I came to Harper College knowing that I wanted to pursue graphic design, but was unsure how to go about it. I left Harper with much more confidence in myself and my abilities to begin my career.

Harper provided the stepping stones for me to learn how to continue growing and developing both my technical and creative skill sets, both within and outside of class. I was encouraged by my design instructors to think about design differently and attempt projects in greater scope than I had previously considered. Even if I ended up with a design that was less than stellar or not up to my personal standards, the instructors at Harper used these moments as teaching opportunities. Instead of the ‘failure’, they focused on growth, and what I could do in the future to develop an idea into a more cohesive message.

Collaboration with other students was also a large part of my success at Harper, particularly the constructive criticism sessions in my higher level design classes. I’ve always been a defensive designer, so these were great exercises in articulating my processes to a group, as well as helping others further develop their ideas. I would come out of these sessions much more energized about my designs, with fresh energy and input from my peers that I could utilize to help inform how to further develop my work.

My most important piece of advice for aspiring graphic design students at Harper is this: Do not sleep on the portfolio show final. The set up involved for this event was extremely helpful. Creating a personal brand, resume and portfolio has been a tremendous help outside of school. I will always continue developing these pieces, but being pushed to create them while still in school prepared me much more than if I did not have that opportunity as a part of my studies. While being beneficial in learning how to present yourself and your designs, the portfolio show could also be a wonderful networking event for you. Personally, I received an internship offer that I was able to start directly out of school which was a great learning opportunity, and added more professional, public-facing work to my design portfolio.

I owe my entire career to Harper’s graphic arts program. In fact, the job board in the print lab is where I landed my first design job, and ever since that point I have made continuous strides forward in the design world.

I came into the GRA program about a year after I graduated with a B.F.A in digital photography from the Institute of Art in Schaumburg. I had a few designer friends who would make extraordinary things and I was just enamored with their work. I was so curious about how they achieved those designs that after a year of not having that curiosity go away I knew I had to learn about it.

The GRA program really gave me a diverse look into the design workflow from sketching, to file organization, to pre-press and printing. It also allowed me to learn about and explore the world of design from print design, to packaging, to branding and more. I can honestly say that each one of those things has been crucial to my success as a designer. File organization was the core of each company I worked at, and sketching pages and pages of logo possibilities allowed me to brand my first company on my own.

By the end of my first semester in the GRA program, I had a good grasp on the basics of every industry-standard Adobe program including Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop, and Acrobat, and I have used each one of those programs on any given day while working as a graphic designer for the past 2 years.

I am extremely grateful for having had the chance to work in the GRA print lab as well, because learning the terminology and the process has helped me communicate with professional printers in my career, and knowing how color and substrate options can affect a design is so crucial to the success of a project. But none of that knowledge would be possible without the teachers.

The GRA teachers are some of the best I’ve ever had in my academic career. Whenever I came to them with a question, or if I asked them for critique or opinions on an idea I had, even if it was after class, they would stick around and provide honest, constructive feedback, and they always encouraged exploration and entertained big ideas. I think that in itself was one of the most important things, because without that encouragement to truly think different about a project or approach, my mind could have been stifled and I could have just fallen flat in a vibrant, influential, creative world.

I was a non-traditional student who was making a complete career change after 20 years of working in the retail management industry. I never worked with Adobe InDesign or Illustrator, I didn’t have graphic design when I was in high school and I didn't know what preflight was. I felt like I would be light-years behind the other students straight out of high school. I’m now proficient in Creative Cloud applications and on a Mac, which is important to know going into design jobs.  

Thanks to the amazing teachers, adjuncts and staff in the graphic design department at Harper College, I was able to not only finish my associate's degree, but also able to exceed most people’s expectations of learning in a two-year program. While going on interviews since graduating in December 2016, I’ve received many compliments on my portfolio and they’re always shocked at what I’ve learned in two years at Harper. New employers are impressed with my sketching, research and file organization, which usually aren’t the fun parts of design work, but are essential to success. The fact that I’ve learned to plan ahead and meet deadlines is an asset that employers are looking for, and I owe this to my teachers at Harper.

Another skill I learned in my graphic design classes is the importance of preflight. I was the art and design editor for our student-run liberal arts magazine, Point of View, for the 2016 school year. I created the entire 48 page magazine from scratch, setting the proper bleeds, using master pages, converting images to CMYK, double-checking links and keeping everything clean and organized. After uploading my job for print at a nearby printing company who has been printing our Point of View  magazine for decades, I was informed that this was the first time they didn’t have to fix anything. My preflight was perfect and the manager came to Harper to shake my hand. He was more than impressed. I have Patty, Kelly, Jay, Nancy, and Bon at Harper College to thank for their talent and skills which they instilled in me.