Rutgers First Design BFA Degree Set for Fall 2015
Degree will serve growing job sector - in New Jersey alone, with an estimated 8,520 openings forecast by 2022
Mason Gross School of the Arts is set to launch Rutgers University’s first Design BFA degree in fall 2015. The undergraduate design degree is open to incoming and prospective Visual Arts Department BFA students.
“This new degree is significant in that it allows undergraduate students to gain from the rich fine arts curriculum at Mason Gross while also developing a rigorous design practice,” says Jacqueline Thaw, Associate Professor in Design. “We’ve seen that this combination leads dedicated students to multi-faceted, creative, and satisfying design careers.”
The aim, Thaw says, is for design students to develop “innovative and meaningful ways of communicating ideas in a wide range of media and engage critically in contemporary culture,” via print and digital platforms.
The new degree provides a broad foundation in the liberal arts as well as intensive training in the field of design, an area of the economy that continues to flourish in New York and New Jersey. According to O*Net Online, the design sector will experience continued growth in New Jersey alone, with an estimated 8,520 jobs by 2022.
Design studio courses will focus on context and audience in formats that include books, branding and interactive design.
At upper levels, students will work on real-world assignments that are meant to hone their sense of design in the everyday, via an internship or other practice-based projects. In addition, they will study the history of design and key issues in contemporary practice. In their final year, students undertake a thesis, in which they create a project that becomes public, in the form of a website, book, an app, or other format.
Gerry Beegan, visual arts chair and design faculty, adds “We’re very excited about this new BFA, which will enable students to navigate an ever-changing landscape of design production over a lifetime of practice.”
The Mason Gross Visual Arts Department now offers four degrees: BFA in Design, a BFA in Visual Arts, a BA in Art, and an MFA in Visual Arts.
More information about the program is available by calling Mason Gross Admissions at 848-932-5269 or by emailing admissions@masongross.rutgers.edu.
About Mason Gross School of the Arts
Founded in 1976, Mason Gross School of the Arts is the flagship public arts conservatory of New Jersey. Part of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, the school is home to the departments of Dance, Music, Theater, and Visual Arts as well as the Brodsky Center for Innovative Editions, Mason Gross Extension Division, Arts Online, and the Rutgers Center For Digital Filmmaking. Its faculty and alumni rosters include arts professionals recognized nationally and internationally, including Kristin Davis, Calista Flockhart, Avery Brooks, Cleo Mack, William Pope, L. Alice Aycock, Sean Jones, and Cristina Pato. The school’s enrollment of 752 undergraduates and 281 graduate students across four departments, combined with a faculty of 219, ensures students the opportunity to work closely with accomplished artists within their fields.
About Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
Established in 1766, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is America’s eighth oldest institution of higher learning and one of the nation’s premier public research universities. Serving more than 65,000 students on campuses, centers, institutes and other locations throughout the state, Rutgers is the only public university in New Jersey that is a member of the prestigious Association of American Universities.