Hello. My name is Brenda Shaffer and I'm a faculty member and serve as the Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Fashion & Apparel Studies at the University of Delaware. This presentation will provide an overview of our department, it's programs and its opportunities. We currently have 325 undergraduate students and 13 graduate students in our department. We offer two majors, Fashion Design and Product Innovation, and Fashion Merchandising and Management. To students have recorded videos describing their educational experience from their perspective. So we'll start first with Fashion Design and Product Innovation. Hi, my name's Amy Wild. I'm a senior Fashion Design and Product Innovation major. First a little bit of background about me and what I'm involved in. I had been a resident assistant for first-year students for the past three years. I've also been on the executive board for multiple student organizations here on campus. One of them is the synergy fashion group. Our biggest event is the fashion show at the end of the school year that exhibits and highlight student work. You don't even have to be design major to submit. So it's really cool, really inclusive, it's really a great event. Just throughout the video I'll put up some pictures of things that I'd made and the colleagues that I'm talking about so you sort of have an idea of what's going on. So what I love most about the way that our department and runs the Fashion Design and Product Innovation Major is that they make sure that we all start from the exact same level regardless of your skill level coming in we all take a beginner sewing class in a beginner art class that we can then build up our skills from. We have classes in pattern-making, draping, zero waste, sustainability and then once you get into your upperclassman years, you get to take a Portfolio Development class. And finally, Senior Collections. I just went through Senior Collections and even though it was probably the hardest and most time-consuming class I've ever taken, it was worth it. However, with all of that, I think the absolute most important thing our department heads is connections and opportunities. We're so centrally located near major cities like New York and Philly that it's so easy to take a day trip to visit it or to even like worker fashion show. And the professors, they know people and they're always so willing to help you make a connection or introduce you to someone in the industry that can then help or mentor you within that design major. And I really, really hope you consider coming. Next you'll hear from a student in Fashion Merchandising, and Management. Hello everyone. I hope you are all doing well. My name is Emma Davis and I'm a junior Fashion Merchandising student at the University of Delaware with minors in Business Administration and Advertising. And I'm here today to talk a little bit about what makes our Fashion Merchandising Program so special. So firstly, our major really is a great blend of business and fashion. So as an FM student you're gonna be taking classes like Economics, Finance, Business Law, and Accounting. But then obviously a lot of fashion specific courses too like Textiles, Merchandise Planning, Product Development, and Art Studio, just to name a few to give you a really well rounded experience which is something that was really important to me when I was looking into different schools. And additionally, the FM curriculum at UD has a built-in Business Administration minor. So without having to take any additional classes you're going to get that tacked onto your degree, which is great. And a lot of our classes do overlap with a lot of other colleges especially the Business School, which gives you a lot of opportunity to pursue a double major if you're interested in that or maybe some minors which is what I'm doing to really tailor your educational experience to what you're interested in. And if you want to learn more about the specific course load for the FM major feel free to go on to the UD fashion website where we have planning guides that lay out the suggested class sequence throughout your four years and all the degree requirements and reach out with any questions that you might have. And secondly, our fashion faculty members are extremely supportive and so incredible because our major is relatively small our professors had the opportunity to get to know us personally and they do make the effort to do that. They know all of our first names and they always make themselves available to answer questions about scholarship applications, job and internship searches and the list just goes on and on. And they're always sending out email blasts about different opportunities so students can get first-hand experience in the industry which is also really important. And because they are so connected to the fashion industry as well they often times will bring in guest speakers and recruiters to our classes to give presentations about their internship and job opportunities and their perspective on the industry so we can ask questions, connect with them and that is how I met QVC where I worked last summer on the buying team which was such an incredible experience. So many other opportunities to get involved as a fashion student and to connect with those fashion companies. One of the most notable that we offer in the fall is called the fashion Meet Up where we'll have about 25 or so fashion companies and retailers table. And students can come in with their resume with any questions that they might have about the internships and jobs that are available and make those connections and that is how I met up with south end under. I worked on the merchandising team this past winter and Burlington stores where I'm going to be headed this summer on the buying team which I am really excited about. And then lastly, because we are so conveniently located in the middle of the tri-state area, we always have the opportunity to travel whether it be on a bus trip to Philly which I did my freshman year to tour the urban campus which was beautiful. Every spring we go take a bus trip to New York and sometimes we just travel within Newark, Delaware to go well, we do have a partnership with the FM program to have our students thinking more sustainably to get hands on as well which is really really cool to get that firsthand experience in the industry. So that's about it for me. But if you