Before the end of the year...

Location: Sheffield, South Yorkshire
Salary: £27,000 per annum
Company: Webrecruit
Job Type: Permanent
Job Title: Web Designer
Source: CWjobs.co.uk

I initially chose this job due to the skills mentioned in the advertisement. The position doesn’t state whether the role is best suited to a junior, middleweight or senior designer.

At the end of this college year, I would ideally be able to apply for a job like this having gained all the necessary skills. Commercial experience seems to be the deal clincher on a majority of job advertisements that I have seen, so over the next year I am going to do my best to land myself some more freelance work out of college hours.

The skills required include Interface Design, Graphic Design, HTML and CSS – all of which I have some experience in, commercially and non-commercially. But I feel that my skills could be improved in order to present a more impressive portfolio upon interview.

Other skills that I wish to improve upon during the course of the next year include PHP, mySQL, CMS and I’d also like to branch out into Ruby on Rails. Although this job is for a web designer, I would also like to think that by the end of the course, I could apply for web developer roles as well.

In conclusion, by the end of this year I want to improve my skill set in preparation for employment, take on more commercial work outside of college to improve my portfolio and complete my HND to the best of my ability.

Thanks for reading,
Sue

Second Year, why am I still here?

After my achievements of the first year, it made perfect sense for me to continue and progress onto second year. After all, this is the industry that I want as my career.

Now we have the assignment schedule for the second year, I'm really looking forward to A13: Content is King. CMS (Content Management Systems) is something that I've been trying to get myself into over the past few months but I've yet to try and use it properly. Another unit that I'm looking forward to is the SMLP (Self-Managed Learning Plan) - another chance for me to learn a key language, PHP.

When it comes to employability; this second year is going to be the most vital to ensure that I gain the skills I need. At the end of this year, I would envisage myself to be in the position where I can enter the world of employment. Which is something I aspire to achieve, rather than my initial intentions of entering a third year in a different institute.

In summary, during the course of this year, I need to be able to give my best in every assignment that I tackle and achieve the best of my potential. Ensure that my portfolio is adaptable to all situations ready for employment. And finally, I want to enjoy this year, because this time next year, I will be in the big bad world of full time employment!

Thanks for reading,
Sue