Meet the Judges, Part Three: InStyle and ESPN

What are you most hoping to see in the students' work? 

Work that pushes the boundaries of what traditional magazines look like. 

During my junior year at the University of Iowa, I moved to NYC for the summer and was an intern at Spotco, a firm that designs posters and advertising for Broadway shows. Aside from working on some design projects and A LOT of scanning, I remember having to organize this amazing library of design and photography books. I still have copies of some of the photos and designs from those books. It was a creative and inspiring place to be.  

The unexpected. Looking at some of the past winners' work, I'm impressed by the quality, but I'd like to see that students can bring something new to a layout, not just ape the style of their favorite magazine.

I never interned (I'm one of those lucky/annoying people who got a job straight out of school), but that actually made me a bigger supporter of internships. I've never stopped learning in my career, but so many of the most important lessons I've learned came in my first few months on the job, and I quickly realized that having done an internship would have given me a big head start on learning those lessons. Plus, it's a great chance to make connections and meet people that could eventually end up being your co-workers.