diverse education experience

I was talking with someone recently about education and the virtues of having been to a University. I have as many qualms with the education system as the next person, but my University did instill in me a very fierce obsession with visual communication.

There is another reason, however, that I am grateful to have attended a University. I've often looked at fellow designers with envy upon finding that they have a degree from SCAD, Prat, The Portfolio Center, or any number of impressive applied arts schools. But then I remember.

At my University,
I took a class in sign language--taught from day one without a single spoken word.
I drummed and danced in an African music course.
I learned about the origins of humans in Anthropology.
I studied Kaftka in "Philosophy in Literature."
I went to see obscure plays and participated in a cultural dance exposition.
I spent a summer in London at my University's campus there, studying European design.

Ultimately my philosophy as a designer is that we must be exposed to a wide variety of things. We must have knowledge about cultures and subcultures. We must seek out visual stimulation of all sorts so that we are not recycling old ideas. We must read and travel and experience all that we can. What is there to pull out of your creative brain if you're not putting anything into it?

Anyone, regardless of what sort of school they went to, can achieve this. But something about the diversity of learning in a University helped get me on that track early in my career.

So...I think I'm due for a trip to a museum, or perhaps a class in origami, or to spend an evening helping to build a new local art center.