BFACommunication Design
Design the visual language of communication to inform, inspire, and ignite change.
Overview
Design the way ideas move
Designer and curator Na Kim speaks to a group at the Curatorial Research Bureau in San Francisco. Courtesy of the Curatorial Research Bureau.
A visual language for the future
Communication design shapes the way the world connects. How something looks, moves, or behaves is part of its message. As a Communication Design major, you’ll study how to make these choices with intention, using typography, image-making, and interaction to bring ideas to life—not just clearly, but powerfully. Communication design can move people, change minds, and deepen understanding in a complex world. Here, you’ll learn how.
A global hub for communication innovation
The Bay Area has long been a hub for reimagining how people communicate—from the rise of counterculture publishing in the ’60s to zines in the ’90s to today’s intersection of design and tech. CCA is shaped by this legacy of using boundary-pushing design to transform culture. You’ll study alongside practicing designers with deep ties to and gain access to real-world opportunities in a city that continues to define the future of communication design.
Studios & Shops
From posters to prototypes
Become fluent across formats, tools, and ideas
Communication Design students access a full range of creative tools—from risograph and letterpress to CNC routers, digital looms, and VR gear. In our state-of-the-art studios and spaces, you’ll try things out, get hands-on, and experiment across mediums. Want to design a brand campaign featuring a typeface you created? Create a custom digital experience? Launch a small-run independent publication? You can. Learning happens through making and tools are part of the process, helping you push your ideas further and bring your work to life in unexpected ways.
Faculty
Influential designers and artists
Helping sharpen your approach
You’ll learn from designers who are actively shaping the field. Our faculty have worked on everything from app interfaces to museum exhibitions, from editorial design to global brand campaigns. But in the classroom, their focus is on you. Faculty lead with curiosity and challenge you to do the same—encouraging critical thinking, experimentation, and bold creative choices. In critiques, they’ll help you see your work from new angles, ask better questions, and sharpen your ideas.
E Roon Kang, Chair of Communication Design
E Roon Kang brings a systems-driven, future-facing approach to communication design—one that connects research, experimentation, and real-world application. As the founder of the design studio Math Practice and co-founder of the research initiative 908A, his work explores the structures behind how we live and communicate, often through unexpected forms and tools. His projects have appeared in venues like MoMA, the Seoul Museum of Art, and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, and he was an inaugural participant in LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab.
Curriculum
Grow as you go
Begin with tools, end with impact
The Communication Design curriculum is designed to grow with you. Throughout the program, you’ll learn to think in systems, lead with ideas, and use making as a way of discovering meaning. View sample courses.
Build a strong design vocabulary
In your first year, you’ll be introduced to core tools, visual systems, and studio culture. The second year deepens that foundation with a set of intentionally connected studios in communication design, typography, and interaction.
Explore focused practice areas
You’ll enter a series of Advanced Studios your third year. These flexible, topical courses let you explore focused areas of practice like branding, motion design, AR/VR, data visualization, and editorial publishing. Studio themes evolve in response to the field, giving you the chance to stay current while developing your own direction. Taught by practicing designers, these studios help you build both depth and versatility as you define your path.
Make your professional debut
Your fourth year centers on a self-directed Senior Thesis developed over two semesters. This capstone experience brings together everything you’ve learned in a public-facing body of work that reflects your values, voice, and process as a designer.
Start strong with the First Year Experience
All undergraduates begin with a two-semester First Year Experience, where you’ll explore tools and materials across disciplines. Through studio projects and critiques, you’ll build the creative and conceptual foundation to thrive in your major
BFA Communication Design
Foundational Curriculum
- Drawing Studio
- 3.0 units
- 2D Studio
- 3.0 units
- 3D Studio
- 3.0 units
- 4D Studio
- 3.0 units
- Introduction to the Arts
- 3.0 units
- Introduction to the Modern Arts
- 3.0 units
- Writing 1
- 3.0 units
- Writing 2
- 3.0 units
- Foundations in Critical Studies
- 3.0 units
Communication Design Major Requirements
- Communication Design Tools
- 3.0 units
- Communication Design 1–2
- 6.0 units
- Typography 1–2
- 6.0 units
- Interactive 1-2
- 6.0 units
- Sophomore Review
- 0.0 units
- Advanced Studio
- 12.0 units
- Media History 1
- 3.0 units
- Media History 2
- 3.0 units
- Graphic Design Electives
- 3.0 units
- Senior Thesis 1
- 3.0 units
- Senior Thesis 2
- 3.0 units
- Studio Electives
- 9.0 units
Collegewide Curriculum
- Critical Ethnic Studies Studio
- 3.0 units
- Upper Division Interdisciplinary Studio
- 3.0 units
- Critical Ethnic Studies Seminar (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Literary and Performing Arts Studies (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Philosophy and Critical Theory (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Social Science/History (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Science/Math (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- History of Art and Visual Culture (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Humanities and Sciences Electives (2000/3000 level)
- 6.0 units
- Humanities and Sciences Electives (3000 level)
- 6.0 units
Total 120.0 units
Careers
Launch your design life
Work on what you care about most
Communication Design graduates leave CCA with a portfolio and a distinctive point of view. In a world shaped by constant communication, the ability to design messages that are clear, intentional, and impactful is a powerful asset. Our alumni bring these skills to studios, startups, nonprofits, and tech companies—or launch their own creative practices. Wherever you go next, you’ll be ready to shape the future through design.
What careers do communication design students pursue?
Our alumni design visual identities, build apps and interfaces, animate stories, publish independent zines, and create experiences that move across screens, print, and public space. They work as product designers at startups, brand designers at creative studios, type designers, art directors, strategists, and content creators. Some design for civic impact or climate action. Others bring design thinking into education, research, or new technology. With a flexible, future-ready foundation, you’ll be prepared to shape your career in a wide range of ways—and lead the future of communication.
Sucess stories
CCA’s community of alumni give back to the college in a variety of ways
Four esteemed graduates of the college—artists, industry leaders, and designers in their own right—share why they stay involved with our community and continue to give back to CCA.
CCA faculty Steve Jones and Martin Venezky receive AIGA SF Continuum Fellow awards
AIGA, the professional association for design, focuses on design as a profession and as a cultural asset that serves practitioners across design disciplines, as well as teachers and students with national and local chapters.
Director Lindsay Daniels Brings Her Drive for Deeper Connections to the FANCY Roster
A design background influences her goal of telling broader stories in film and forging a deeper emotional resonance with viewers
News & Events
Let’s redefine design
CCA alum known as the go-to designer for top Bay Area restaurants
Robert van Horne (BFA Graphic Design 2007) has become a leading graphic designer for California wine labels and Bay Area restaurants. His logos, signs, menus, etc. have quietly shaped the visual vocabulary of today’s food and drink world.
Five reasons to consider a STEM-designated undergraduate program at an art school
From state-of-the-art tools and industry partnerships to opportunities to make a real-world impact and design the future, learn why a STEM-designated undergraduate program at an art school may be right for you.
Keen as folk: Quality Time
What do MFA design students do after graduation? Alumni from collaborative design studio Quality Time share the foundation of their work and the importance of community-building.
How to Apply
Design work that makes a difference
CCA’s BFA Communication Design program is for students who believe that visual culture is more than just decoration — it’s how we connect and drive change. Whether you're into type, motion, interaction, publishing — or still figuring it out — you’ll find the tools, mentors, and studio energy to create work that resonates across