New Media Studies is a very broad field of study; its students could end up just wondering through different classes without really creating a coherent set of skills for themselves. In order to avoid that, my professor challenged us to critically examine our plans for our time here at DePaul and present them creatively, by drawing a map.

Here’s a good time for me to make a confession. I am NOT creative. The simplest of creative tasks are usually quite challenging for me, so I’m quite proud of the creative spurt I had during this class.

The Monopoly inspired plan I created for my Proseminar class. Please click to enlarge.

I was inspired by my favorite childhood board game, Monopoly. I turned each cluster of classes or skills into a square on the board. All the squares were given names based the cluster it represented plus a street, drive, circle, boulevard, etc. in in order to go along with the names of properties in Monopoly. It also includes a “DISTRACTION!” square which is the equivalent of jail and Internship and Graduation squares which are similar  to chance. Of course, I gave the Dream Job Boulevard the same space as the most coveted Boardwalk in the real game.

When I shared my design with the class a few of my colleagues found it interesting, so I thought I would share it here as well. My classmate Robert, of Robert’s Hilarious Design Blog, said the Monopoly game was a good idea because life is like it, a mix of good and bad.

I’m so glad for this assignment. It really helped me see exactly what my goals are. After feeling like I spent the entirety of my undergraduate career confused, clarity is a beautiful thing.