Description
Our UI/UX Design certificate program will assist you on your path to becoming a skilled and marketable user experience designer. UX is critical to the success of any website or mobile app and, in today’s environment, often the key competitive advantage. As such, people with these skills are in high demand in a rapidly growing industry.
During this course, you’ll build your user experience skills through a combination of lectures, hands-on learning, and guided practice time, and apply those skills to the planning, design, and testing of your own in-class project.
Included in the class at no extra charge, class attendees will have the opportunity to schedule 1:1 sessions with the instructor between classes. This 1:1 time helps to ensure everyone can receive direct support and feedback as needed.
Whether you’re an aspiring UXer, a graphic designer looking to add UX skills, or a product manager, developer, or entrepreneur who would like to build better products, this course is the perfect introduction to practical, tactical UX.
Read more about what makes our certificate programs unique.
Interested? Attend A FREE Open House For This Program
Meet the instructor, get your question answered and get excited about learning User Experience design during one of our FREE virtual open houses! See dates and details.
Prerequisites
A love of design (not just making things pretty – although aesthetics are important – but making them functional). An interest in how people think, understand, and see. An appreciation for collaboration and a willingness to share peer design feedback.
This class will be based on using Figma to create design artifacts. Sketch is very similar to Figma, so we can use either during class. You don’t have to be an expert, but practicing with a prototyping tool ahead of time will allow you to more effectively create and present your design solutions during the course.
Though there will be ample practice time to begin designing and developing your own project during the course, coming prepared with a concept already in mind and any graphic and content material will really help you make the most of your time with us.
Program Goals
During this course, you will:
- Learn how to think and solve problems like a UX designer.
- Gain practical experience and skills in each phase of the UX design process.
- Apply the UX design process to your own personal project and create project artifacts that can be added to your portfolio.
- Collaborate with other students on projects like a real-world UX team.
- Learn how to design a compelling resume and UX portfolio.
- Learn about the UX profession and receive UX career coaching.
What this course WILL NOT cover:
- Coding for the web or generating an actual website or mobile app.
- Intermediate or advanced techniques in UX prototyping tools or Adobe products.
Equipment and Software Needed
For this class, it is strongly recommended that you bring your own computer with design software already installed. Suggestions for this include Figma (best case), Sketch, or Adobe XD.
Computer Requirement
This is a hands-on class where you’ll “learn by doing” – therefore you’ll need a computer (Mac or PC). If you need any particular software installed, that will be detailed below. Not all programs require special software so if there isn’t any detailed listed below you will only need a computer with an up-to-date web browser.
If you would like to take your class work and sample projects home, please be sure to bring a Mac-compatible portable drive with 4GB of free space.
Note: BDA students qualify for a 50% discount on the purchase of a Sketch license. To receive this discount, visit their educational store and complete the form for “student/teacher/staff”. They request a “valid receipt (must contain the student name, date/duration of the course and the name of the academic institution)”. This can be the registration confirmation email that you receive from us when you complete your registration.
After You Register
BDA is committed to making this process as smooth and enjoyable as possible so that you can focus on your learning. After you register you will be contacted by our staff who can answer questions and assist you with any logistical and travel concerns you might have.
Agenda
Scheduled for 5x consecutive Sundays from 9am to 1pm.
Session 1: Guiding Principles
- Introductions and class project discussion
- Defining “user experience” and the user-centered design process
- UX design principles and best practices
- Activity: Design studio workshop
- Homework: Pick a project to work on and complete your Project Brief
Session 2: Getting to Know the UX Toolkit and Your Users
- Review Project Briefs
- Demystifying UX roles and deliverables
- User Research fundamentals
- Activity: Create 2-3 personas for your project
- Review personas and exchange feedback
Session 3: Ready, Set, Design
- Information Architecture fundamentals
- Activity: Card sort
- Interaction Design fundamentals
- Activity: Collaboratively map user/task flows for each project
- Activity: Sketch design ideas for your project
Session 4: Don’t Forget to Test
- Review sketches and exchange feedback
- Wireframing and Prototyping – tools and techniques
- Usability testing 101
- Activity: Wireframe 2-3 key screens for your project*
- Homework: Finish wireframe*
- *Option to work privately at home or offsite for this afternoon – to be determined that afternoon, by class participants.
Session 5: Practice & Prep for the Real World
- Activity: Present final projects
- UX in the workplace
- Collaborating with peers and communicating with stakeholders
- Growing yourself and your UX career
- Activity: Review students’ resumes/portfolios and exchange feedback
- Certificate presentation
