Illinois State University is excited to announce the availability for current students to download Adobe Creative Cloud to their personal machines at no additional cost. From website to infographics, magazines to portfolios, Creative Cloud offers applications that allow you to create just about anything you desire.
Faculty across campus have begun introducing Adobe Creative Cloud into their coursework inspiring students to make choices in the classroom that transfer into creative exploration for independent projects. Offering Creative Cloud not only allows students to express themselves for independent projects but empowers them to explore artistic options in their coursework, engage with material in a more in-depth way, and work with other students in a collaborative environment to produce unique classwork.
Illinois State students: Adobe Creative Cloud is available for your own devises at no extra cost. Download now: About.IllinoisState.edu/Adobe
Engagement
At a university like Illinois State, small class sizes encourage student engagement in the classroom. The ability to create artistic and unique websites, videos, and graphics allows the student to become more invested in the topic they are learning. Hulda Black, associate professor in marketing uses Adobe Creative Cloud applications in the classroom as a way to inspire students to fully engage in the material they are working with. Black said, “in using products like Adobe Spark, students are forced to condense their projects and be more creative in the process of delivering their projects.”
Black also says that her students found joy in diving deeper into their work by exploring the different functions and features of Adobe Creative Cloud. By urging students to become involved in Adobe creative jams, Black got her students to make full use of the technology they were given. Now thanks to the availability of student Creative Cloud packages these students can experience Creative Jams outside of the classroom.
Empowerment
Technology advances quickly and it is important to empower students to make use of the technology they have access to. In many cases, the software and programs they come into contact with in the classroom will follow them into their professional careers. From understanding how technology operates in a positive way, to understanding respect for intellectual materials, two individuals in the School of Communication are taking student empowerment to a creative level.
Bob Carroll, TV-10 coordinator and instructor said that allowing students to use the Adobe Creative Cloud products, “empowers them to think differently and creatively about how things can be done. There is a complete shift in technology, and we need to adapt to how students use it. They are able to do so much with it so we have to think about how they can benefit from it and how to use it in a positive way.” Carroll employs programs like Photoshop, After Effects, and other programs with his students to help them complete projects for TV-10 while getting them used to software they will be using in the professional field. Brent Simonds, a mass media professor, also uses Adobe Creative Cloud in his classroom as a way to educate his students on the importance of respecting intellectual property. Adobe Spark has a feature that allows an individual to search for royalty-free images and videos in a database and select an option to insert into their work. When an image or video is selected, the source is automatically created and added at the bottom of the project, giving credit where credit is due. For resources outside of the Adobe Creative Cloud, Simonds said, “it is really a good way to get them to think about intellectual property and citations. They are now creating intellectual property so I get them to try and think about how they would feel about someone taking something that is theirs.”
Collaboration
An important aspect of in-class work is collaborating with peers to gain insight and feedback on a particular subject. But how can students collaborate when they are expected to complete traditional projects? Rosie Hauck, associate professor in Business Information Systems uses Creative Cloud as a method for her students to give and receive peer feedback. This is used in place of traditional end-of-semester papers. For Hauck, getting the students to work together to give peer feedback on such an important piece of classwork is revolutionary. “It isn’t possible to make copies of every person’s 25-page paper and send it to other students for review. This way when students are using a platform like Adobe Spark, they can share the link with classmates and receive feedback before submitting it to me to grade,” Hauck said.
Using Creative Cloud in the classroom allows the students to learn how to use a particular software and urges them to use it in their own lives. Before the availability of the Adobe Creative Cloud as a download for students, it was available on computers in labs across campus. This new availability gives students the opportunity to work off campus or in the residence halls to complete coursework or explore creative experiences outside of the classroom.
Students have used the skills they learned in using Creative Cloud to create online portfolios to get jobs after graduation, produce documentaries and other information videos, and create beautiful and unique graphics proving that Adobe Creative Cloud not only elevates classroom creativity, but inspire students to succeed far after graduation.
Interested in downloading Adobe Creative Cloud? Students can visit https://about.illinoisstate.edu/adobe/ to fill out a request form. Once the form is completed and reviewed, you will receive a notice from the University to begin your download. Faculty and staff can visit https://www.adobe.com/ and sign in using your ISU credentials.
Happy creating!
