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One of my dreams for a lifetime achievement is actually “elevating web design at the universtity level”, at least here in Portugal. I would absolutely LOVE to join this initiative if something is carried on, either by Leslie or by anyone else.

Please let me know of such moves, I’d appreciate it very very much!

posted at 10:43 am on January 20, 2009 by José Mota

2 First-hand experience at what a kludge the whole s

Leslie, this is a great article—calling on professionals to step up and contribute to the higher ed community is timely and necessary.

I’m curious if the field is complex enough that it should be an accredited major (ie 60 credit hours or more) at the undergraduate level.

I think an undergraduate certificate is probably more appropriate than a full on undergraduate degree.

If there was a 15 credit certificate, I could imagine a breakdown similar to:

one 3 credit class in:
interface design & typography
presentation code

and a choice between:
human factors/usability
information architecture/lib sci
or e-commerce systems

and two 3 credit on-site internships at two different shops.

I also think the curriculum has to be established at the institutional level rather than at the instructor level:

I taught at a private art college in Washington DC (without a graduate degree), and at an institutional level it was really every man for himself—my class was straight up XHTML/CSS/layout/usability whereas next door everyone was playing in Photoshop for 4 hours a week making rich gradients, drop shadows and gel buttons. Talk about a circus when one of the other class’s students dropped by my class to make up a missed lesson.

posted at 10:44 am on January 20, 2009 by Chris Avore

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I took a web design and development course in 2005 at Georgian College in Barrie Ontario, and honestly, I don’t think it could have been a more relevant course. We studied strictly HTML/CSS layouts, usability, accessibility and project management from a web perspective. The professors also made a huge emphasis on the students figuring out solutions on their own, with their own resources, may it be Google or textbooks.

The material that we were being taught was so far a head of the game. One of our instructors, Lisa McMillan, got students into Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and tons of other web communities before they had really even taken off. We also had great speakers come in, including Derek Featherstone, to give small mini-lectures to the students.

I can’t talk enough about how great this course was… I still apply so much of what I had learned to my current projects. Unfortunately, my class was the last graduating class as the college decided to close the program. I still feel that this was a ridiculous decision. Someone I knew had registered for the following year, but do to the closure, was forced to take a course at another college in the area. The other course, a 9-week intensive, was still teaching tables and frames.

posted at 10:57 am on January 20, 2009 by Zack Ginies

4 Turning the Ship

Fantastic article, and for me personally, it is well-timed. I recently filled an adjunct role in Drexel University’s Westphal College of Art and Design, teaching a web-standards design class to those graphic design majors who have chosen a “web track” focus.

IMHO, the thought leadership in design schools are starting to wake up to the needs of the industry… but the talent isn’t necessarily right at their fingertips. That’s why I think Leslie’s call-to-act is important. Reach out to your local design schools and find out the structure of their curriculum. Find out if you can assist in any way.

posted at 10:59 am on January 20, 2009 by Christopher Cashdollar

5 Yes, the system is a mess right now.

I can perfectly relate to most points in your excellent article, but the one that hit me closer to home was about teaching outdated technologies or practices. I’ve done a graduation on Communication Technologies, and web design is a large part of the curriculum. Can you believe that, by 2006, they were still teaching how to layout pages using tables? That’s right, 2006, not 1998. Of course I’ve since learned proper web design, but more from personal practice and passion for the subject than from classes.

In fact, the only thing I do not regret about getting my formal education at a University is the doors it ultimately opened to me. I currently enjoy a good position as a web designer because of a couple of good projects I worked on during my period at the University, so I believe there’s still some point in getting a formal education.

posted at 11:00 am on January 20, 2009 by Bruno Abrantes

6 It Can Happen

Thank you for this great writeup Leslie. As a former HS web teacher (8 years) your article hits very close to home. It’s great that you are asking professionals to get involved. Often, teachers teaching Web Design don’t even know what they don’t know. In other words, they don’t know what they need to know. It takes highly motivated teachers to ensure that students are getting relevant subject matter. My experience has been that the necessary motivation is often lacking.