do have any other questions, again, my name is Emma. Please feel free to reach out I would love to answer them for you. Otherwise thank you so much again for listening. I hope to see many of you on campus in the fall. Thank you. As you can hear our students are very passionate and enthusiastic about our programs. Here you see a comparison of the courses that students in both majors take some of the courses are common between both Chemistry, Textiles, Product Development, and there's others. And then they kind of diverge and you'll see that Fashion Forecasting and Design, Flap Pattern Draping, Knitwear are courses that are unique to Fashion Design and Product Innovation. whereas our Fashion Merchandising and Management students take a deeper dive into business Excel Management and those types of courses. We currently have three Undergraduate Minors, Fashion History and Culture, Fashion Management and Sustainable Apparel and Textile Innovation and one minor that is under proposal for the fall, and that's Functional Wearable Design. As was mentioned previously our Fashion Merchandising and Management majors automatically complete a Business Administration minor as part of their core curriculum so that is already kind of baked into their program. And there's also another 144 or so other minors that are available across the university. The Horn Entrepreneurship Certificate Program is another opportunity for students There are seven different certificates that a student can pursue. The difference between a certificate and a minor is just the number of credits so there's a few less credits for the certificate versus a few more credits to earn the minor. There is a wealth of resources at the University of Delaware and within our department. We have a design technology lab students can learn Optitex Industry software, as well as the Adobe Suite, Photoshop and Illustrator. We have technology aided instruction for a merchandising students that again takes a deep dive into Microsoft Excel skill sets and also they have the opportunity to access edited Data Analytics. We also have historic fashion and textiles collection that is housed within one of our buildings. There's a university-wide makerspace that offers state-of-the-art technology and also a multimedia center that is free to students and is housed in our library. This depicts the 6-Wire Carnegie Hall Concert Event that our students had an opportunity to be involved in. There are specifics details that you can read about if you click on the link below the picture. But our students and faculty and we're tasked to design and produce garments that were worn by UD's world renown music ensemble, 6-Wire, at they're sold out concert in Carnegie Hall in New York City approximately two years ago. Research with with faculty is plentiful. There are a number of different opportunities and ways in which students can work side-by-side with our faculty on a range of research projects. We have a summer scholars program if you're part of the Honors Program, you can participate in the undergraduate thesis and research. There's a volunteer program in our historic costume collection where you can actually work on it and there are a number of ways to do community out reach research that's fashioned focus but engaged for the greater good. Other ways that student research is supported by industry we have an ongoing collaboration with Goodwill Industries that's a partnership it's addressing the issue of textile waste within our world. Some other collaboration's with companies such as Under Armour, Destination Maternity, Reebok as you see depicted here and many others that are really focused on real-world challenges. The EPA 6-8 Sustainable Design Projects are research grants that are awarded to our faculty and researchers focused on sustainability issues. As you can see, the University of Delaware has been a grant recipient for many years. They offer opportunities for students and faculty who traveled to Washington DC and they get to exhibit the outcomes of their research. Want to work on growing mushrooms to make shoes? We have those kinds of opportunities as well. You can click on the link above the picture to find out details about this type of research project. I was asked to work with some students at University of Delaware and I thought wouldn't this be a great opportunity because it's sort of pushing forward the idea you know of inspiring and helping women go after their dreams. Ruthie Davis is a well-known New York shoe designer who offered our students an opportunity for an internship with her over the last year. The task was to design a shoe collection for Disney to coincide with the release of their remake of Mulan, Our students actually traveled to Los Angeles for the movie premiere. The FIT Visiting Student Program is one that has been running in our department for well over 25 years. This offer students an opportunity to earn a bachelor's degree from the University of Delaware and an Associate's degree from FIT. There's three programs that you have to choose from at FIT. Fashion Design, Fashion Merchandise Management, and Textile Development and Marketing. Students find that this is an excellent way to kinda get the best of both worlds by combining their college campus life, and also a city experience rolled up in one. Other opportunities are over 300 clubs across our campus that range in just about every interests that a student may have. We have several of those organizations that are house within our department. UDress , Synergy, the Fashion Merchandising Club, AATCC and The New. And they do things ranging from publications of magazines to creating, designing, and producing fashion shows. The University of Delaware was one of the first universities to actually establish a study abroad program, and they have continued to do so over the last 100 years. And as we all know to the fashion, industry is very much a global industry so we feel it's extremely important for our students to get this breadth of knowledge in terms of their international education. So it's offered in many different ways. We have a student exchange program where students can actually study at Hong Kong Polytechnic in Hong Kong for a semester. We have many courses that are focused on the global fashion industry and we also have travel study programs that go to Paris every year, other years we've taken students to Hong Kong and a couple