Van een tekenmap in een handomdraai een echte, stevige stoel vouwen. De fluxchair, een uitvinding van industrieel ontwerper ir. Douwe Jacobs, komt volgende maand in vijftien landen op de markt.
Wie klein behuisd is, kent het probleem: soms komen er meer mensen langs dan je stoelen hebt. Dus halen veel mensen de vertrouwde klapstoeltjes tevoorschijn. Maar echt mooi zijn die vaak niet. Douwe Jacobs bedacht een oplossing: een trendy vouwstoel.
In niets lijkt de fluxchair op het eerste gezicht op een stoel. Hij is beter te vergelijken met een grote tekenmap of een platte koffer. Weinig spraakmakend dus. Toch is dat alles wat nodig is om een designstoel te vouwen. Jacobs demonstreert vliegensvlug hoe de koffer een stoel wordt. Het is alsof je naar de transformatie van een lelijk eendje in een zwaan kijkt. De saaie koffer verandert binnen een halve minuut in een mooie, strakke stoel met een relaxed zitvlak en een rugleuning die wat weg heeft van de kroon van een vulpen.
“Het vergt wat oefening, maar de kopers krijgen er een handleiding bij en er is een demonstratiefilmpje op de site. Als je het een paar keer hebt gedaan, is het absoluut niet lastig”, zegt de industrieel ontwerper. De vouwstoel is verkrijgbaar in acht verschillende kleuren en er is ook een ophangsysteem te koop.
De introductie van de stoel, gemaakt van weersbestendig polypropyleen, verloopt succesvol. Twaalfduizend zijn er al verkocht, nog voordat de stoel officieel op de markt is. “We maken daarom een eerste batch van vijftienduizend. De belangstelling is enorm, we hebben nu drie keer meer stoelen verkocht dan waar we in het meest positieve scenario van uit waren gegaan. Dat komt onder meer door de hulp van onze investeerders. Zij hebben een wereldwijd netwerk. Tom Schouten, waar ik het bedrijf mee run, en ik zijn beiden industrieel ontwerper en de investeerders vullen nu de zakelijke kant aan. Ik denk dat de stoel zo aantrekkelijk is omdat het simpel werkt en toch mooi is.”
In vijftien landen moet de origamistoel furore maken. “We hebben net ook Japan binnengehaald, daar is men zeer enthousiast. In de grote steden zijn veel kleine woonruimtes en dan komt een vouwstoel natuurlijk goed van pas. Daarnaast zijn Japanners gek van vouwen. Ook vanuit Frankrijk en Italië is veel belangstelling. De mensen daar houden van design.”
Jacobs wil liever niet dat zijn uitvinding vergeleken wordt met vouwstoeltjes op de camping. “Uit onderzoeken met onze prototypes blijkt dat mensen de stoel zien als design. Dat blijkt ook uit de interesse. Vooral mensen die van designmeubelen houden, nemen contact met ons op. De stoel is ook als tuinmeubel geschikt. Studenten zijn niet onze specifieke doelgroep. Zij hebben weliswaar vaak weinig ruimte, maar ik denk dat zij eerder kiezen voor een goedkoop klapstoeltje dan onze duurdere vouwstoel.”
Ook cateraars tonen interesse. “Op een beurs kwam onlangs een topchef naar me toe, die er direct tientallen wilde bestellen. Cateraars in het luxe segment komen liever bij een klant aan met onze stoelen dan de goedkoop uitziende klapstoeltjes.”
Toch blijft het een vreemd idee om op een dik vel te gaan zitten. Dat is een horde, die mensen vaak wel moeten nemen voordat ze op de fluxchair plaats nemen. “Ze denken van te voren dat het een soort papier is en dat het niet zo lekker zal zitten of dat het doorbuigt. Maar dat is uiteraard niet zo. Veel mensen verbazen zich er uiteindelijk over hoe stevig de stoel is.”
When Susanne Rudolph was a student, she admits that she would often skip lectures. Yet now in her position as a teacher at the Faculty of Civil Engineering & Geosciences, she has won TU Delft’s first annual Best Teacher Award competition, in part for her abilities as a lecturer who constantly strives to ensure her lectures are engaging and captivate her students.
Rudolph, who coincidentally celebrated her birthday on the day she received her TU Delft Best Teacher award, was totally overwhelmed when she heard the news that she had won the award. In her acceptance speech, she said she was surprised that she’d even been nominated: “I’m very self-critical and don’t regard myself as a good teacher.”
She does however acknowledge that she’s an extremely enthusiastic teacher, and she felt especially honored because students had chosen her for the award. “It’s a great joy to me that the students said: ‘For us, you’re the one.’”
