Lecturer Donna Pinter established that design in 2006 to give final-year visual communication students professional practice. Some of the studio’s best work featured in a retrospective Learning and Teaching Week exhibition in the Joanne Felk Gallery. Credit: Haley Forrester.
Earns Australian Learning and Teaching Council citation
Establishing a student graphic design studio with real clients has won a University of the Sunshine Coast lecturer an Australian Learning and Teaching Council citation.
Debra Livingston.
The citation for outstanding contribution to student learning recognises the way digital design lecturer Dr Debra Livingston integrates industry-based engagement and the regional community into her curriculum.
Students provide design solutions for community projects and exhibit their work in regional galleries. They also complete an internship in their final year. Debra placed all students locally this year, with the students completing projects ranging from creating a brand for a new cooking school to promoting the Lions Club Maroochydore Markets.
This “hands-on integrated work practice,” which is similar to Avondale College’s ‘that design,’ helps the students “learn to interact and work with a client and begin to understand the [design] process . . . from the beginning of an idea to production output,” says Debra.
The initiative seems to be working, with two of Debra students receiving commendations in the 2010 Southern Cross Packaging Design Awards.
The community also benefits. According to Debra, exhibiting the work of the students promotes: design as a possible vocation; the students as prospective employees; and the students’ work as worthy or purchase.
Introducing the new look of the student graphic design studio
Kirsten Bolinger
Public relations assistant
Cooranbong, New South Wales, Australia
“Gate: that design lab, Avondale College.” ‘that design’ is a student graphic design studio located underneath the Chan Shun Auditorium on the Lake Macquarie campus of Avondale College. The studio has been providing cost-effective and professional design solutions for corporate and non-for-profit clients since 2006. “At the beginning of each year, I have a fresh batch of young, keen and very green third-year design students,” says manager and lecturer in graphic design Donna Pinter. “Come graduation, I have a team of accomplished, published young designers. Their individual and collective commitment and dedication to ‘that design’ is a credit to each of them.”
“You are invited to the launch of ‘that design’ studio.” ‘that design’ launched its new brand this past Wednesday (October 27, 2010). Local business owners and representatives from the local chambers of commerce joined staff members and students in attending.
‘that design’ logo. Katie Page, a Bachelor of Arts (visual communication) graduate of 2009, designed the new ‘that design’ logo. “I chose bright colours to represent the personality of the students who make up ‘that design,’” she says. “The colours are also warm, which represents the nature of the students’ relationship with their clients.” Katie also reflected the youthfulness of ‘that design’ by using hand drawn curly brackets and the playful script-like Arsenale White font. Katie says the design is also clean and bold, reflecting ‘that design’’s professionalism.
“Passenger ticket.” The logo is one part of the brand; the tagline, “Take flight,” is the other. ‘that design’ reflected this tagline in the material—including boarding passes for invitations—it created for the launch. It also made the launch into a flight experience with students playing flight attendants and lecturers pilots. “We wanted a new logo and a new tagline for the studio because the real-life experience we gain here helps us to take flight in skills and in confidence,” says student Evelyn Munoz. “The learning curve is steep but fun.”
Avondale College of Higher Education