What You Do in Design School
In design school, you'll learn about various design principles, techniques, and tools. This involves engaging in projects that teach you graphic design, product design, user experience (UX) design, and much more. You'll explore creative processes, develop your artistic skills, and gain a deeper understanding of design history and theory. Additionally, you might study software like Adobe Creative Suite and work on real-world design challenges to build a strong portfolio.
Honesty: A Lesson in Failure
Design school is notoriously difficult, and it's not for the faint of heart. If you go to a really good one, it will push you to your limits and beyond. Expect to sleep no more than 3 hours a night and pull at least two all-nighters a week. You'll be stressed out trying to decipher assignments that seem to make no sense. There will be nights you cry to your parents at 3 AM, and you'll consider dropping out multiple times daily. You'll constantly doubt your abilities and believe that everything you do is horrible. And yes, everything you do in the beginning is horrible.
The first lesson you should be taught is that not only is failure possible, but it's inevitable. You're going to fail left and right, and you'll have to redo things. You may even have to redo the redos. While you're busy redoing everything, you'll get more assignments because that's how the real world works. However, this leads to the second lesson: when you fail, it doesn't end. You have to keep working at it until you get it right.
Lessons in Productivity and Cynicism
Depending on the curriculum and the type of design school, you'll also learn that life is not fair. You'll shoulder a significant portion of the burden in group projects, and people will expect you to get it done. However, they won't thank or praise you for it. You'll make friends in other courses, but they'll go out on weekends and party while you work late at school or in your apartment. This part will be challenging.
But design school is also where you'll learn to make amazing things. You'll discover how to make things you didn't know you could, and you'll figure out ways to do things on the fly to get the end result. No one will say, "I shit you not, that was my assignment in my 4th week of Introduction to Graphic Design."And you'll leave class feeling numb, go home, and cry like you haven't cried since you were 7. But then you'll suck it up and break the problem down into small, easier-to-digest pieces. A week will pass, and you'll show up to class with a shadow puppet, a muppet knockoff, and a full-body costume, all of which you made from scratch and all of which will turn into bags. Your teachers will look at them and say, "But..."
Resilience and Accomplishment
As you push through the hardest assignments you've ever faced, you'll realize that even when you think you can't do something, you can. You'll stop seeing piles of junk and start seeing ways to combine them in your head to turn into amazing things. You'll start noticing how horribly signs are designed, the poor typeface choices people make, and how badly they kern them. You'll understand how colors and typefaces tell you about a brand and how to better utilize them. Color and typography will become a new language you speak fluently.
When it's all said and done, as you near graduation after two grueling years of literal blood, sweat, and tears—physical scars from accidentally cutting your thigh, and your friend losing the top of his thumb due to a slip with an X-acto knife—you'll take everything you've made, remake it, and make it better. You'll improve upon it and put it together in a nice, beautiful book called your portfolio. You'll create a website where you'll post images of it. You'll brand yourself with a personal logo and color palette. You'll start marketing yourself to agencies and design shops. And when it's all done, you'll look back on it all and marvel over all that you accomplished and wonder how it was possible. You'll smile because you'll realize that nothing the world can throw at you will ever hold a candle to what you just survived. And you'll know that you can do anything.
That's what you do in design school. If you want a suggestion, I went to the Creative Circus in Atlanta, Georgia, and it has been one of the best decisions of my life.