What makes Shillington grads special from those that employ them

Date
28 July 2014

In the past couple of weeks we’ve looked at why Shillington College was founded to offer a different kind of graphic design education and heard from some of the teachers at Shillington campuses around the world about how they make this happen in practice.

But as an institution whose whole raison d’être is producing practically-minded graduates who are all set for the working world, it makes sense to ask those who are best placed to judge just how good Shillington graduates are; those that employ them…

Matt Kendall – RetroFuzz

We’ve had two Graduates join us directly from Shillington – Ryan Meikle and Hannah Tomlinson, both of whom have gone on to become valued members of our team in a very short period of time.

One of the key strengths of both has been the ability to jump straight into live briefs in a confident and assured manner. Both graduates were given live briefs from day one of joining, and not just the less important projects either – Ryan was placed into a team working on Lady Gaga’s website and Hannah working on an online campaign for Eastpak bags – and their mature and confident approach to each was a key factor of the success of their work.

Something I’ve noticed is that their passion for progression often comes from the varied backgrounds of the student in each course. In our case, both students had creative backgrounds in other fields (Product Design and Account Executive respectively) who had used Shillington to retrain for a new sector. This led to a well-rounded approach to creativity, and gave them the ideal launchpad to push towards their new goals.
www.retrofuzz.com

Scott Leonard – The Champion Agency

Three things stand out about a Shillington graduate:
 
Design – their typography and grid skills are second nature along with execution and production knowledge; the course clearly drills the value and respect of design principles.
 
Speed – They understand the importance of time and are not afraid of tight deadlines, working on two-hour briefs on an intense three-month course sharpens their design intuition.
 
Creativity – they have strong technical and design understanding which means more time is spent developing ideas, constantly pushing the work to a more creative outcome.

We’ve employed two Shillington students and are looking for another; Alex Lewis (work above) joined us in April and is already a key member of the team.
www.thechampionagency.com

David Palmer – Love

The main thing for me is their attitude. They’ve tended to have tried something else for a career and decided to change course. Subsequently they arrive with a great attitude and a level of life experience and maturity that is often missing from 21-year-old graduates.
www.storiesbylove.com

Paul Sissons – BBC Head of UX & Design

The graduates from Shillington that are with us at the BBC have a great grounding in their craft as well as having a curiosity to explore and research design challenges and methodologies. 

The thing I’m most impressed with is their value of process, consideration of what’s around them, trying things out before diving in and an awareness of the audience. Recognising that people are the reason we do what we do. Design isn’t simply about vanity it’s about needs that help shape why and what we make.
www.bbc.co.uk

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Shillington College recent student work: David Orr

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Shillington College recent student work: Georgie Trasenster

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Shillington College recent student work: Helen Drake

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Shillington College recent student work: James Cooper

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Shillington College recent student work: Rebecca Lay

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Shillington College recent student work: Gregory Bemis

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