My Certificate Journey:
The New Media Certificate journey was one I had been hearing about since my freshmen year of college, and I’ve wanted to take it ever since. Due to my major and minor coursework, I got a later start than most but it has been such a gratifying and amazing journey. The program has been rich with opportunities to learn the ins and outs of web design, technological innovation, and new media skills to showcase my work and better execute my creative vision to set myself apart.
I started the certificate in an unusual way, first taking the New Media Industries class and then taking the intro class the following semester. While I was among a small number of first semester certificate students, it was still an amazing opportunity to learn from professionals and take in their career advice and wisdom. I learned useful skills in networking, as well as general life skills regarding credit cards and health insurance.
My second semester of the certificate, I took Intro to New Media and Web Development. These two classes really helped me set the foundations for my future journey in New Media, as well as in my future career goals in Entertainment and Media. While I struggled in Web Development, and there were some times I wanted to give up, I pushed through and was able to learn concrete skills in web design and coding that I will be able to take with me in future courses and professional work.
For my third and final semester in the certificate, I took Advanced Web Development and New Media Capstone. Advanced Web Development taught me a lot about patience and perseverance, encouraging me to push myself beyond what I thought I could do to execute really cool projects. My favorites were the Jukebox assignment and the Cat API assignment. Learning to work with API’s was a really beneficial experience that I’ll be able to use for a lot of cool projects in the future. Advanced Web Development gave me a huge boost in my coding skills that will definitely give me an edge with future job endeavors. New Media Capstone was an equally rewarding experience that taught me so much about teamwork, effective communication skills, and adaptability. Our team faced numerous challenges, but we were able to learn so much in the process and really benefited from our struggles. SLAM was so much fun and it was a great way to show off all of our hard work from the semester. Capstone was a great finale to my certificate journey, and I’m so glad I chose to be apart of the NMI!
