<p>I am interested in going into advertising or publication design and am trying to decide if Yale can help me in these goals. I already know:</p>
<p>Interaction with Yale School of the Fine Arts</p>
<p>Ability to work with graduate students </p>
<p>Paul Rand was on faculty </p>
<p>A small class environment in art</p>
<p>Close enough to NYC for internships</p>
<p>Digital Media Center for the Arts </p>
<p>Can anyone correct or add to this list? I’m still on the fence…</p>
<p>Completely unrelated - I just like how similar our screen names are. I’m interested in theatre, though, so I don’t know anything other than what you’ve stated about fine arts possibilities at Yale.</p>
<p>too funny!</p>
<p>Yes I think it would be very helpful even though Yale does not have a pre-professional advertising/communications design program like say, Syracuse University does. Getting good summer internships would be key, of course, and your graphic design professors (as well as other students, including graduate students in the department) and the University Career Office (which maintains an enormous alumni career network) and/or Alumni Association would be able to help with that. Also, very prestigious companies like Proctor & Gamble actively recruit at Yale for advertising spring & summer internships, sometimes even beginning in the freshman or sophomore year, and if you could land something like that, you never know where it could lead. </p>
<p>Another thing you can do is work during the year for one of the many dozens of undergraduate & professional publications at Yale (or in New Haven), as an extracurricular activity or even as a paid position. Doing this would let you assemble a valuable portfolio so that you can compete with the people from other universities and colleges who might be majoring in publication design or advertising, but more importantly, it is fun to work with other students on projects like these. You could also work for one of the undergraduate theatre groups and Yale will provide the money to allow you to design elaborate sets and graphics for the shows. Yale has an enormous budget to support undergraduate activities, including the various publications, theater and literally anything else you might think of. DMCA is another valuable resource. </p>
<p>In terms of undergraduate majors besides art, you might consider majors such as psychology, economics, film/theatre studies, art history, architecture, history or American studies, since those are somewhat related to advertising (business, writing, consumer analysis, culture, and/or design). Another option is to do an MBA at a top business school or a 1-year master’s degree (if you want to do something like quantitative market analysis) in this area after you graduate from college, although generally speaking, in the field of advertising real-world experience and networking is more important.</p>