Can design teachers evaluate students’ products from an end-user point-of-view?

The purpose of design education is to teach future designers to create products that fulfil the needs, wishes and expectations of the targeted users. Therefore, it seems reasonable that teachers in design education should have knowledge on how users experience products and apply this in the evaluation of design assignments. The question is whether ‘teachers are able to estimate the user experience?’. To answer this question the correlation between the assessment of products done by users and by teachers is analysed, by assessing 76 products designed by students. The teachers assessment correlated strongly to the assessment done by a jury of end users, (ρ = 0.743, α <0.000), if the products designed for general target groups (i.e. adults between 18 and 65 years of age without special disabilities or very specific problems and needs). However, no correlation was found between the assessment of teachers and a jury of end users of products designed for people with disabilities or very specific problems and needs (such as bed bound hospitalized children).