Ashia Scott

I took the Graphic Design Course because I am a Brand Strategist but felt I lacked the technical skills to work with my peers of graphic designers, content strategists, paid ad specialists and others if I couldn't use the platforms they were using. Having these skllls has also given me the confidence and skillset to create my brand strategy ideas versus waiting for someone to give me the go ahead to create as the only time I can highlight my expertise.

I learned a lot about myself during Figma and Illustrator. Figma showed me that I have a lot more creative intelligence and intuition than I gave myself credit for while Illustrator reminded me of the acceptance of being a beginner. I was so frustrated I wasn’t catching it as quickly and not being able to make beautiful things as easily, but I kept reminding myself that I’m a beginner and that’s exactly why I’m here - to learn!

Puno's personality via the videos made everything 1000% better. Acknowledging it was going to be hard and frustrating so I didn't feel bad, reminding us to take our time, return back later if we needed and just having fun as if we were in front of each other made me feel good about signing on everyday (during my first 8 weeks when I signed on Mon-Fri lol). I also loved getting feedback from Sarah and Mindy! It felt great to get feedback from experienced professionals who do this work for a living. Their comments and suggestions went a long way. Taking the course without them just would have left me feeling uncertain of if what I was making would actually survive in the "real design world."

I would recommend taking this course if you need to know any of these design platforms, if you’ve been wanting to learn or feel like it might come up in your line of work. It’s a better experience than any YouTube playlist you can make. It’s planned with a designer/marketing perspective in mind and it’s either going to take you where to go or equip you with the skills to get there.

One good thing that’s come out of this course for me is my portfolio!!!!!!! This thing has been about 3-4 years in the making and frankly I didn't have the skills or money to make the website I really wanted, but I was able to build this out in Framer because of what I learned in Figma!