IXD portfolio

All students pursuing an MS in Information Experience Design are required to create a digital portfolio that must be approved by their faculty advisor before they are allowed to graduate. The IXD portfolio is a representative overview of your work that collectively demonstrates your competence with the learning outcomes of the IXD program.

Overview

IXD portfolios serve two main purposes:

Academically, your portfolio shows that you have achieved program learning outcomes, shows evidence of your individual learning and development, and allows you to spend your entire time in Pratt. Provides an opportunity to reflect on one's educational experience.

Professional Preparation. Professionally, your portfolio indicates your readiness to enter the UX profession, demonstrates your UX knowledge, skills and abilities, and potential employers and other members of the UX community. Displays your best work in front of

Deadlines

To graduate on time, students must submit their portfolio by the following dates.

Graduation Semester Submission Deadline Fall 1 November Spring 1 April Summer 1 September

When ready, submit your portfolio to your advisor via the IXD Portfolio Submission Form.

Suggested timeline

As there are many different timelines for completing the program, we are unable to provide a specific schedule of steps you should take to complete your portfolio. However, here is a general suggested timeline:

First Semester - Meet with your faculty advisor to discuss career goals and start planning your study program. Attend UXPA Portfolio Criticism Session.

Second Semester - Sign up for the IXD Portfolio Workshop (workshop schedules are announced at the beginning of each semester) and start building your portfolio. As you complete the projects, add them to your portfolio and tweak / adjust them as needed.

Semester 3 - Criticize your portfolio. Continue adding as the project completes.

Final Semester - Meet with your advisor (as soon as possible) to finalize your portfolio submission plans. Complete your portfolio and submit it by the appropriate deadline (see above).

Of diagnosis

Your faculty advisor guides you through the process and reviews your e-portfolio using IXD Portfolio Assessment Rubber (PDF). Rubark describes four levels of program-level learning outcomes:

Ideal

Able

Developing (requires revision)

Unacceptable (requires major revision).

For each result, your advisor will review your portfolio and determine which level is appropriate. To meet the portfolio requirement, students must get at least "competent" results.

If one or more results do not meet the "worthy" level, your advisor will contact you with more detailed feedback and work with you to strengthen the areas in which additional work has been done. Required.

Content guidelines and tips

We encourage you to use your IXD portfolio as a vehicle to creatively showcase your achievements and learning experiences from the program, showcase your cutting edge thinking, and demonstrate your professionalism. Think carefully.

Selection of plans

Typically, IXD portfolios should be between 4-10 projects. As a whole, your portfolio should consist of the work that you are most proud of and that relates to your educational path and career goals. If you think they are relevant, you are encouraged to include completed projects in and out of the classroom.

If you have received feedback on the project from your professor or project supervisor, you are encouraged to make these changes before adding them to your portfolio.

Should all projects come from my Pratt classes?

It is expected that you will include your prototype coursework projects, but you can also include projects that were completed as part of the practice course, independent studies, standstone projects, or internships. When you were enrolling in Pratt.

Can I add pre-admission projects to Pratt?

Students should strive to provide the latest project to provide an accurate picture of their current skills and abilities. For this reason, we do not recommend including projects completed prior to enrollment in Pratt. If you would like to add a previous project to your portfolio, please talk to your consultant.

Can we use group projects in our portfolio?

Yes. If you are adding a group project, be sure to clearly indicate your role in that project.

Can I use any of my last semester projects in my portfolio?

Yes, but only if the project is completed (or approximately) by the portfolio submission deadline. If you would like to use the Final Semester Project, you should discuss this with your Faculty Advisor.

Making case studies

Each project in your portfolio should take the form of a case study. The exact format, organization and presentation of case studies will vary depending on the student and the project, but as a general rule, all case studies should include the following four components:

Describe the problem Briefly describe the problem that the project was solving and your role in the project. Identify key stakeholders and determine the success of the project. What were the basic user goals? What challenges make this issue unique? Were there any factors influencing this project (e.g., time frame, budget, client requests, etc.)?

