Behrend

Penn State Behrend students expand their digital toolboxes with Adobe Workshops

Jaret Kelly, a first-year marketing major, edits a photo in Adobe Lightroom, one of the programs now available to all Penn State students thanks to the University's recent partnership with Adobe. Credit: Penn State Behrend / Penn StateCreative Commons

ERIE, Pa. — This past September, Penn State announced that Adobe Creative Cloud (CC) will be available at no additional cost to all Penn State students and faculty members at all campus locations. For students in the Black School of Business at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, this was a game-changer.

“Having access to the Adobe Creative Cloud is such a great opportunity for students to get experience with industry standard software,” said Kristen McAuley, lecturer in marketing.

The new partnership with Adobe ensures that every Penn State student has access to all 20 Adobe desktop and mobile applications for design, photography, video and web, including creative tools such as Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator and more. Skills like that have never been more valuable in today’s workforce, especially as students and recent graduates work to distinguish themselves from the competition. That’s one reason why Penn State Behrend’s Marketing Department decided to create the Adobe Skills Workshops.

The workshops, which were led by McAuley and offered free to all Black School of Business students during Sept. and Oct., were comprised of four 75-minute sessions. Each session focused on a different Adobe program, including Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere and InDesign. More than 30 students attended the Workshops where they received hands-on instruction before creating their own designs using sample files.

“We recognize that Adobe skills are in high demand with employers, so we decided to offer the Adobe workshops in order to give our students a leg up on the competition,” McAuley said. “It is so important to know the ins and outs of these programs. They can help students build their own personal brand and also create professionally-designed résumés.”

The strong student response to the Adobe Skills Workshops has led the Black School of Business to introduce a new course for the spring semester, a 1-credit Adobe lab known as MKTG 397: Special Topics. So far, that seems to be a hit as well, as only one open seat remains in the course.

According to McAuley, that’s because students recognize how mastering these programs can dramatically impact their future success.

“These skills can be a differentiator for students that can get them the internship, assistantship or job,” McAuley said.

McAuley said there are plans to again hold Adobe Skills Workshops in the near future. She said the Marketing Department will also look into holding a variety of other free student workshops should the need present itself.

For more information on the Adobe Skills Workshops, contact McAuley at kem361@psu.edu.

Last Updated November 28, 2017

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