<![CDATA[Higher-order thinking and problem-solving skills are essential requirements for 21st-century learning, yet their implementation in secondary schools remains suboptimal. The design thinking approach has the potential to develop empathy, critical thinking, creativity, and the ability to design solutions through the stages of empathy, definition, ideation, prototype, and testing. This study aims to identify the design thinking ability profile in environmental pollution learning among eleventh-grade students at SMA Negeri 15 Semarang at each stage. The study used a quantitative descriptive method with a sample of 307 students. Data were collected through multiple-choice tests covering five design thinking indicators, then analyzed using percentages and converted into criterion achievement. The results showed that the define indicator had the highest achievement with a sufficient category, followed by prototype and empathy in the sufficient category. The ideate indicator was in the less category, while the test indicator showed the lowest achievement with a dominance of the very less category. These findings indicate that students' ability to decipher problems is relatively more developed than divergent and evaluative thinking abilities. In general, students' design thinking ability profile still needs strengthening, especially at the ideate and test stages through learning that emphasizes creativity, reflection, and feedback-based iterative processes.]]>
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