Parsons design students working with Poltrona Frau

It's been a long time since Pratt Institute, my alma mater, was the only game in town for those looking to earn Industrial Design degrees in New York City. These days Core77's own Allan Chochinov heads up the Products of Design MFA program at the School of Visual Arts, while crosstown rival Parsons The New School for Design offers a BFA in Product Design. Now the latter school is extending their offering, rolling out an MFA in Industrial Design.

Under skipper and veteran designer Rama Chorpash, the two-year program "will prepare designers to negotiate the seemingly contradictory forces at play at all scales of product design. You critically engage with issues such as production and sustainability, consumerism and social and environmental betterment, and global and local industry, integrating these considerations to improve industry, human life, and the planet."

Ah, NYC design education then and now. The neighborhood of early '90s Pratt was blighted by the tail-end of the crack epidemic, our precinct had the highest crime rate in all of New York City (tied only with the South Bronx), students were mugged with regularity and acquiring art supplies meant waiting for a G train that ran about as frequently as the Space Shuttle. And now there are not one, but multiple ID-related programs in Manhattan proper, in nice, safe neighborhoods with their own art supply stores. No, I'm not bitter. Enjoy your design educations, you lousy....

Parsons' MFA in Industrial Design program rolls out in Fall of 2015. Later this month, a panel discussion at Parsons called "Product City: Shortening the Supply Chain" will serve as the program's official kickoff.