Business of Art and Design (BA)

Statement of Purpose

The Business of Art and Design (BOAD) program exists to prepare students to be creative leaders who work at the intersection of art, design, and business. BOAD attracts students who are collaborators, blue- sky thinkers, and creative problem solvers. BOAD students learn how to inspire vision and purpose; manage people and projects; and are prepared to work on the business side of innovative organizations. Our students master traditional business skills while also being immersed in studio courses that allow them to experience and understand the creative process. In the classroom, BOAD students explore the essentials of business, such as: strategic planning, marketing, negotiations, entrepreneurship, production management, accounting, human resources, and economics. Inside and outside of our classes, BOAD students work across disciplines to learn how to manage and collaborate with artists and designers.

The curriculum emphasizes experiential learning to ensure that students are prepared for a wide range of business and entrepreneurial opportunities upon graduation. Graduates put their business skills to work within a wide range of creative industries, working in for-profit and nonprofit environments, in small studios and large corporations. Upon graduation, they pursue exciting opportunities as production assistants; creative project managers; marketing assistants; account coordinators; product managers; event planners; gallery assistants; or they create their own ventures. The BOAD undergraduate program provides the unique opportunity to combine hands-on studies in art, design, and creative business through classroom and studio training, experiential learning, internships, and independent studies.

Student Learning Outcomes

1. Creative Business Mindset: Students earning a Bachelor of Arts in Business of Art and Design will demonstrate the ability to use a critical and innovative thought process, which is reflective of creative analysis, data synthesis, and integration of relevant information.
   1. Research and Analysis: Uses empirical and anecdotal data to support a declared position, argument, or recommendation as it relates to a problem, case, example, opportunity, and project execution.
   2. Concept: Demonstrates innovation, ideation, concept iteration, and out-of-the-box creative thinking in concept development through to potential solutions and outcomes.
2. Process Integration: Students earning a Bachelor of Arts in Business of Arts and Design will demonstrate the ability to integrate strategic operational, financial, marketing, managerial, and organizational behavior principles of business with creativity, innovation, art, design, and multi-media elements.
   1. Business Operations: Provides quantifiable elements to support business case.
   2. Financial Projections: Demonstrates effective use and proficiency in the creation, reading, understanding and analysis of financial spreadsheets to support the business case.
   3. Marketing Strategy: Uses both quantitative and qualitative methods to support business model case and industry adoption of concept.
3. Creative Communication Solutions: Students earning a Bachelor of Arts in Business of Art and Design will demonstrate the ability to develop creative communication solutions.
   1. Visual and Audio Communication: Designs value-added communication strategies for products and services using effective audio and visual techniques.
   2. Written Communication: Demonstrates effective and written storytelling techniques to detail business models that communicate across all disciplines to all stakeholders.
   3. Oral Communication: Demonstrates significant ability in oral argument, defense of position and negotiating solutions.
4. Professional Practice: Students earning a Bachelor of Arts in Business of Art and Design will express a personal code of ethics that includes key principles of sustainability, defined as consideration for people, planet, and profit throughout 100 percent of classroom and experiential learning assignments.
   1. Sustainability: Uses principles of socio-economic and environmental modeling in all aspects of creative business design through all four years of learning.
   2. Ethics: Demonstrates an understanding of the differences between personal codes of ethics, professional codes of ethics and professional business practices.
5. Leadership: Students earning a Bachelor of Arts in Business of Art and Design will demonstrate a collaborative style of managing team process while maintaining strong leadership skills.
   1. Collaboration: Provides direction, focused structure, communication, and ability to motivate multi-disciplinary project teams to full completion of team goals. Demonstrates an ability to understand, negotiate and assume different roles on a team.
   2. Team Management: Provides results-oriented guidance to all team members to complete tasks at the highest level of performance using best practices. Demonstrates active listening, respect for other’s opinions, and the ability to provide constructive feedback. Demonstrates the capacity for empathy for team members and clients. Demonstrates the capacity to be objective and assume the role of ombudsman in mediation of issues if called upon.
   3. Personal Brand: Demonstrates a clear, creative, Personal Brand (PB) in 100 percent of written, oral, and media driven communication.