Alexa Patton Interns with the FSU Art History Department

from FSU Art BA ’21 Alexa Patton:

During my internship with the FSU Art History Department I have had many opportunities to expand upon my skills for a desired career in graphic design. I worked with design programs such as Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign to create a collection of works for the department, ranging from event posters to brochures for their annual symposium. I also have learned how to navigate WordPress for general website updates and post creations for their monthly newsletter. Other responsibilities of my internship included management of their Instagram page for the department and brainstorming of ideas for future posts.

Of course, completing an internship during a pandemic can be challenging, seeing as there are not many in person events to create content for, but it has been fun trying to make interactive posts on Instagram to keep people engaged and to create posters formatted for the web. This year the department’s huge annual symposium was all virtual for the first time, so creating their brochure for digital consumption was a great task to accomplish. In addition to the brochure, I was also able to create backgrounds for their zoom lecture to make things fun for the participants tuning in.

Through this internship, it has confirmed my continued interest in design and I plan on continuing in this path for my future career. In my free time of the internship, I have been learning UX/UI design and expanding my skills as much as possible during an online time of our lives, that I believe will never fully go away even after things begin to “go back to normal” after the pandemic. From designing more for the web vs. print, I stumbled upon some research about dyslexia in design and plan on using my findings for future projects.

Overall, I have loved this experience and it has been a pleasure to learn from my supervisor Jean Hudson. Participating in internships help students think about their ideas in regards to the overall department or company they are working for, facilitating the tailoring of their skills to what is needed for the task at hand. I believe it is important for every student to do an internship during their time at FSU because it can help you turn your art skills into valuable job skills to put on your resume and give you a positive experience to talk about in job interviews.