Reflecting on life as a design instructor
This write-up is not a case study, but a reflection of the time I was teaching for work.
During a coffee outing and reunion with one of my high-school classmates, I learned about RED Academy Toronto, where my friend was teaching an Intro to Marketing program part-time. He said it was a newly established bootcamp, the 2nd branch of RED Academy which started in Vancouver. I was informed they were running a UX foundations class, and were actively looking for instructors.
This seemed like an interesting opportunity to get into something new, and I was curious about the syllabus.
So I went in and checked it out. It was a gorgeous little school. 3 classrooms lined with massive whiteboards, a very cute social area with a foosball table, crimson red couches, and cozy areas to chill. The decor was neatly planned out, and there were small neon signs reflecting off of red brick walls. It felt very comfortable, like a place someone can spend lots of time in. I wished my school looked like this!
Upon meeting some of the staff (and my friend who introduced me to them) - I was met with warm welcomes and incredibly intelligent minds. We exchanged nice chats about life, our work, and our hobbies.
Then, I was asked. “Would you like to teach with us?”
And so I said yes. Initially, I was teaching the part-time UX foundations program twice per week. It was a side gig at the time, one I thoroughly enjoyed. It was fun coming in to meet new people, helping them learn design, and watching them network. After a few months, I was offered a full-time position to run the Toronto pilot full-time courses.
I thought to myself: “I never knew I would be teaching.”
It was kinda crazy how one small event lead to a series of larger events like this. The ripple effect was fully experienced that day. So when the opportunity presented itself, I was excited (and nervous) to give it my best and help others in their future career. I had already been working at G Adventures for over 4 years, so it felt serendipitous to change directions for a bit.
During my first cohort teaching full-time, honesty, I had a real case of impostor syndrome. Training on different learning styles, the course outline, and human psychology was a little overwhelming at first. However, my confidence laid in being a patient, nurturing person with a desire to help others grow. I knew I would be making an impact in people’s lives.
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The course I was teaching included design fundamentals, technical skills, capstone projects, and real clients. We ran design-thinking workshops, brainstorm sessions, rapid tests, and much more. What was really cool was tying the UX/UI work together with the web development students, who then took our projects and made them real. That’s some true teamwork!
The students varied from slightly older professionals in completely unrelated fields, young aspiring designers who have never worked a full-time job before, to everyone in-between. The relationships forged through this experience continue to be rewarding and important to me, and seeing so many of these students working in the industry today is one of my biggest accomplishments. Years later, I still keep in touch with some of the alumni. Finding them LinkedIn and seeing that many of them are senior designers now is truly special.
There were some not-so-sunny days, of course. But we worked through it all.
It was very exciting and empowering to share knowledge with students from all walks of life. The challenges of becoming an instructor have taught me a lot more than I ever imagined - Managing different learning styles in a high-pressure environment, helping students through their design journey, and discovering how to be a mentor, and just…listening to people, seeing their unique goals and circumstances.
I will be forever grateful for this work. I may not have tangible portfolio pieces from this chapter in my career, but they did. And that’s what mattered most.
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I worked at RED Academy from Sep 2016 - Apr 2018, and occasionally came in to be a career coach thereafter.
Now, as for the school’s inner workings: The school has shut down in 2019. There has unfortunately been deeper internal problems, some of which I knew about while there. The founder of the company made poor decisions, and shut down the school abruptly. This resulted in students losing their tuition money, which is very troubling and painful to know. My heart goes out to the students who were at the tail end of the school’s existence. There was so much potential in this school, and it shined bright for a little while.
