05/12/2025
You ever see some news that has you throw your entire to-do list out the window to write about it?
Of course not. Me either.
Just kidding.
I found out today that a professor I had in art school is retiring. She was head of the Graphic Design department—and she made it very clear she did not like me.
You know the signs: the looks, the sighs, the “why did I get this grade” conversations.
Sophomore year was when we finally got to engage with our majors, and critiques went like this: you tacked up your work and were given golden star stickers. You went around the board to add your star sticker to the piece of work you thought looked the best.
After too many frustrations, I tested something: I hired a junior to do my homework. The professor’s response confirmed my gut. When my (secretly not mine) project collected a galaxy of gold stars during critique, her reaction was:
“Surely there are OTHERS just as good, if not better!”
“What about some of these other ones?”
I mentally clocked it.
Later that semester, we had a packaging assignment which took me four days of all-nighters. I wasn’t great at 3D construction, but I didn’t deserve: “Jennifer, I can see you’re trying to get an A—but it’s making me sick.”
I walked out of that critique ready to walk out of the whole graphic design program.
We see Jenny now: confident, vocal, bold. Some call it arrogance—but it was survival.
I had decided to confide in my typography professor. If he thought I ALSO sucked, I’d leave.
I’d asked him to look at the designs I used to submit into the design program, and to look at things I’d been making for myself. Designs that I used to remind me of why I was even enduring this struggle to begin with.
He looked at them and said something I’ll never forget:
“THIS. YOU MAKE THIS??”
I nodded. Insecurity was bigger than my whole body.
“IF YOU MAKE THIS, JUST KEEP MAKING THIS! DON’T LISTEN TO ANYONE ELSE!”
He yelled. But I needed all that volume to drown out my doubt.
That moment shifted everything.
Spoiler alert: I stayed and graduated in 2007.
That same professor—who had once made me feel worthless—was the one to hand me my diploma and she apologized.
It felt good, but by then it didn’t matter. I had already won awards, secured an internship, and represented the school at a design conference in NYC.
Today, almost two decades later, I’ve been working as a designer ever since.
The road’s been wonky, but I’ve never wanted to leave it.
And now, with her retirement, I had to share this story.
Because I know I’m not alone.
How many times have we let someone else’s opinion make us question what we know we’re meant to do?
How many times has someone shut us down—or out?
What stories do you hold about being told you can’t—or worse, shouldn’t—do the thing that calls you?
Drop them here. I know I’m not the only one.
