Grace Ai | The Chronicle
From the senior parking passes and coffee bags to the banners in the counselor office at Mason High School (MHS), you’ve probably seen the work of Design Studio Internship- probably without realizing it.
A class and a student-led internship opportunity at MHS, Design Studio Internship is a place where students create designs and graphics for clients beyond school borders at a more professional level. While it’s overseen by art teacher Dan McKay, the class also has three student directors who deal with most of the coordination between clients and designers.
As a supervisor, McKay says he primarily helps the students get in contact with their clients. Clients can range from other teachers, school clubs, or simply anyone in the community looking for a specific design.
McKay said that aside from approving projects, ensuring his students safety while simultaneously supervising the internship is his main goal. For each project, he has to assess the potential client and decide whether or not the project is an appropriate fit for the students so that it’ll give them the best learning experience and let them grow artistically and managerially.
“It’s protecting the students and knowing that they’re getting really robust, quality projects to work on,” McKay said. “[but] it’s also making sure the client understands that these are high school students who, while they can work at a very high level, are different from for-pay professionals. I don’t want their time to be exploited or for people to treat them poorly.”
There’s many things about the internship that sets it apart from the other art classes offered at the high school; in order to be in the internship, students must take the Digital Image Design (DID) courses at MHS and then get recommended by the teacher that teaches their DID class to Design Studio Internship. After being recommended, the student may be selected to take the internship.
“Unlike a typical art class where I as the teacher would come up with a prompt based on the learning objectives I have, Design Studio Internship is for students that have already completed levels one and two of any of the digital design courses,” McKay said. “By the time they come to Design Studio Internship, they should possess a high level of skill using Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop, and an understanding of the elements and principles in design layout.”
Additionally, what the students work on is entirely dependent on the clients that work with Design Studio Internship. McKay said that while it can be a stretch to make art for someone else in a way that’s different from working on personal projects, the experience helps expand any artist’s skills.
“You’re not making anything for yourself,” McKay said. “There needs to be a willingness to understand that these stretches are growing you as an artist, so when you’re back to making your own personal work, you’re drawing from a greater well of knowledge and experience.”
Senior and Creative Director of Design Studio Internship Olivia Close says that she predominantly helps with the second stage, managing all of the designers projects, whether that be a logo for a company or an entire t-shirt design for a club.
“My main job is working closely with the client by making sure we understand the ins and outs of what they want us to do,” Close said. “Then, it’s being able to accurately and efficiently translate all their needs to our staff designers.”
The designers chosen for the project will then create multiple iterations of a design for the client to review until a final one is decided on. Eventually, the final design is constructed and sent to the client, a process that can last anywhere from a few weeks to several months. Close said that herself and the design team are not shy to the many problems that can come up during this process.
“It can be hard to communicate what you have in your head to others without designing it yourself,” Close said. “As a person who likes to have a lot of leadership, it was very important for me to realize that I can work with other people.”
For Close, graphic design is a catalyst for growth for the people in the internship. It improves everything from communication and artistic skills to overall collaboration skills.
“People don’t really think about this, but our whole world is very much tied to graphic design,” Close said. “It’s the way that we communicate ideas nonverbally, and communication in general is very important for artistic growth”
Even for those in the internship who aren’t going into the art industry, McKay says that Design Studio Internship gives students skills that many employers value among potential hires, often putting the students ahead of their colleagues after graduating from high school.
“There’s translatable skills from this class, even if you’re not going into art necessarily,” McKay said. “It shows that you’ve interacted with clients, that you have time management skills, and that you can work with a team on a deadline. We’re equipping people with skills that can be advantageous to them not just in college, but going forward professionally.”
Even though the professional art industry has been facing challenges with employment as generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other AI technologies becoming more common in recent years, these work skills remain valuable. Despite the development of AI, Close says that computers can’t replace designers.
“People have to understand that art’s not going away,” Close said. “Design is not going away because of new technology, because it’s so human and we can’t do anything about it. It’s staying.”
