**okay, im 18 <img src="//cdck-file-uploads-global.s3.dualstack.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/business4/uploads/core77/original/2X/4/442e459c5ced45cb70e8a05e77e07cea6fee4928.gif" width="15" height="17" alt=":mrgreen:" title="Mr. Green"/>** . and have finally figured out what i want to do, i want to create and design things that everyone uses... did not know what that was until i did research and found industrial design, i want to learn as much as i can about it ALL. but the schools are either reeeeeallly expensive or well, no thats it their just really expensive. my family is poor , (in theory) , we live in Louisiana and ULL has a great ID program (nationally accredited anyway) and it is about 14k overall which is cheap by standards of the rest of the country, but man, i JUST CANT AFFORD IT. help me. IS THERE A CHEAPER BUT SIMILAR DEGREE TO ID? IS THERE A SCHOOL THATS A GOOD FIT FOR ME AND MY WALLET? OR SHOULD I JUST I GIVE UP BECAUSE MY NEEDS DONT FIT THE FIELD? helppppppppppp!!!
how about student loans? Almost all of us have them.
Get a job while you study. I was lucky and had two as a shop monitor and as a teaching assistant at my school, so it didn’t impact my projects. But any job will do as long as it puts the top ramen on the table.
Or look into scholarships. I went to school with many talented classmates that paid little to nothing for their education.
I’d discourage to go into a adjacent field for financial reasons. Being “close” to a design education isn’t a design education and you will probably end up going to school for longer and spend more money in the end.
You need to know that if you really want it, you’ll get it. But there is always a price to pay. Time, money, social life, sleep, sanity.
Good luck!
I’m not sure how grants and scholarships have changed, but when I went to community college, almost a decade ago, I was going for free. I received enough grants and scholarships, based on my parents income (which wasn’t exactly poor), to pay for my 3 years at CC. I was able to take all my Gen Eds and take Fine Art classes to create a portfolio to transfer to an art school. Those fine art classes got me a good amount of scholarships and halved my tuition.
Depending on the type of Industrial Design you are going after, you might want to look into building an art portfolio (fine arts) to get extra scholarships when transferring. That’s not how I imagined my college career would go, but it ended up pretty good considering I have minimal loans, and went to a good private art school.
To add to what Bepster said, make sure you plan your college career path. Don’t go into engineering classes or something thinking it will lead to design later. I had a vague idea of what ID dealt with and my counselor recommended engineering classes, because they didn’t offer and ID related course at my CC. That was pretty stupid of me to take their word and not do more research. ID is pretty specific and I needed a Fine Art background for most of the schools I wanted to transfer into.
Have you tried to see what FAFSA will offer? If your family is under a certain income level. You should get a significant amount of Federal Aid. Which will cover a large majority of college. If thats not enough, there are still student loans, as well as work study and part time jobs during school. If theres a will theres a way.
Seriously check into FAFSA. Talk to your school counselor they should be able to give you good insight into whats out there.
You should look at CC. But unless it saves you money be careful with it. A lot of people get sucked into that void and most don’t come out. Scary. If you go this route, put your head down and work hard, the CC party scene is weird, just do your own thing.
I’d recommend looking at good programs and talking frankly with the financial aid people at each school. Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, MI is coming along very nicely with their program. SCAD is a very good choice. Both are a lot cheaper than Art Centre, CCS, Pratt (not as good as they use to be), RISD. Look at those programs too, they might have killer endowments? Which brings me to my next point, Killer Endowments. Schools like Notre Dame and Penn take family circumstances into account, and forgive what they see as asking too much of the family. So ND might be $30k/year (guess?) , but your FAFSA says you get whatever, and your family needs to pitch in like twelve large each year. That twelve grand is on the house, not from your house. Also ND has ID as a major and is a good school. BYU might also do something like that, but you can’t have facile hair and can be dismissed for having contraband in your privet house (and you have to agree to let them search it (WTF?)) BYU puts out really good alumni.
Too bad there are no ID apprenticeships anymore. At least, I haven’t heard of someone coming up like that in a long while. I think it would be reasonable alternative.
True you really need to talk to the Financial Aid people. I know at Harvard. If your accepted and your family makes under a certain amount. You go to college for free. The school covers what your financial aid doesn’t cover. While Harvard doesnt have an ID program. Im sure there are other schools that have a similar set up.