Hi everyone,
I hope you are all having a peaceful week.
I am a Product Design Engineering graduate student at the Glasgow School of Art (GSA) in the UK.
Currently, our design team is focusing on a project dedicated to children living with Muscular Dystrophy (MD). Through our academic research, we’ve learned about the incredible strength and resilience of these children, but we also realize that mainstream products and school environments often fall short of meeting their daily needs—especially when it comes to independent learning, desk-based activities, fatigue management, and everyday play.
We want to design something meaningful, practical, and truly helpful, rather than just imagining solutions from a classroom. To do this, we desperately need to learn from the real experts: the children themselves, their parents, caregivers, and teachers.
If you are a parent, family member, teacher, or adult who grew up with MD, we would be deeply grateful to hear your stories and experiences.
If you are open to sharing, we would love to know:
- The daily hurdles: What are the most exhausting or frustrating physical tasks during a normal day (e.g., getting dressed, holding objects, fatigue management)?
- School and learning challenges: How do traditional school desks, heavy writing tasks, or long classroom hours impact a child's ability to learn independently?
- Unmet needs: What products, tools, or adjustments do you wish existed to help these children play, study, and live with more autonomy and less physical strain?
You can reply directly to this thread, or if you prefer a private conversation (via Reddit DM), please feel free to reach out. Your stories will be treated with absolute respect, kept completely anonymous, and used solely for academic design research to create better solutions.
Thank you so much for reading this, and for your time and kindness. Wishing you, your families, and your little ones all the best, strength, and health.
Warm regards,
Product Design Engineering, The Glasgow School of Art