Pursue a Bachelor’s Degree in Graphic Design

Adobe Photoshop is the premiere image manipulation tool for print design, Web design, and photography. You can learn to tame this creative powerhouse of a program in this online Photoshop course. Working with a design pro, you’ll learn the best techniques for common Photoshop jobs including selecting and isolating objects, creating image composites, masking and vignetting images, setting typography, and improving images with retouching and effects.

Color is a fundamental medium for any artist or designer. Typography is what sets designers apart from other artists. Composition, literally the assembly or construction of elements, is the artful arrangement that guides the viewer’s eye through an image. In this course, you will analyze everything from Grand Masters to Madison Avenue ads to tubes of toothpaste, and discover how color, type, and composition are combined to create effective and powerful visual communications. Class projects challenge you to build and apply your design skills in application to real-life creative scenarios

Many people are afraid to draw, but the truth is that drawing is not as hard as it seems. If you can relax, get your mind around the task, and begin to understand what you see, you can draw. In this online drawing course, you’ll learn how to analyze what you see in the world around you and communicate it on paper. Guided by a professional artist, you will explore the critical concepts of line, mass, form, perspective, value, and composition, building a solid foundation for all your art and design work.

Writing is an essential skill in almost any professional career you can name. In this online english composition course, students learn to become better readers and writers. Your goal is to produce clearer, more active sentences, better structured paragraphs, and more coherent and interesting personal and analytical essays. Throughout the semester, class discussions will use the critique of images and videos on art as a stimulus for writing. Students will develop two polished essays that will be presented for peer critique..

Layout designers today need the skills to move seamlessly between print and digital projects. Luckily, Adobe InDesign can handle it all. In this online InDesign course, you’ll explore a host of essential InDesign techniques and focus on developing efficient workflows. The course will impart a working knowledge of InDesign’s main capabilities, everything from basic features to using parent pages, importing and manipulating objects, controlling text flow and style, and organizing content with tables, layers, links, and conveyor tools. Projects give you training in a range of real world print/digital publishing projects, from brochures to catalogs, magazines to ePubs, and even an interactive folio for the iPad.

Typography, technology, and culture are intertwined. Type has the power to communicate meaning and mood through its quirks and beauty, its history and diversity. In this advanced online typography course, you’ll learn advanced concepts in typography, building your portfolio through hands-on projects. You’ll experiment with type fusion, learn the details of text layout and information hierarchy, create a visual identity for product package and a civic authority, and even design your own currency.

What essentials do artists and designers just need to know? In this online art history course, you’ll build a foundation in art and the artists who created it. You’ll explore profound themes that have concerned artists for centuries: nature, the human body, society, religion, and politics. Through engaging lectures and projects, you’ll learn how to identify the mediums, materials, and techniques artists use and discuss the styles of important artists, art movements, and historical periods from antiquity through the mid-20th century.

An understanding of human psychology is essential for any designer. In this online psychology course, you’ll build a foundation in theories of the mind. The course focuses on the biological and environmental bases for human behavior, including motivation, emotions, states of consciousness, learning, and personality. Students examine classic theories and theorists in psychology and complete research- and reflection-based projects.

In order to build a Web site today, you need to know how to code using HTML and CSS. In this online HTML/CSS course, you’ll learn just how fun and creative hand coding and designing Web sites can be. Working with a professional Web designer, you’ll discover how to create Web pages with HTML and control page design and layout with CSS and get up to speed with current Web design practices including HTML5, semantic coding, CSS Grid, Flexbox, Web fonts, and CSS3 effects. The course will also provide an introduction to techniques used to test website accessibility.

For a novice designer, sending a job to the printer is a mysterious (and expensive) process of trial and error. To manage a print job effectively, you must understand how print shops work, how to communicate with them, and how to identify the best design solution for your budget. In this online print production course, you can learn the fundamentals of producing professional-looking print publications. Working with an expert instructor, you’ll learn to choose papers and Pantone inks, modify your materials and processes based on a budget, use Adobe InDesign to prepare designs for print, manage the phases of the production workflow, and most importantly produce high-quality work.

