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Ok, so what the hell are you 'sposed to do after college?

Every year, students graduate with advertising and design degrees only to realize that having a degree and having a portfolio that gets you hired are two very different things.

Maybe your professors told you that you'd be ready... but you're just not feeling like it. Maybe you're discovering that your work isn't quite where it needs to be compared to student portfolios you're seeing. And maybe the interviews and job offers aren't piling up like you'd hoped.

Now is not the time to give up — you can still get to where you want to be.

PARENTS WHO JUST DON'T GET IT

🎓 You just finished college, why the hell would you go back and do even more school? 🤷‍♀️

YOU, WHO DOES GET IT

👀 Because graduating and being ready for the creative job you actually want aren't always the same thing. 🧠

College may have given you four years of education, a degree, and a much better idea of who you are. That's valuable. But it's just a start. If you want to become an advertising art director or copywriter, agencies are eventually going to ask to see something college may not have given you: a portfolio full of great ideas.
WHAT COLLEGE DID COLLEGE
DAD

WHAT DAD DOES

A degree.

A piece of paper that's proof you finished college.

VS

A portfolio.

A website that's proof you can think creatively and make the kind of work agencies actually hire art directors and copywriters to make.

General knowledge.

College gave you a broad education, which is part of what makes it valuable.

VS

Specific knowledge.

Drill down deep for 15 months on all the specifics of how to become an advertising art director or copywriter.

Assignments.

You made work for classes, professors, grades, and requirements.

VS

Creative briefs.

You make advertising ideas for ad agencies, get them critiqued by working agency creatives, kill the weak ones, push the good ones, and keep doing it until your work gets better.

Graduation.

Your school's end goal.

VS

Getting hired.

DAD's end goal.

 

DAD IS NOT MORE SCHOOL. It's MORE OF WHAT SCHOOL LEFT OUT.

We’re not asking you to spend 15 months doing more of what you just did for four years. DAD is built around the stuff college probably didn’t give you enough of: real-world briefs, creative partners, working agency creatives, presenting ideas, getting brutally useful feedback, making the work better, and doing it all over again.

You’re not here to repeat college. You’re here to finish what college started.

THE WORK YOU'RE COMPETING AGAINST

Think your portfolio is ready to compete?

Your college portfolio is your college portfolio. When you start applying for agency jobs, you won't be judged as a student — you'll be judged as a professional. Agencies want to see if you're ready to work or not.

Every project you're about to see was made by a DAD student. As you check out their work, ask yourself — does this look like student work? Or professional work?

Roll the dice below and see what you're up against.

LOADING THE HALL OF FAME...
EXPLORE ALL DAD PORTFOLIOS →
97%

of DAD grads from 2020–2025 who looked for a job found one.

DAD-REPORTED GRADUATE EMPLOYMENT OUTCOMES, 2020–2025. FIGURE APPLIES TO GRADUATES WHO SOUGHT EMPLOYMENT. INDIVIDUAL RESULTS VARY; EMPLOYMENT IS NOT GUARANTEED.

9 out of 10

DAD grads land jobs outside Denver.

The reality is, most of our students come to Colorado for 15 months and then leave for a bigger market. You don't come to DAD because you desperately want a job within a 20-minute radius of our building, right? You come here because you want options, and that's exactly what our national agency network provides.

GRADUATE JOB LOCATIONS REFLECT DAD'S REPORTED NATIONAL EMPLOYMENT FOOTPRINT.
DAD HAS A NATIONAL FOOTPRINT, NOT A LOCAL ONE.
16
SAN FRANCISCO DAD CREATIVES
27
LOS ANGELES DAD CREATIVES
20
COLORADO DAD CREATIVES
23
CHICAGO DAD CREATIVES
37
NEW YORK CITY DAD CREATIVES
7
TEXAS DAD CREATIVES
12
THE SOUTH DAD CREATIVES
158 students placed from 2020–2026 + 16 students in SMALLER MARKETS / 13 REMOTE / 3 FREELANCE
DAD ART DIRECTORS + COPYWRITERS NOW WORK AT PLACES LIKE:

Goodby Silverstein & Partners / RPA / Dentsu Creative / Highdive / David&Goliath / BarkleyOKRP / Deutsch / Havas / McCann / Mischief / Saatchi & Saatchi / Leo Burnett / Wieden + Kennedy / Ogilvy / VML / GUT / Mekanism / TBWA\Chiat\Day / and more...

FIND YOUR PATH

Which kind of creative are you?

Portfolio school takes you deeper into the job you want to do than college ever could. What's your path?

01 ART DIRECTION
Do you think in pictures?

Photography. Film. Design. Type. Color. Composition. Visual worlds. You see what an idea could look and feel like before anyone else does.

EXPLORE ART DIRECTION →
OR
02 COPYWRITING
Do you think in words?

Stories. Headlines. Scripts. Voice. Culture. Language. You hear the line, find the observation, or know exactly what an idea needs to say.

EXPLORE COPYWRITING →
SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE?

That's normal. Maybe you design a little bit, maybe you write a little bit. Skip to our 30-second career tests to see which side sounds more like you.

COULD I BE AN ART DIRECTOR? → COULD I BE A COPYWRITER? →

DAD AT A GLANCE

TOTAL TUITION
$27,000
DENVER + ONLINE
PROGRAM LENGTH
15
MONTHS 5 QUARTERS 10 WEEKS EACH
HOW YOU ATTEND
LIVE
ONLINE OR IN DENVER EVERY CLASS LIVE
HOW THE WORK ADDS UP
60 CREATIVE BRIEFS
→
360 IDEAS
→
6 PORTFOLIO PIECES
AWARDS
#1
MOST AWARDED PORTFOLIO SCHOOL NORTH AMERICA · 2026
SOURCE: THE ONE CLUB ↗
COHORT SIZE
16
STUDENTS MAX EACH COHORT
TRACKS
AD + CW
ART DIRECTION + COPYWRITING
CLASS SCHEDULE
MON–THU
5 CLASSES / WEEK MORNING + AFTERNOON + EVENING NO FRI + SAT + SUN
FULL-TIME COURSE LOAD
15 + 25
15 HRS IN CLASS 25 HRS OUTSIDE PER WEEK
ENROLLMENT
FALL + SPRING
TWO STARTS A YEAR
SO WHAT NOW?

You don't have to figure this out alone.

Maybe you're ready for portfolio school. Maybe you're not. Maybe you just need someone who actually works in advertising to tell you where your portfolio stands.

Hit us up below, that's a conversation worth having.

Or maybe you want to come sit in on a real DAD class. Meet the students, watch working creative directors critique their ideas, and see what building a portfolio actually looks like.

Talk to us or come by and hang — it's free, there's no pressure to apply. And you might just leave with a much better idea of what to do next.

VISIT A CLASS HIT US UP START YOUR APPLICATION