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Why This Student Centered Photo Program Is Unique

The other day someone on the phone asked me what the difference is between the classes that we have here and the classes at the places on Lincoln Avenue? 

My first response was "Sustained Learning" and then I asked the caller to attend one of our free 90-minute workshops, that we have each Sunday starting at High Noon.Still: fair question, what is the difference between us and the other guys?

Our curriculum has been refined and proven for the past 40 years. Over 20,000 people have been through our classes and thousands have been part of an Exhibit. Most of our exhibitors started with Photo I less than 9 months before their show. For the past 40 years many of our former students have gone on to make their living through Photography.

We have over ten Photo I classes in three cities each week and in March we are adding a downtown Class that will start at 6:00 PM. Our classes are offered week nights, weekends and some week days. Every student may attend the first class at any time during the first week of classes and continue the second week on whatever day that fits their schedule.

Our proven curriculum is consistent each week so if work or family calls, you can make up in any class and will receive the same lesson. We open our facilities many hours before classes begin. We have unrestricted free parking 24 hours a day. We keep our class size to 20 or less. We also have four Photo II classes at our Chicago headquarters each week.

We maintain a "walk in" gallery as well as an "online" gallery for the display and sale of our students work. Both galleries have 24-hour access. The LED lights used in our gallery are free of harmful UV and IR radiation. UV and IR radiation is the cause of colors fading. The color of the gallery lighting is the same as daylight, which allows the photographs to be viewed to their best advantage. The gallery lights do not emit heat, which preserves the archival permanence of the Photographs.

Some of the places on Lincoln Avenue charge for their Show Openings. Our Show Opening Parties are free.

We have no restrictions on which Photo paper is used in our printers. In Photo I we give each student a box of 8.5" X 11" Archival Epson Photo paper, for no charge. Other places require their beginning students to buy Epson’s most expensive photo paper. It seems, for no other reason than they do not want to change the ink in their printers?

We have one teacher for every five students in our Photo I labs. One of our staff is writing a "how to" book about Adobe Lightroom, the "image processing" program we use. She is proving her text through our Photo I students. That means each student is given detailed written instructions in each lab session about how to use Lightroom. By the end of Photo I this constitutes a manual. All of our Photo II, Photo III and "Show Track" students have unrestricted 24 hour a day access to our facilities. That means the computer labs, studio and lighting may be used at whatever time is best for their schedules.

Are the classes here different? I would say so! Check out one of our free classes and see for yourself.