What really needs to happen is the right people need to be placed in decision making positions. Imagine you were the head of your department Leslie (maybe you are). Who would you hire to ensure you had the best possible web program. Next, imagine you were the head of your department and had almost no web experience. What kind of person would you view as qualified to teach this subject now? I hope you are involved in some way in the decision making process at UTC.

Finally, over the last 6 months or so I’ve seen firsthand what a motivated educator is capable of. Jeff Brown, a teacher at Damascus High School in Montgomery County, Maryland, is doing great things with his students. Anyone who ever wonders if what you’ve described is possible needs to visit his classroom.

posted at 11:01 am on January 20, 2009 by Jason Leveille

7 TRUE TRUE !

Entirely True…

Students like me, teach themselves… learn from blogs and other ppl …

The Art/Design department is too laid back … its more like AIGA… They will only hire people with a masters degree… no matter how talented they are…

Beautiful Code?? what does that mean???

Inconsistency in browsers??? My professors had no idea that codes render differently in different browsers….

The concept would have to change that web design/dreamweaver = learning dreamweaver interface.(I love Dreamweaver.. but that’s not the point)

Another idea I had was to divide a classroom into group of web designers and throughout the semester or year… make them handle local clients, and projects… with changing roles….

If the local clients don’t trust you with their business, there’s enough departments in the university itself… We could even use those departments as clients …

posted at 11:01 am on January 20, 2009 by Subigya Shakya

8 First hand experience

I left my university course that was supposedly aimed at teaching e-commerce and business management. I wanted so much more from the ‘e-commerce’ side of things that the University and the lecturers just couldn’t provide. Techniques being taught were simply out of date and most of the time I thought I could give the lecturers a run for their money, I’m no guru but it really was that bad.

I left when I became sick of my lecturers abandoning the course and then learning that the course had been scraped from all future admissions. I certainly wasn’t alone either the original class had dwindled down from about 28 to 10.

Although the Business side of things played a part in my decision being not very business minded I was coping. Back in 2004 there was just very little choice in the way of web development and this course presented itself as the best option for me.

posted at 11:03 am on January 20, 2009 by Rob Edwards

9 And the requirements are...

Nice article, and good to see the range of the great and the good interviewed. Given that you assign a substantial part of the problem to the issues around hiring graduate web designers and developers and part of the article quoting the interviews, I do have a few questions if you get the time:

• How many of the people interviewed (not just quoted), are directly responsible for the hiring and firing of staff at their organisations
• What are the sorts of numbers we’re talking about (interviews / staff)

• Again with those interviewed, which are responsible for organisation strategy and planning how to make the best use of any agencies most valuable resource, it’s people.

Since you’ve published the interviews it would be good to get a feel for the weight of them based on who presently has issues in this area.

posted at 11:17 am on January 20, 2009 by Richard Conyard

10 Yes.

I am glad an article such as this has come about. The current state of affairs in web design classes range from abyssmal (still teaching basic HTML with frames) to much better (CSS/XML).

I’m going to recommend this article to my higher ups (and my students – who should already know about A List Apart). As an instructor I feel for the admins in that they don’t have time to keep in touch, but they should at least see when instructors doesn’t do a good job. There’s always room to teach outside the curriculum, and take the time to point out good websites – even if it’s five minutes at the end of class or two minutes posting in an LMS or e-mail listserv type thing. Maybe fifteen seconds on twitter, or five minutes on a personal blog.

I definitely tell students that the software skills they learn will be obsolete soon after they get out of class. The generic skills they do learn will be applicable throughout their career; much like the programmer who understands object oriented programming rather than just Java or C++. Lifelong learning indeed!

What isn’t happening is a commitment and understanding that courses will be changing rapidly, quite often from semester to semester. Instructors need to understand that the course they’re teaching today, may not exist next semester, and they will have to adapt. Knowledge is growing at an exponential rate, so it should be adapt or get carbon dated.

posted at 11:17 am on January 20, 2009 by Jon Kruithof

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