Youth Design played an immense role in promoting my enthusiasm for design as well as in determining my direction for the future. I had not anticipated that one summer program and internship would be this beneficial for my design education. Interning with Catapult Thinking was influential in my understanding of design strategy, branding, and research based projects. It was an introduction to a holistic design approach, a primer for the skills and methodology that I would later learn at Carnegie Mellon.

Carnegie Mellon University School of Design

After almost three years of immersion in design school, it’s difficult to comprehend a time when design had little to no significance to me. And I think that a lot of design students are content completely forgetting that there was ever a stage in life when design did not play an important role in their way of thinking, acting, and making. However, students in public high school are less likely to realize the potential for design because the opportunity is rarely presented to them.

My future in design revealed itself one day when I came across a hi-lighter yellow flier for the Youth Design program unassumingly taped to the wall outside my history classroom. For the next month before interviewing for the program, I spent my free time creating and consolidating a portfolio of my best work. This process was my first experience compiling a portfolio, one that would prepare me for when I applied to Carnegie Mellon’s industrial design program the next year.

My Sanctuary "aka" My Design Studio

Now that I am a junior at CMU, much of what I have learned is beginning to culminate in the development and synthesis of integrated products and systems. It’s been a short time since I graduated from Youth Design and I’ve already witnessed the positive outcome that the program can offer students like me. That’s not to say that it doesn’t take some diligence on the individual’s part. All of the effort I put into my work is formative in my progress as a designer, and I have come to learn that (much like the Thursday YD sessions) an experiential and collaborative process is a substantial component of design.

Conrad Ennis is a Youth Design Class of 2008 Alum and is currently studying Industrial Design at Carnegie Mellon University. Click here to view his work.