The Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising - Los Angeles

Date: Aug 05 2010
Major: Design Arts - Industrial Design/Graphic Design/etc (This Major's Salary over time)
Forget the ratings on the friendliness or quality of school during school…let me save everyone time and especially money and let you know how it is after graduation, before you make your choice to come to fidm. Because this school is great while in school its after graduation that no one tells you. NO ONE. And I will be the first to tell you the TRUTH! Don't read or believe anything you hear about fidm like i did prior to going there. This was a waste of my tuition for two years when I graduated I got nothing in return. I'm very innovative, and my design skills are great, but after graduation, the industry don't give a shit if you're good, if you never even worked in the indusrty, when applying for jobs, they will under value us. They don't even care about the fact that you are a fidm graduate, they will offer you way below 26k. Now you can easily make that working at a dept. store wp even having your Associate degree. So i don't get why fidm charge so much when we're not even guaranteed a good paying job. Unlike going to a cal state or trade school for nursing or getting your bachelor in physcology would even make more money than spending 40,000 at fidm and come out with a job that pay you $12. You can make that even before getting a degree. When they fabricate all those bullshit story don't believe. Most of my friends I went to school with all changed majors, and some is working in the field but has 2 jobs just to survive because fashion design does not pay you well. If you're willing to be a slave when you come out for under $13 bucks an hour to gain experience then work you way up then go for it, when the money you make will barely be enough to repay your student loan. The one thing fidm never tells you is the pay we're going get, all they care is getting you in and out and taking your tuition. There is no job placement as I was told when I signed up, no one helps you find a job, whatever we see in our job portal is what they have. They have like 1 new posting a day and like over thousands of us graduated, how on earth do you compete for jobs. Take your money and go somewhere else that you will gain from after graduation. FIDM is not it. No wonder fidm has a huge drop out rate, those are the smart people who left first yr, and not having to go thru paying for the 2nd yr so they don't owe a whole chunk of loan. If it was that great, people would not leave. I stayed because I truly love fashion design and after graduation, working as an assistant designer gets paid so low. Rather work at an office job and makes more. Unless you have hook up and connections, you will get a design position with great pay, but if you don't have connections, good luck at starting from the bottom working your butt off for $400 a week after tax. Sad. You can make more at in and out.