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The ���ϲʿ�’s degree in User Experience Design equips you with the creative, technical and communication skills to enter a career in a fast-growing industry.

���ϲʿ�'s is one of a handful of universities to offer a four-year undergraduate degree in the emerging field of User Experience Design and takes advantage of its location in Austin to offer career-building internships and professional connections.

User Experience Design, often referred to as UX, sits at the intersection of design, technology and innovation. UX seeks to understand how people search for information and interact with digital tools to design more intuitive, easy-to-use products — both digital products, like apps, websites and software, and other processes and systems.

You should consider a career in UX if you have both an artistic and technical mindset and enjoy working in teams to build new digital products that improve people’s lives.

Key UX Program Courses

Key courses in the ���ϲʿ�’s UX program are taught online, giving you useful experience in the digital space where you’ll be working. This format also prepares you to communicate and carry out teamwork in an industry where remote teams are common and in a post-pandemic world where virtual collaboration is the norm.

Your classes will teach you to design prototypes, conduct user research, carry out usability tests and learn basic coding. You’ll also build strong communication skills through liberal arts courses in psychology, communication, business and sociology. You’ll learn how to listen, negotiate compromise, understand different cultural expectations, and develop deep empathy — all skills that are essential to being a good designer. This combination of relational abilities and practical experience will prepare you to enter a career in a field that’s in demand in Central Texas.

For more information about the User Experience Design major or minor, please contact Kim Garza, area coordinator of User Experience Design.

Earn Two Degrees in Five Years

with our pathway to receive two degrees in five years.

Success Coaches and Academic Advisors guide students through undergraduate and graduate courses to maximize benefits.

What do our graduates do?

As a UX designer or researcher, you’ll be ready to join any size of team, from a startup to a small boutique design studio to a large, multinational company. All industries hire UX professionals, especially information technology, software, finance, insurance and consulting. You may work on websites, software products, mobile applications or artificial intelligence products — or you could help any organization seeking to improve its process and better serve its clients.

• Senior experience designer at Accomplice in Austin
• UX/UI designer at USAA
• UX designer and researcher at Visa
• Digital creative designer at James Avery Artisan Jewelry
• Interactive production designer at Houndstooth Studio

The Classroom & Beyond

Your courses will incorporate plenty of hands-on experiments and application. In your studio classes, you’ll work in collaborative teams structured like real-world, professional teams. The UX program was developed with significant input from partners in the industry — so you’ll graduate with the specific training employers want in their new hires. And, like all majors at ���ϲʿ�’s, the UX major will teach you to consider how diverse social identities influence your work, as people’s cultural backgrounds and physical abilities shape their expectations for the user experience.

Experiential Education

• UX for Social Good teaches you to partner with a community organization and apply UX processes to address a social issue. You’ll learn how to research the issue and formulate a user-focused solution to an identified community need.
• UX Studio: Digital Spaces will give you hands-on experience creating digital products such as websites and app prototypes.
• UX Senior Studio challenges you to apply your skills and knowledge to design a self-initiated UX project. You’ll develop expertise in project management, research, problem solving, and prototyping and present your project outcomes as part of a professional online portfolio.

Student Organizations 

• Topper Studios is the digital media club. Members are involved in creating podcasts, YouTube channels, short films, music videos and comedy sketches, and helping their fellow students produce digital content. Students in Topper Studios also frequently make promotional videos for other clubs at ���ϲʿ�’s.
• The Digital Media Center in the Munday Library is a resource for creating your own content and learning new skills. Here, you can produce and edit videos, podcasts and visual design projects with the help of your fellow students. The lab is equipped with top-of-the-line computers running the latest software including the Adobe Creative Suite. It also has a group editing/podcasting room, a green screen room and a “whisper room” used for voiceovers. If you are skilled at software, hardware repair, graphic design or video editing, you can apply to work in the lab as a digital media specialist.
• The Computer Science Club helps students build their skills through events like Capture the Flag, a cybersecurity-focused programming competition.
• The ���ϲʿ�’s Maker Club attracts tinkerers and programmers who have worked on projects involving 3-D printing, soldering, programming LED strips, and creating art through programming.
• The Command G graphic design group furthers skills through studio tours, museum visits, lecture series, workshops, and bi-annual screenprinting sales. 
• The Video Game Association hosts game nights – with a mix of console games, PC games, MTG, D&D and handheld games – as well as LAN parties and tournaments.

Internships

You’ll work with your faculty mentors to connect with internships at companies ranging from tech startups to large, multinational corporations.