A little more about Leslie
Leslie has been designing since the ‘90’s. Her diverse professional background ranges from working as the graphic designer on a major motion picture to serving as a university professor.
While a professor, Leslie earned her Doctorate in Learning and Leadership. Through project-based initiatives that applied design as a catalyst for sustainable change, her work—both in and out of the classroom—focused on creating meaningful relationships between education, industry, and community. Her experience, as a professional designer, professor, and doctoral candidate, gave Leslie a unique perspective to understand that most design students were not graduating with the skills they needed to thrive within industry. She recognized that this skill gap led to hiring companies being unable to hire the talent they needed.
Leslie realized that companies needed to hire a specific kind of designer but they could not find the right talent. This lead Leslie to work on design education initiatives such as the development of a holistic curriculum for designers through the The Web Standards Project Education Task Force, the Open Web Education Alliance, and the WE (Web Education) Rock Summit/Tour.
After years of service to the University, Leslie understood the constraints of a traditional higher education setting and realized that the constraints were not affording educators the opportunity to adequately prepare their students for a career beyond graduation. This realization inspired her to search for a better way to structure a learning environment to support the needs of students and hiring companies.
Leslie's Presentation
Unicornucopia: Learn the Skills Needed to Survive and Thrive as a Creative Unicorn