Graphic design is the art of visual communication, the visual representation of ideas or concepts. In this advanced graphic design course, you’ll study the movements that shaped today’s design world. Working with a professional designer, you’ll discover how to conceptualize projects, reinvent clichés, distill complex information, and motivate your audience. Class assignments include postage design, annual report layout, poster and book design, an art poster, and a direct mail piece.

Today’s business clients are looking for designers who can apply their creative talents in ways that enhance strategic business goals. In this online introductory Marketing Design course, you’ll learn tried-and-true marketing concepts and explore how they affect the design process. You’ll gain a solid grasp of the marketing process, understand key terms and concepts that every marketer uses, and pick up smart questions to ask in client meetings.

The course provides essential preparation for finding employment opportunities in your creative industry. You will learn how to define a personal career path, break down the job market, and define their goals, talents, and ideal job. This course explores different ways to brand yourself as a professional creative, discussing tips for resume and portfolio preparation, self-promotion, marketing, client searches, responding to leads, interviewing, and presenting work and/or campaigns.

A design is more than an individual piece, it needs to be integrated into a system. You will begin your exploration of contemporary design systems with a focus on how to apply them when planning, developing, and advancing your design work. What kind of professional designer do you aspire to be? In collaboration with faculty advisors you will review and analyze your current portfolio and identify what kinds of design you want to develop and produce during your program of study and beyond.

Typography can be endless. In this course, you will take a “deep dive” into the world of type to research and explore how typographic letterforms have been and can be presented in creative and innovative ways. You will demonstrate the ability to iterate multiple design solutions, employ advanced aesthetic judgement, and show the ability to communicate with diverse audiences and cultures. You will synthesize multiple design principles as you produce a variety of compelling designs prominently featuring typographic elements.

Building upon your branding expertise, you will focus on effectively producing strategic and compelling graphic identity and branding materials. Your designs will be informed by your research of branding for product-driven and service-driven companies, as well as non-profit and cultural organizations. In this class, you will select or develop a signature project and carry it through a classic process: research, brainstorming, feedback, finalizing, client presentation, and final adjustments.

As a creative professional, you will communicate ideas to complex and diverse audiences. This course explores multiple theories of cultural anthropology that inform the way we understand identities and societies. Areas of focus include language and communication, economic and political systems, ethnocentrism and culture, kinship and descent, marriage and family, gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, religion and belief systems, the effects of colonialism and industrialization, and the impact of globalization on culture.

In this second individualized course, you will research, develop, and present projects that support your portfolio and career goals. You will develop a project plan with your instructor, then fulfill it as you continue to analyze, evaluate, and synthesize design theories and integrate them into your well-considered and compelling project(s). Your class grade will be based not only on the quality of your work but also on your ability to meet deadlines, effectively finalize your designs, and present your work.

As a designer working today, you’ll likely need to develop designs deployed through a wide range of interactive media and/or social media. How will you react when a client wants you to direct their web strategy or coordinate their social media campaigns? In this class, we will research and discuss current interactive marketing strategies and venues. You will then translate your research into the development of practical interactive media projects that can expand the depth of your portfolio. The final presentation should reflect your research and include finalized designs that demonstrate your design expertise and ability to strategically plan the development of interactive graphic design.

To get your foot in the door in the design field, experience matters. In this industry-focused class, you will engage with a professional client or employer in your local area and expand your experience in the field, with the benefit of the insightful support of your instructor. Working for a real client or employer will provide you an opportunity to hone your problem-solving, client communication, and project management skills, creating a business solution(s) that will stand out in your portfolio and on your resume.

Any creative who wants to establish a freelance career or succeed in business will benefit from a basic understanding of accounting. This course includes a focus on basic accounting principles and how they can be applied within the context of a small creative business. You will explore and identify how to use Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), ledgers and journals, and how to follow and apply accounting strategies and cycles when running a creative focused business. Additionally, this course provides an introduction to balance sheets, financial statements, assets and liabilities, and equity, as well as an exploration of business ethics.