UWF to add bachelor’s degree in graphic design and digital media this fall

The University of West Florida announced the addition of a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Graphic Design and Digital Media degree program, with a specialization in illustration, on May 6 at an artwork unveiling event at the Darrell Gooden Center on UWF’s Pensacola campus. The program, currently being offered as a specialization track in the Bachelor of Fine Arts program in the College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, will launch as a stand-alone degree this fall.

“This program has had strong enrollment for many years,” said UWF Provost Dr. Jaromy Kuhl. “Elevating this program to a bachelor’s degree program will make it more visible to prospective students and make graduates more marketable to employers.”

The undergraduate degree program consists of 120 semester credit hours that prepares graduates to become graphic and digital media designers. Graduates of the program will be qualified for traditional and emerging roles as graphic designers, web designers, UX/UI designers, motion graphics designers, brand and identity designers, advertising designers, environmental graphic designers, exhibition designers and illustrators. Job openings for graphic designers in Florida for 2023-31 are projected to increase by 9%, with 17,623 average annual job openings with an average mean wage of $58,910.

“This degree already has an excellent record of placements for students,” said David Earle, dean of the College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities. “Graduates have been hired as designers or technical illustrators in companies as diverse as Northrop Grumman and EA Games. The department does a fantastic job preparing students through real-world, client-based opportunities so that students graduate with strong portfolios of applied projects that were actually used, rather than just homework assignments.”

Cross-college collaboration and the use of the Usha Kundu MD, College of Health’s Anatomage Tables for illustration courses will be a key part of the new degree program. To showcase that, art and design instructor Dale Castellucci and her students displayed stunning artwork using the Anatomage Tables at the degree announcement event. For the past three semesters, Castellucci has integrated the high-tech virtual dissection tables into the curriculum of her figure drawing classes. By viewing and drawing the musculoskeletal structures invisible to the naked eye on the Anatomage Tables, students developed a deeper understanding of the human form, ultimately strengthening their figure drawing skills.

“The integration of the Anatomage Tables into my figure drawing class was a result of interdisciplinary collaboration between the Department of Art and Design and the Department of Movement Sciences within the Usha Kundu, MD College of Health,” Castellucci said. “The study of human anatomy is crucial in the visual arts, and the Anatomage Tables are invaluable in deepening students’ understanding of the internal structures that influence their observations of the live model in the Drawing Studio.”

For more information UWF’s College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, visit uwf.edu/cassh.