of years we have also taken students to Italy. During the summer session, students have an opportunity to take advantage of our Hong Kong internships study abroad program. This summer it was supposed to have been relocated to Singapore because of some of the unrest that was happening in Hong Kong and unfortunately, the Singapore program has had to be canceled due to the current situation but we are hoping to offer it again next year. These are some of the positions that are interns have actually acquired over the years through this Hong Kong Internship Program and you can see they work for companies from Levis to Target to UnderArmour. We're a member school of the YMA Fashion Scholarship Fund and we have been participating in this competition for over ten years. We have had, multiple winners every year since we began competing. This past year we had eight winners six of which are depicted here and each of the students received a minimum of $5,000 and one of our students was actually a top eight finisher finalist, and she won $15,000. There are many other award opportunities and competitions that students have the ability to participate in this is just a couple of them. ITAA sponsors a student design competition in 2016 we had the top award. Paris American Academy sponsors a scholarship for both Fashion Merchandising majors and for our Design and Product Innovation majors here you see two of our students that won those scholarships. Our department has been heavily focused on sustainability for over 15 years before it was really even a buzzword in the industry. Our students leave our programs prepared to help companies meet the challenges faced by the industry and as part of that we're a member of the founding circle of the SAC, Sustainable Apparel Coalition, we also have sustainability integrated into most of our courses. We have one unique course that is focused entirely on the components of social responsibility and many of our research projects, as you have already seen, are incorporated and involved in sustainability. University of Delaware's opportunity to earn a graduate certificate in Socially Responsible and Sustainable Apparel Business is one that is very unique because this is just, it is not just for students it's also for professionals outside of the university but many students will pursue this much like they would a minor and all of these courses are offered online. Many potential pathways that are available for our students the opportunities really are endless to personalize your educational goals. You can double major, you can add a minor or two or three. You can pursue the Graduate Certificate in Socially Responsible and Sustainable Apparel Business. You can pursue a Master of Science in Fashion Studies, and our Fashion Merchandising majors can also perhaps do a four plus one program where you earn your Bachelor of Science in Merchandising and your Master's degree in Fashion Studies in five years. FASH Advisory Council is a unique resource for our faculty and our students. It is a rich network of prominent industry executives from every facet of fashion. It enables us to keep our finger on the pulse of what is happening within the industry and also prepare our students with the skill sets that they need it as the industry demands. The UD Career Center has an extensive resource breath to help prepare students to meet their career goals. They sponsor things like on-campus networking opportunities like large Career Affairs, we have solely for in the fashion industry that network with about 250 to 300 of our students, we also have more intimate opportunities with Company Meet and Greets. This is an example of some of the companies that our students have interned with over the years. There are many more companies that I could add to this list but this is just to give you kind of a taste for what some of those companies are. Recent graduates first jobs, on the left, you see a sample of some of the positions that our graduates have been able to obtain. On the right you see a number of the companies that they have worked with as first jobs and again, there are many, many more that we could add to this list this is just to give you kind of a sample. I think this slide really speaks for itself. This is over a four-year period our students were surveyed both are Fashion Merchandising and our Design students and as you can see 99% of our Merchandising students and 98% of our Design students secured positions in the industry or were pursuing further education so companies really do seek out our students. Our alumni really do excel within the industry we're very proud of them. Here's just a sampling of what some of our alumni have been doing over the years and some of the positions that they have occupied anything from Vice President of Product Creation at Nike to Vice President of Merchandising at Ross Stores, to Designer at Tory Burch and many others in between. So kind of summing everything up for today, the top five reasons that we think you should choose the University of Delaware. One is our campus and our resources which are very broad and deep our interdisciplinary program that leverages all of the intellectual base here at the University of Delaware. Our stellar reputation and recognition within the industry, our emphasis on sustainability and preparing our students for all types of issues and challenges that the industry may have in terms of sustainability. And lastly, the ability to really curate your educational experience and make it unique to your particular educational goals. So with that, I offer my congratulations again on your acceptance to the University of Delaware. We look forward to your arrival and hope to see you in the fall. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to me, again my name is Brenda Shaffer and you will see my email address at the bottom of the screen. Take care and good luck.
Department of Fashion & Apparel Studies Presentation
From Kristina Demou March 31, 2020
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Interested in pursuing a career in fashion? This presentation provides an overview of our Department of Fashion & Apparel Studies, its programs, and its opportunities. Hear from Brenda Schaefer, Director of Undergraduate Studies in the department, as well as some current UD students who share their experiences in their majors.
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