For college you attended Devry and graduated with a degree in graphic multimedia design. Why did you decide to attend Devry?
Earlier I stated in High School I transferred schools. My Jr year of High School I ended up transferring to Devry University Advantage Academy. “Advantage Academy enables qualified students in Chicago, Columbus, and Decatur, GA, to take college courses—and earn an associate degree in Network Systems Administration or Web Graphic Design—while still in high school.” Once I finished High School with my Associates degree, it felt right to just finish the last two years at Devry.
How was your college experience?
College was worth it, although I definitely did get burned out. While attending Devry is when I really started to invest a lot of my time in Photography. College helped me become a better-rounded artist as I began taking classes on film and graphic design. The Graphic design background is really helping me out in my agency work now when it comes to my compositions. I don’t believe my degree necessarily got me a job, but I do know it’s a good thing to have to fall back on.
While in college you were able to intern for Havas. Back in January you got a full time position as a Content Creator at Havas. What was your intern experience like? How did you transition into your full time position?
That internship was a critical point in my career. I was in Minnesota for a trip and when I was getting back, I was seeing some of my friends who worked at Havas post about the internship. I ended up giving it a shot and winning a spot. I ended up taking a break from school to do this internship. While in this internship I met so many creative people and attended so many creative workshops. Honestly, the first month into my internship may have been the hardest month I’ve ever faced. There were 7 interns, and I was the only one with no advertising experience, but that didn’t stop me. I eventually got grounded and continued moving forward. It took me a bit to find the direction I wanted to go, but once I did, I realized that this was something I was going to be good at.
After the internship ended around May-June, I knew that this was the agency I wanted to work for. In June I finally graduated college and begun freelancing for six months. During those six months I made sure to always show my face to the people at Havas. I would always go to all of their events. I made sure that I was one that they couldn’t forget about. December of 2015, I ended up going on a trip to New York and Miami. In Miami I ended up bumping into Jason Peterson and went to his workshop for Leica. At that point I felt like Jason realized I was serious about working for Havas. Two weeks later after that trip I ended up freelancing for Havas. Not even a month later I was then hired as a Content Creator. Really have no clue if the Miami trip had anything to do with me getting hired, but thats my theory..
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