Transferring school from CCS

Hi,
I am a student who is currently enrolled in College for Creative Studies for Transportation Design major. I finished my freshman year last semester at CCS and I took a leave of absence this semester due to personal reasons. I am considering about transferring school and changing my major to industrial design. I have gpa around 2.0(its very low…) and I have listed California College of the Arts and Ohio State university on my list for ID major. I want your guys opinion about these school’s ID program compare to CCS’s and other opinions about transferring school.(I would love to hear from graduates from these schools. I want to hear about environment and atmosphere of CCA and Ohio State University.)
I am very interested in electronics and UI field in ID major which school is great for this field?

Why not stay at CCS (the alma mater of my ID degree) and move from trans to product?

It would help to understand the reasons behind your desire to change major and school.

Obviously doesn’t like transpo. I thought it was my “passion” until I did it for a semester. Happy never to look back.

As for the school, I get CCA. Out of the midwest and a better place for connections to the consumer electronics business. I don’t get Ohio.

But I do agree the OP needs to state an objective for a new school. Right now we are just throwing spaghetti against the wall. My least favorite “design technique”.

Its my alma mater too (trans major), and have worked in the car industry since. With the ID program half full of people who are actual aspiring designers not wanting to work on cars and half full of aspiring car stylists who didn’t get into Trans, I can’t blame him for wanting to do ID elsewhere.

I know if I had to do it all again, I might’ve rather stayed in product design, and possibly switched to a school that was less big-firm ID/car styling oriented, and more small-biz ID/design thinking oriented like RISD or something. There is so so much about “car design” that flies in the face of actually designing a better product for the sake of ‘cool’ lines and shapes, that its ridiculous. But of course I am injecting my own preferences and critique into the discussion, and agree with the above poster, that the OP should add some more reasoning criteria for wanting to transfer.

The reason why I am considering transferring is that I am not sure if CCS can provide the ID program that can help me with getting into electronics & UI field. (I think CCS is well known for Trans major but I am not sure about other majors.) I don’t like the city Detroit, it would be nice if you guys can tell me about the surroundings of CCA and Ohio state university.

Ahh, doesn’t like the city of Detroit - can’t fault you there, I think that sentiment is almost universal (sorry to my friends still there).

I haven’t been on campus since 1996 so I can’t stick up for the ID program except to say that from 92-96 the ID program was top notch, and not just for the car industry. Specifically for UI, there was a trend at the time to double major in ID and GD and courses for that were evolving into GUI design as a forte but I don’t know if that is still the case?

I wish you luck no matter where you land.

FWIW, three of my co-workers are from the ID major at CCS and all very talented. Two are more recent grads and one graduated a few years ago.

Linked in just rated CCS in the top 5 ID schools in the country. Based on careers of alumni.

CCA and Ohio state are not on there.

I appreciate all the comments you guys gave me. I felt like I need a fresh start but seems like I might have to reconsider since CCS sounds like a good choice still.

My alma mater, CMU, is top on the list! Every ‘best of’ list is completely subjective and subject to the whims or what lens they are being looked at thru.

That being said (and I’m sure things have changed drastically over the years) CMU positioned itself as less of a ‘skills’-based school and more of a ‘thinking’ and ‘process’ minded one. I know all schools teach some level of skills, process and thinking, but (at that time) it was less focused on drawing and computer modelling prowess, and more into the mind and process of design and leading with design.

Great point, I think CCS is much more heavy into the style and aesthetic drawing/modeling end of design, than depth of thought and process. And while things may have changed since I was there around the turn of the century, I don’t think they have much in the way of a specific UI focus.