This past Fall term, I took a class called Design Your Degree, an Antioch required class that starts us on the path of developing our self designed major. As of the end of the class, the name of my self design degree is “Visual Storytelling.”

In one session of the class, our professor, Mary Ann Davis, had us separate into groups to continue to work on our statement of inquiry (the documentation of our self design major). I joined the group that stayed behind with her to discuss our thoughts and fears; generally, it was a group with those who didn’t exactly know what they were doing. A lot of the members of my group cried that session, including myself. We were all facing an overwhelming fear where we were being asked to explain our dreams and goals in a way that could be approved, labelled valid, and presented to the rest of the college. It was a scary thought to think that in that class, right then, right in that moment in time and space, we were deciding our lives. It sounds overly dramatic, but that was genuinely how I felt on the inside.

At most other colleges, you chose a career field and took the cookie cutter classes that were within the degree plan. At Antioch, you own your education in a way that allows you to learn as you please, with some extra classes for flavor. The Co-op program allows you to get the experience you need in or out of your field. It’s an open system that can be really scary if you don’t know exactly what you want to do already, but there’s plenty of room for error.

I am an art student, but not the abstract, classical, or super super strange art student. I like video games and cartoons. So, I guessed my degree would be Animation and Motion Graphics. But sometimes I do like to paint and draw. Then, that was it. Illustration. I could generalize it to “Visual Arts,” but I liked writing too, and would often write stories only to later make them drawings. I had a hard time coming up with a general explanation of my degree, of all the little things I want to fit under one story. My story.

So, I chose “Visual Storytelling.” I don’t remember where I got it from but I just felt right. I’m an art student of a new age. A new age of technical art. A modern age where my explanation for my degree is, “You know, video games, cartoons, comic books, etc. Basically anything with art and story.” It’s a story I can stick by if my focus changes in medium but I’m still staying true to myself. I still don’t know exactly what I’m going to do with my life, but I think being at Antioch has been a good start.