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Instructor-Led Certificate Programs
Earn a Professional Certificate in Graphic Design
Complete this Professional Certificate program in 9 months or less, working at your own pace. On completion, credit can be applied towards earning an Associate or Bachelor’s Degree at Sessions College.
NEXT CLASS:
November 1, 2024
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About this Program
Unleash your Creative Talent, Gaining Professional Skills
Do you dream of becoming a graphic designer, crafting the images, icons, ads, and layouts that shape our media landscape?
In the Professional Certificate in Graphic Design program, students learn the software programs that every graphic designer needs to know: Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. Students discover how to produce digital images, illustrations, and page layouts, addressing concepts of color, typography, and composition. Class assignments involve hands-on photo editing, logo design, poster design, magazine design, and more.
In this instructor-led, project-based program, study with industry-leading design and digital media professionals. Learn at your own pace—no mandatory logins or preset meeting times.
Enroll now to start by November 1, 2024
Program Duration: 9 months or less
Clock Hours: 360
Tuition: $2750
Next Class:
November 1, 2024
“At Sessions College, we prepare designers to enter or advance their careers and pursue their own creative paths. Our goal is to help you gain relevant skills and generate the compelling body of work that matches your career interests.”
Andrew Shalat
Department Head of Graphic Design, Photoshop and Graphic Design Instructor
Program Curriculum
Designed for the busy adult learner, the Professional Online Graphic Design Certificate is a 360-hour program completed in nine months or less studying part time, at your own pace.
Level 1
4218 Photoshop Basics - 60 Hours
Adobe Photoshop is the premiere image manipulation tool for print design, Web design, and photography. You can learn to tame this creative powerhouse of a program in this online Photoshop course. Working with a design pro, you’ll learn the best techniques for common Photoshop jobs including selecting and isolating objects, creating image composites, masking and vignetting images, setting typography, and improving images with retouching and effects.
4226: Illustrator Basics - 60 Hours
Adobe Illustrator is a powerful and versatile tool for creating illustrations, logos, and graphics for print and the web. You can learn to produce detailed and scalable art in this online Illustrator course. Working with an expert instructor, you’ll build a strong foundation, exploring shape tools, drawing tools, layers, the Pen tool (a lesson unto itself) as well as transformations/distortions, type tools, and modifying paths and shapes. Hands-on illustration projects include creating a robot, a series of album covers, a marketing postcard, an advertisement vehicle wrap, and a company logo.
4023: Design Foundations - 60 Hours
Color is a fundamental medium for any artist or designer. Typography is what sets designers apart from other artists. Composition, literally the assembly or construction of elements, is the artful arrangement that guides the viewer’s eye through an image. In this course, you will analyze everything from Grand Masters to Madison Avenue ads to tubes of toothpaste, and discover how color, type, and composition are combined to create effective and powerful visual communications. Class projects challenge you to build and apply your design skills in application to real-life creative scenarios
Level 2
4228: InDesign Basics - 60 Hours
Layout designers today need the skills to move seamlessly between print and digital projects. Luckily, Adobe InDesign can handle it all. In this online InDesign course, you’ll explore a host of essential InDesign techniques and focus on developing efficient workflows. The course will impart a working knowledge of InDesign’s main capabilities, everything from basic features to using parent pages, importing and manipulating objects, controlling text flow and style, and organizing content with tables, layers, links, and conveyor tools. Projects give you training in a range of real world print/digital publishing projects, from brochures to catalogs, magazines to ePubs, and even an interactive folio for the iPad.
4302: Typography II - 60 Hours
Typography, technology, and culture are intertwined. Type has the power to communicate meaning and mood through its quirks and beauty, its history and diversity. In this advanced online typography course, you’ll learn advanced concepts in typography, building your portfolio through hands-on projects. You’ll experiment with type fusion, learn the details of text layout and information hierarchy, create a visual identity for product package and a civic authority, and even design your own currency.
4013: Graphic Design I - 60 Hours
Graphic designers today must be ready to tackle a wide range of projects from identity design to editorial design to product and packaging design. In this online graphic design course, you’ll establish a firm foundation for professional design work. Gain insights from industry veterans and explore the challenges of designing posters, logos, magazine covers, book layouts, 3D designs, and brand identities. Hone your design process, as you research each project, develop concepts, work with expert instructor feedback, and begin to develop pieces for your portfolio.
Program Outcomes
By completing the program, Graphic Design Professional Certificate students develop the following competencies:
Technology
Create images and design layouts by effectively and efficiently using design software including Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign, and other industry technologies.
Art & Design Principles
Demonstrate the ability to produce visually compelling work by applying knowledge of color, typography, and composition.
Design Process
Develop strategic and compelling designs for a variety of audiences and social contexts.
Projects
Produce and present a range of standard professional graphic design projects including graphics, posters, ads, logos, page layouts, and packaging.
About Sessions College
Sessions College has been inspiring creative professionals for 25 years. Accredited since 2001, we have a unique and proven approach to online education.
Accredited by Distance Education Accrediting Commission since 2001
Recognized as top design school by GDUSA
Winner of four USDLA awards for distance education
A Better Way to Learn
- Fully Online and Asynchronous. Our programs are fully online and asynchronous, allowing you to fit learning into your life. We provide weekly deadlines to keep you on track, but there are no mandatory login times and our learning platform is available 24 hours a day.
- Project-Based Learning. Our curriculum is designed to be highly interactive and project-based from the ground up to improve learning outcomes and keep you engaged.
- Feedback from Creative Pros. Our program is taught by industry experts who provide 1:1 feedback on all of your work.
Designed for Career Success
This program will help you prepare and advance your career as a graphic designer or digital media professional.
Learn from experienced professionals
Complete a wide range of relevant projects
Develop skills for an exciting career
Graduates could be employed in design or digital media industries as a Graphic Designer, Brand Identity Designer, Web Designer, UX/UI Designer, Production Artist, Desktop Publisher, or Digital Designer.
Median annual salaries in top industries
In May 2023, the median annual wage for graphic designers was $58,910*. The median annual wages for workers in top industries was:
| Specialized design services | $62,330* |
| Advertising, public relations, and related services | $56,970* |
| Publishing industries | $54,450* |
| Printing and related support activities | $44,500* |
*As of May 2023, according to the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Truly Accessible and Affordable Education
Open admissions for any student who has graduated high school or attended college. Streamlined online Professional Certificate admissions process sets you up for success in your program.
Our truly affordable tuition is:
$2,750 total program tuition and fees. Payment plans are available.
Significantly more affordable than other online design or digital media colleges.
On completion, transfer credit earned into an Associate or Bachelor’s Degree at Sessions College .* Find out more.
What Students Gained from Our Professional Certificate Programs
Before I started at Sessions, I felt unsure of where to even start with building a portfolio. What kind of graphic design work is most sought after these days? Posters? Online ads? Book covers? These are all questions that have been answered during my time in this program. I feel much more confident in continuing to pursue graphic design as my career.
I wished I had known about this program 10+ years ago—I used to help publish a bimonthly magazine for a civic organization, and my InDesign class would have cut our workload for preparing the magazine by 75%. The instructor’s grading and assistance were fantastic.
I’ve always been a creative person, but have never had any real artistic abilities. I finally feel like I have an outlet for my over-analytical brain to create art through building beautiful, functional websites. For the first time in my professional career, work doesn’t feel like work.
Advance your career with our 100% online design and digital media programs today!
Sessions College
Main Office
404 S. Mill Avenue, Suite 201
Tempe, AZ 85281
Contact Us
800-258-4115 (US)
480-212-1704
admissions@sessions.edu