The Columbus College of Art and Design

Date: Aug 01 2016
Major: Art & Design Department (This Major's Salary over time)
I attended CCAD for two years. It was the best school for what I wanted to do in Ohio. They gave me really great scholarships, I practically went for free. I was super excited at first. The first year was great. It was only when I really got into the Advertising and Graphic Design program that I was really let down. In hindsight, the issues I came across weren't terrible and I should have stuck it out if just to complete a degree, but at the time, here is why I left: The design program is very uncreative and competitive. In all my classes, my professors encouraged me to look at other people's work and the internet to be "good." In order to eliminate this idea of a starving artist, they taught you to do trendy design work and advertise, and sell sell sell. I thought it was odd, being an art college… you would think the design program would be more fine art based. The students are super competitive and pump out trendy projects, then brag about all the internships they are getting. With huge projects due in every class all at once, the competitiveness, and the lack of time to really develop your artistic style, I ended up becoming a very stressed out, depressed and anxious person. Everyone else around was suffocating and stressed out as well. It's definitely not a positive or healthy atmosphere, especially combined with Ohio's terrible winters, no matter how many petting zoos they try and bring to campus. It just wasn't worth it to me. The icing on the cake was the chair of the design department was one of my professors, and he was a complete joke. He never gave a lecture- only assignments to do during the three hour lab class while he did his real job stuff, made fun of students work in front of the rest of the students, and made students who wanted to suck up to him run his errands and do all the things he simply did not have time for. I don't understand why you would make the chair of the department teach if he doesn't have time to. Not only that, but how does it reflect on the rest of the department look if the chair of the department's class sucks? I wrote all this of to the dean of the program, who only said in response that this guy was an exceptional teacher and friend and he was sorry I was having issues. Like… it's a small enough school to where if I'm a disgruntled student, I should get more than a brushoff email, and apparently where all the faculty is so close & buddies that a complaint from a student doesn't bother them… Anyway, that was my experience. I moved out west. It wasn't a terrible school. If you want to be in advertising and marketing, then it's a great design program.