I'm sure your portfolio is great, I just can't read it

Think back...

Remember Wired magazine in the early years?   Every colorful page a different and original font in an unusual colored ink on a really bright and busy background.  And the facing page had a matte gray 8 point font on a glossy black background with a matte pop-art image.

We see it all day in EVERY-DAMN-PORTFOLIO.    Red text on saturated green background,  high resolution moire'  backgrounds with thin calligraphy fonts.  Don't even get me started on the PowerPoint stuff.

Your students may have some great design writing,   some outstanding engineering - if I can't read your portfolio I'm just going to move on to the next candidate in the stack.

Please do your students a favor throughout the entire program and critique their text presentation for clarity, readability, typography, spelling and grammar- being able to present information in text is just as important as anything they will ever design, engineer, or animate.

Put best practices images on the wall of portfolios done well.
Team up with students from the Art program to help the designers and programmers make something that is expressive, creative and unique that humans could actually parse.

A short course in 2D layout, typography, and readability should be mandatory for all students.