Eleventh International Conference on The Image

Abstract

Design students registered for my Poster course at Barry University joined forces with local designers to help AIGA-Miami, the Wolfsonian-FIU museum, and the Florida Department of Health (FDH), to create posters to educate the public on the HIV/AIDS crisis in South Florida. As a proponent of community service, I took steps to obtain a Service-learning designation for this class, allowing me the opportunity to teach students how to use their talents in ways that benefit the community. This semester, the poster research process began by attending the AIGA-Design for Empathy workshop. Attendees learned a great deal of information about HIV/AIDS and the stigma surrounding the disease. Participants also took part in brainstorming activities and viewed the collection of historic HIV/AIDS posters at the Wolfsonian-FIU for inspiration. During the next few weeks, students explored design concepts/techniques in order to produce a meaningful poster. They then submitted their posters to a panel of judges consisting of representatives from the Wolfsonian-FIU, FDH and the local design community. Judges narrowed down submissions (which included professional and student designers) to ten finalists. I was ecstatic to learn that five out of the ten finalists were from my poster class, along with three honorable mentions. This Service-learning project concluded with the class and myself volunteering during the AIGA-PosterFest:Design For Good event at Wolfsonian-FIU, a day-long event revolving around HIV/AIDS education. Upon arriving to volunteer, student finalists were happy to see their posters printed/framed, and learned they would be on display at the museum for several weeks.