I am a senior in highschool and am trying to decide which college i should go to next year. Anyway i was admited to 5 design programs Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, Auburn, Syracuse University and Pratt. For various reasons i have narrowed the list down to Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech. I am having real trouble trying decide on which school i should attend next year. It seems to me that Georgia Tech has the better reputation in the design world. On the other hand Virginia Techs facilities are so much better than Georgia’s that i am not so sure that Georgia actualy has the better design program. Any imput of any knid on this matter would be more than welcome. Thanks
Sounds like you are getting pressure to go for a public university? Although the cache and education from Pratt is valuable-- there are some very unique opportunities availible to you from a university setting. Both Georgia Tech and Va Tech have decent programs, but make sure you have a solid reason for your decision. Take a look at what some of the graduates are doing (use Coroflot as a resource). Who’s work do you prefer? Who has the better internships?
I am one of only two people that has gone to both GA Tech and Pratt( i know it is already off your list). I did my undergrad at Pratt and my Masters at Tech.
If I were to compare my experience between the two. I learned to be an artist/designer at Pratt and I got portfolio at Tech. Not because Pratt wasn’t good school for it but I didn’t have focus at Pratt. And not that Tech was a great place for a portfolio. It is all about what you put into it.
I often wondered what would have happened if I didn’t go to art school for design and I went to a public school. Beyond the obvious issues, that I didn’t have the grades for Tech out of high school. Art school teaches you first to see, then to feel and finally to express. Tech teaches the pragmatics of design but not the soul.
If you have no soul for design, go somewhere where you can get it. I spend two years learning how to see form, understand how object and people relate to each other and the world around them in a way that became implicit. It affect everything I do, more than marker technique, or CAD skills.
FYI, if you can’t draw, learn. Granted the ‘art’ side of design is less than 5% of my daily activities, it is the most important. Draw, Draw, Draw. That is the value of Art Schools. My freshman year was 6 hours a week drawing, 6 painting and 6 more sculpting. (1 hour english and 1 hour of art history) In a public school, you will be luck to draw at all your freshman year.
Excuse grammer and spelling, A) this a message board and B) I went to Art School.
I already posted a long reply in the other thread, but I’ll add some comments to what people have said here.
I think Cyclops is pretty on point for the most part. As far as the soul of design, I think thats really something that can’t be taught. The bottom line is some people simply aren’t good designers, and others just need to learn to use their potential.
A huge part of design more than formwork is problem solving. There are 50,000 designers overseas being taught how to design consumer electronics that are super snazzy. In order to stay ahead it’s really going to be about learning to identify problems and solve them in ways that make sense.
A group of girls in my studio are doing a project on how to solve water issues on a horse farm. They designed a cart system that was designed to be towed by something. They spent several minutes discussing research on noise from gas vehciles (like a quad) and then electric alternatives. I looked at them and said “Why don’t you get the horse to pull it?” and suddenly it all seemed to make sense to people. A lot of people get so caught up in being high tech and edgy with design it makes them overlook the obvious.
I also agree that at either VT or GT drawing is done more on a technical level then it is on an artistic level. I had the advantage of having a good art program in high school, so that wasn’t as huge of an issue.
The reality of it though is if you know from the get-go you need to draw, you should pick up some books, and start drawing from the second you get to school. I blew it off for a while because I was always able to get away with it, mostly because the class as an average had poor sketching/rendering skills and we weren’t pushed as hard to really improve our drawings as long as our final products got better.
If you want to be a good designer you can do it at any school. For some fields, like Transportation design, you’re very limited simply because of connections that only schools like Art Center have. You need to set out to be not only the best in your class, but to keep an eye on everyone elses work around the country to keep you on the level you need to be.
95% of college education is what you put into it. And with that said, Go Hokies.
