D
Deleted20245
Guest
I am the perfect example of someone who swallowed the slowlane pill through my 20's. I went to college, hated it, came out with no student loan debt and with a BFA in Painting. I worked for 3 years as a hotel maintenance grunt before going back to grad school to get an MFA in Painting so I could teach. (I'm cringing as I write this.) I wound up with roughly $70,000 in debt, no cushy college teaching job, and I'm making less per year now than I did before grad school. The bright side is that I am now 1 month away from zero debt.
Right after grad school, my school hired me to develop an online course for them. I got about halfway through and lost faith. I was making about $5/hr working on this course, which was slated to be published in a shitty, outmoded system of eLearning with no video and terrible interaction. Plus, a teacher had to teach the course every semester. AND the students would be paying about $3,000 each for the class.
I gave up, told them I couldn't finish the course. They were all too happy to pass it off to someone else.
I felt like a failure. They opened the door to a college teaching job, and I didn't make it through. I thought that was what I wanted. I went back home to live with the family and pay off debt.
About a year ago, I decided that I should start teaching art anyway. I found some people in town to teach to, and taught them some things. It seemed stupidly limiting to go this route, so I recorded some lessons and threw them up on youtube. After that, I figured that I could make a website as a digital textbook, so anyone can refer to it to learn what I've been teaching.
Then I discovered DeMarco's book. I realized that I could theoretically have a great effect on a lot of people by building up a community of teachers and artists--my own fully fledged art school. Is it necessary? Yeah, there's $1 trillion in student loan debt. (Hopefully art itself is somehow necessary.) Is the entry tough? Yeah, very. I can control it, scale it, and eventually divorce it from my time. I immediately re-worked my website, dubbed it "The Anti-University Art University" or "AUsquared" for short, and started making plans for version 2, which will have all kinds of fancy automated systems for the users.
Now, I'm juggling content development, video recording and editing, my job, making art, and research. The family says, "I hope you someday get a job you love." My friends are supportive skeptics. I spend loads of my week recording, reading, and researching. I'm making a catalog of recordings so that I can release them one at a time on a regular basis while I work towards new lessons, which is why you won't see much on my site at the moment or for the next several months.
All in all, I'm glad to be here. I hope to be inspired by what everyone's doing out there.
Right after grad school, my school hired me to develop an online course for them. I got about halfway through and lost faith. I was making about $5/hr working on this course, which was slated to be published in a shitty, outmoded system of eLearning with no video and terrible interaction. Plus, a teacher had to teach the course every semester. AND the students would be paying about $3,000 each for the class.
I gave up, told them I couldn't finish the course. They were all too happy to pass it off to someone else.
I felt like a failure. They opened the door to a college teaching job, and I didn't make it through. I thought that was what I wanted. I went back home to live with the family and pay off debt.
About a year ago, I decided that I should start teaching art anyway. I found some people in town to teach to, and taught them some things. It seemed stupidly limiting to go this route, so I recorded some lessons and threw them up on youtube. After that, I figured that I could make a website as a digital textbook, so anyone can refer to it to learn what I've been teaching.
Then I discovered DeMarco's book. I realized that I could theoretically have a great effect on a lot of people by building up a community of teachers and artists--my own fully fledged art school. Is it necessary? Yeah, there's $1 trillion in student loan debt. (Hopefully art itself is somehow necessary.) Is the entry tough? Yeah, very. I can control it, scale it, and eventually divorce it from my time. I immediately re-worked my website, dubbed it "The Anti-University Art University" or "AUsquared" for short, and started making plans for version 2, which will have all kinds of fancy automated systems for the users.
Now, I'm juggling content development, video recording and editing, my job, making art, and research. The family says, "I hope you someday get a job you love." My friends are supportive skeptics. I spend loads of my week recording, reading, and researching. I'm making a catalog of recordings so that I can release them one at a time on a regular basis while I work towards new lessons, which is why you won't see much on my site at the moment or for the next several months.
All in all, I'm glad to be here. I hope to be inspired by what everyone's doing out there.
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