and business and organizational research.

Stratford faculty members, Karen Cochrane and Daniel Harley, received one of the inaugural Google Academic Research Awards for their work using artificial intelligence to create more inclusive gaming experiences for people living with complex disabilities.

A device wrapped around a right hand

Stratford's Priorities

large group of students standing together at orientation raising their arms excitedly in the air
Every year, the Stratford School sends acceptance letters to students with the drive, ability, and passion to succeed — but they can’t join us because they can’t afford to. Our new GBDA Entrance Award fund helps tomorrow’s design leaders realize their dreams and ambitions by increasing the number of scholarships we can offer to attract and support high-achieving students.

instructor stands before class wearing a virtual reality headset and holding a remote while giving a virtual reality lecture
With this critical fund, the School responds to new needs and opportunities. Whether it’s rewarding excellence with student prizes, ensuring we’re on top of new technologies for our students to work with, or supporting student learning activities such as Capstone, this is the fund that keeps us agile.

students and instructors talking in front of a whiteboard
Help our students get out into the world to network with fellow scholars, build relationships with industry leaders, and try on careers that feed their passions for making change. This endowed fund provides financial support for students to participate in critical learning experiences such as internships in start-ups and not-for-profits, industry conferences, and hackathons.

Students posing inside a cutout frame featuring the letters spelling out GBDA's Creators Collective with additional images of a paint palette, calenda
Our students are full of bright ideas that extend their learning beyond the classroom. This fund supports initiatives for individual students and student groups, as well as clubs like our student-led Creators’ Collective gallery, that build leadership skills, enriches our community, showcases our students’ creative extracurricular work to the Waterloo community, and provides students with a publication credit for their résumés.