Explain your process Explain your method of resolving this issue. How did you try to understand the problem? What were the first steps in the process of solving your problem? What did you know about this problem? What research did you do (if any) and what did you learn from that research that would inform your solution (s)?

Show your solution Show your method for solving the problem. What was the result (or consequences) for you? How did you get to them? How did you engage users or add user feedback? Were there any unique or unexpected problems for you along the way?

Describe Your Delivery Your Last Delivery Worth If this project was for a client, to whom was the final product delivered and how did they react to it? If it weren't for a client, do you think your project was a success? Do you have any evidence (feedback from stakeholders, users, professors, etc.) to show that you are successful? Did you learn anything from this project? Would you do something different?

When creating a case study, the goal should be to state what you did and how you did it, not to say that visual content (images, screenshots, graphics, etc.) should run narrative and textual content. A few additional tips:

Write briefly. Make sure you cover important details, but aim to make your text easy to scan. Proofreading is absolutely essential.

Show everything. Don't just show off your polished visual design. Show pictures of anything that helped you reach your goal: user flow, spreadsheets, doodles, whiteboards, documents, etc.

Tell your story. You will be working on many different things in your career, but consider tailoring your portfolio to your strengths or interests.

Creating your own identity

Your portfolio is not just a platform for your work, it also shows who you are and what you bring as a UX professional. Thus, in addition to case studies, you should also paint your picture in these terms:

Your professional identity. Write a tagline or a slogan that represents who you are (and who you want to be) as a UX professional. Introduce yourself to the type of work you want to do and what you are interested or excited about in the field. Showcase your credentials and experience by providing a PDF of your resume.

Your personal identity. Include a professional quality photo and a short biographical sketch to understand who you are and where you come from. Realize who you are as a person; Show some of your personality (for example, show some of your hobbies or interests).

Platform and hosting

Your IXD portfolio should be a website; It's good that your website is publicly accessible, but at least it should be accessible or viewable by your advisor (ie via password or private sharing link).

There are many benefits to making your portfolio public, including your ability to present your work to potential employers. If you are not sure whether to make it public or not, you should discuss the matter with your faculty advisor.

Choosing a platform

There are dozens of hosting options available for your IXD portfolio, and it must match your needs. There are three aspects to consider:

Ease of use. You don't have to worry about knowing the technical details of your portfolio platform. Choose something that has an easy learning curve and is easy to use and easy to maintain.

Customizing your platform should give you flexible options in terms of layout and appearance, so make sure it allows you to customize it to your liking.

Price Make sure you are not paying too much for what you are getting. Almost every platform or hosting provider has student discounts or special prices for educational users, so be sure to find them before signing up.

Platform options

One of the most common ways is to use an all-in-one hosting platform. All-in-One platforms provide both web hosting space, a custom content management system, and cloud-based design tools (usually with templates). Many of these sites also provide custom domain names. Here are some popular all-in-one platforms:

Square Space: $ 6 / month with student discount

Adobe Portfolio: 9.99 / month (including Photoshop)

Wix: $ 5 / month (Contains ads; ہ 11 / month to remove ads)

Weebly: $ 4 / month (Contains ads; $ 8 / month to remove ads)

Another way is to use a standard web hosting service. Web hosting services offer the most flexibility because they allow the use of any popular content management system (such as WordPress, Drupal, etc.) or customization options. There are dozens of web hosting services available (SI Faculty uses Dream Host, Blue Host, Deluxe Hosting, and Web Fiction, and most of them offer one-time or student discounts, so any one of them Do your homework before signing up for

Should I code my portfolio website?

If your goal is to build a career in front end web development or UX roles that include programming, you should consider coding your portfolio website (either from scratch or using a framework like Bootstrap). ۔ For everyone else, focusing on content and offering your portfolio is a much better use of your time.

What should my domain name be?

Most UX professionals use their name as their portfolio URL, but it is not required. Your domain name is part of your professional identity, so choose it carefully and make sure it's something you can live with for a few years.