The jury for the Best Teacher competition – consisting of Rector Fokkema, two members of the student council and one member of the student association council – chose Rudolph over six other nominees. The other candidates for the award were: Erik Tempelman (Industrial Design Engineering); Daniel Rixen (Mechanical, Maritime and Material Engineering); Michiel Kreutzer (Applied Sciences); Jan-Anne Annema (Technology, Policy and Management); Ron Noomen (Aerospace Engineering); and Fred Vermolen (Electrical Engineering, Mathematics & Computer Science).
Of the other nominees for the award, Rudolph knows only Fred Vermolen. “And honestly, I must say that I thought I had no chance against Fred,” she adds.
In the months prior to the selection of TU Delft’s Best Teacher 2009, Delta profiled each of the seven nominees. For Rudolph, whose profile was published in Delta 34, the portrait that emerged was that of a free spirit who was much liked by her students, especially those students in the Life Science & Technology (LST) program, who had nicknamed here ‘Kung Fu’. “This is because I always gesticulate so wildly,” Rudolph says. “At the end of the course the LST students told me: ‘we’ll miss your Kung Fu classes!’”
Rudolph (42) is married and has two children, as well as a slew of pets, including a dog, two cats, two guinea pigs, a rabbit and two rats. The specialist subjects she teaches at TU Delft include properties of hydrocarbons and reservoir fluids, rock fluid interactions, and courses for the introduction to petroleum engineering.
Previously, Rudolph was named the best teacher of the year at LST. She found the lectures she gave while teaching at LST better than those she now gives. Presently, she teaches in the petroleum engineering section of the Applied Earth Sciences program, where she teaches a variety of other subjects and has also taken over lectures from her departmental colleagues. Rudolph: “I reinvent their lectures until they fit my style, but you must give a particular lecture about three times before you find your own unique style.”
Her teaching style is, she says, “structured”. She knows beforehand why she is giving a certain lecture and where it must ultimately lead to. And there is also a red thread always running through her lectures, yet it’s not always easy to maintain. “I talk too much and too fast,” Rudolph says. “But because of my enthusiasm and because of the interactions with students, sometimes I can also lose track of the red thread.”
Rudolph says that she is always striving for improvement, also in her position as chairwoman of the education commission. She also has contributed to renewing the curriculum in her specialist subject areas. It is no surprise then that she has been nicknamed the ‘Change Agent’ within her faculty and is also an ambassador for Dewis (Delft Women In Science).
Positive
After the first round of selection process for the Best Teacher 2009 competition, Rudolph commanded a big lead in voting based on the support of student associations. For instance she was already a highly respected teacher among the members of the Mining Engineering Student Association, where she was praised for being engaged, accessible, enthusiastic and social. Moreover, the association’s students admired her ability to find solutions to problems that arose in the educational program, and also for her forthrightness in accepting responsibility for any changes that occurred, when others were hesitant to do so. After the selection process was complete and the jury had compiled its short-list of seven candidates for the award, the jury evaluated the teachers in a subject that they currently taught. For Rudolph, this was her Rock Fluid Interaction course. The jury looked at the overall exam grades, pass/fail rates and the number of students taking the course over the past three years. The jury also evaluated the extent to which the shortlisted teachers involved their MSc students in research and contributed to innovation in education. The jury also evaluated the way in which the teachers coached and advised their students.
Rudolph stood head and shoulders above the competition when it came to the wide-ranging contributions she made within her own faculty. Moreover she scored as well or better than the other candidates when it came to her ability to communicate with her students, the use of ICT and didactic methods, and for the encouragement she gave in compelling her students to do something positive with the knowledge that they had acquired. Rudolph also excelled in updating and revitalizing old exam assignments and in integrating her course subjects within the faculty. In addition, like the other nominees for the award, she was also highly praised for ability to help her students to learn to think for themselves.
In the final round of jury evaluation, the student members of the jury also attended lectures given by the seven nominees for the award. After attending a lecture given by Rudolph on thermodynamics & chemistry, the jury’s report included the following comments about her performance in front of the class: “punctual, explained matters during the break, interactive, calm, PowerPoint, Whiteboard, good pronunciation of English, direct, high tempo, blackboard, oral exams and good luck!”
Although the jury did find her lecture to be rather chaotic, they surmised that this was partly to do with the fact that the lecture they attended was the final lecture of the exam week.
Following the award ceremony, Rudolph confirmed that indeed all had gone wrong during that particular lecture: “It was indeed very chaotic. After the end, I asked the students fill in a survey about the lecture and one of the surveys I got back was totally destructive. I was very upset.”
Nevertheless, the jury noted, Rudolph continued to answer questions until she was certain that her students thoroughly understood the subject matter. She also related the subject matter back to actual practice in real life and moreover instructed her students in how they must use the various formulas.
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