I think it should be at LEAST offend as an elective, like keyboarding... or even as a secondary class to keyboard like keyboard 101, keyboarding 110: Typographic Basics. Have more on the chidrens computers than microsof word like Indesign or Illustrator.

Chase Langdon

1. No. General education—at least here in the states—is muddled up enough trying to cram in the interests of too many people as it is. Trying to teach everyone something as subtle and esoteric as typography would just leave them more confused than they already are.

2. Mandatory music classes education hasn’t done anything to change the public taste for bad music, so I see no reason to assume that it would work with type.

Carefully developed personal graphic identities seem pretty unlikely to happen on a large scale; people have better things to do with their time. That’s why so many people just stick with Arial and Times New Roman.

Or, rephrased, could typography someday become a part of person’s style (resembling one’s preferences in cars, clothing brands etc.). The answer is probably no, but could you at least imagine such scenario?

American Psycho

That is true about music. People would rather pick something easy and fast than spend time to find whats really good. Thats why people just listen to hits radio to find out what they like rather than pouring themselves into a nice independant record company. But I still think it should be an elective, to give at least the choice to discover type before college for those not growing up around design.

Chase Langdon

I think ’design’ in general needs to be better taught. Aspects of Graphic design could certainly be included in Writing classes and art classes.

“American Psycho”

ROFL.

I imagine a wife nagging her husband that while the neighbors already use 2 nicely matching DTL fonts we only have a license for Courier.

I’ve said this in another thread but will repeat it here. Am doing some mandatory and painful PowerPoint training. I am amazed and disgusted by the delivery of the material. It’s all about everything you CAN do, and nothing about WHY you should do it. One thing that would have incredible impact is Microsoft getting rid of “WordArt” (has there ever been anything more offensive to a typographer) and making some effort to educate users of its software about the fundamentals of design, rather than just telling everyone, “Look! You can center it!” “Look! You can make everything a different color!” “Look you can italicize it!” or, of course, the creme de le creme, “LOOK! YOU’VE GOT HUNDREDS OF FONTS TO CHOOSE FROM!!!”

Teaching it in schools? That would require good teachers. Who’s going to educate the teachers?

“Teaching it in schools? That would require good teachers. Who’s going to educate the teachers?”

Could they be perhaps guest lecturers instead?

I’ve noticed that for many people it’s quite interesting to hear about the origin of a typeface etc. once they get beyond the feeling that all sans faces look the same. And children use to be excited when they can identify Optima or Futura on a product packaging or posters in the street. But yes, it would be different if they were obliged to do a homework with that subject.

“I am amazed and disgusted by the delivery of the material. It’s all about everything you CAN do, and nothing about WHY you should do it.”

Par for the course when it comes to MS pro