How I got into design

For the longest of time, I’ve always had a creative entrepreneurial attitude. When I was nine, I would copy and paste codes from outside websites of background layouts and sparkly pink cursors to my Neopets store. I enjoyed managing my own e-commerce shop selling things from ice cream to magic potions. After I grew out of my Neopets obsession, I started doing almost the same thing to my Myspace. I added playlist generators to my blog which also became a digital space for my preteen musings and selfies. Who would’ve thought that fast forward 8 years later I would still be (kinda) doing the same thing?

How design intersects with information technology

According to a General Assembly article, “Why Design Thinking Matters” by Hayley Yudelman, design thinking is “… a method of creatively and practically solving problems that keeps the user top of mind. Understanding the user’s wants and needs allows us to make more accurate decisions during the inspiration, production, and iteration phases of building a product.” – IBM Design.

Graphic design is a great skill to have, especially for web and mobile developers, social media marketers, and project managers. Design thinking was created to train engineers, product managers, and marketers to think like a designer for the corporate world.

Vision

Early in the Fall 2016 semester, I had the great opportunity to be a member of the Vision for Entrepreneurs organization located right in SU’s Blackstone Launchpad.

We are an Adobe-sponsored club that focuses on academic diversity within entrepreneurship. I’ve worked with students from Newhouse, iSchool, Whitman, and VPA on various product initiatives, specifically our Vision Pop^ Event Week during December 2016.

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Last December, we planned a week long innovations event, Vision Pop-Up Series. We brought in various technologies like Adobe Creative Cloud and VR Cameras for students to tinker with. My team worked on the iSchool event. Our goal was to have iSchool students use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator as design tools to spark creativity.

Most of our meetings consisted of open pitch sessions where we would pool in our ideas on how we could attract iSchool students to creative products. Going through the entire process of building an interactive design lab was the best team work I have ever been a part of.

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How we got Adobe to sponsor us

One of our club presidents, junior Julia Haber, spent summer 2016 getting Adobe to sponsor our club. We were invited to be part of their college pilot program, Adobe Creative Club Network. Schools like UCLA, Harvard, and Princeton have student entrepreneurs passionate about bringing Adobe products to their campuses. As a team, Vision members communicate with Adobe’s marketing coordinator in creating ideas for our events. We received a massive package of Adobe decorations and also bought a giant cut out of our lightbulb logo.

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We had a total of three teams throughout the Pop^ week which included iSchool, Whitman, and Newhouse. The iSchool consisted of four team members. They created the interactive design lab for our logo contest in less than three weeks. The winner was able to receive their design on a t-shirt and the participants got theirs on stickers.

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To Check out more on the Blackstone Launchpad visit: http://launchpad.syr.edu/ 

Want to be a part of Vision? Or find out when they’re next event is? visit: http://visionforentrepreneurs.com/