Personally I think I put more value on the moving away from home, meeting other students, learning how to fend for yourself, bonus that you get official qualification. After having been and done that once I’d choose the other option for any top-up or career-change leaning.
1 month ago
| 13
I am in the USA and here (at least in my experience) a degree matters. If you want to get a job with a high paying company you have to have a college degree and experience. Then you have a chance for a job that pays around $60 000 to $80 000 where I live. Without a degree from a known college or university you have very little chance to get a top paying job if you have no experience. Small companies might still hire you but pay won't be great. A college degree is not just about graphic design but you spend 4 years learning a variety of subjects that keep your mind challenged., You learn problem solving (not just in graphic design), you learn to work in study groups (teams), and you have many chances on branching out - like working on anime, marketing, business projects, film projects, sports related projects, and often you do internships with companies your college or uni has a relationship with. I am glad I got my degree here and my state finances education (4 year college or uni) if your grades are ok. So we end up with having to pay for housing, books (but there is a loan system too), and whatever else we need, but the degree is paid for, mostly. I ended up with having paid a little over $200 per semester.
3 weeks ago (edited) | 1
In my eastern world, that degree is a good leverage so I don't get paid less than minimum, unfortunately. In a sea of applications with great portfolios, they take your school, past experience, communication skills, and degree into account😩 plus it takes insane luck to actually have a job that actually let's you take the wheel creatively. I think the one year thing is good for those who can self-employ or freelance or those who wants to do creative work on the side or those who wants to further hone their existing skills. Otherwise, it cannot even be guaranteed that hiring employers will get to see your portfolio
4 weeks ago
| 4
That’s bonkers. I paid 7k total for my bachelors in the mid 90’s from a trade school and have made a lot of money over the years. Why do people go to universities? Unbelievable.
4 weeks ago
| 1
I can only speak from my experience. I got a 2 year community college bachelor's degree in art, then got a job with a couple of older, real world experienced artists. I learned much more from them than in college. I then got a job with a large printing company and learned all about pre-press and printing. All that experience was much more valuable than my diploma. In the commercial art world what you can actually do is going to get you work, not a piece of paper. Don't go into debt for a prestigious degree.
1 month ago
| 2
Unfortunately, from my experience, jobs use having or not having a degree as an easy way to remove applicants from the pool. Nowadays, a very solid and large network is worth more than experience/degree but if you don’t know anyone and don’t do freelance, a degree is your best bet in getting your first junior job.
1 month ago | 3
The software isnt the issue. It's teaching proper design fundamentals and the importance of problem solving in Graphic Design.
4 weeks ago | 0
Me personally, I have found a degree is more often than not about checking a box than actually graduating with the ability to do the job. I trust someone with a certification more than someone with a degree most of the time (ran into that a lot with my previous job and I found quite a few people in various industries who needed qualified individuals to do the job felt the same way). I went the route of college. Spent roughly $60k. Am still paying off student loans. Have a Bachelors in Multimedia Design and Development and while I did learn some stuff about the theory behind design, I have always felt I learned more from watching YouTube and finding tutorials on things. There are some fields where you can't get around needing the degree but I don't feel Graphic Design is one of them. I'm only recently getting back into Design (ended up working management in the quick service food industry precisely because of those student loans and am so excited to be getting back to this) and I've learned more watching these videos than some of my college courses gave me. My sister went a slightly different route than the traditional college degree and she has no student loans and is doing pretty well. My 2 cents LOL (probably 5 cents now with inflation LOL)
1 month ago
| 3
What if my "western" country has free education and I didn't pay anything, but now have a provable by diploma education in the field and not just "finished a course by a YouTuber" on my resume?
1 month ago | 2
Learn from YouTube (95% of it is based on your portfolio and resume anyway) and just say you have a degree (95% of jobs won't even check).
4 weeks ago | 0
My degree at a university was only about a third of that amount wtf are you smoking lol
1 month ago | 0
I went to college to study graphic design just to find out $60k later that I could have just took less expensive online courses. I took those courses too and learned things I never learned in school. I even had a recruiter visit one of my classes and flat out tell us “if your portfolio is good enough we don’t really care if you have a degree or not” 🥲 I’d love to take a course from you though lo
1 month ago
| 3
Dansky
In the Western world, a graphic design degree will set you back $15k-$30k per year - and take 3+ years to finish.
What if I could teach you the software, how to actually design professionally, and help you build a killer portfolio - all in 1 year, and for a fraction of the cost… but without the “official” piece of paper at the end.
Which would you choose?
1 month ago | [YT] | 43