CLINTON — EskoArtwork has made a $1.2 million donation in software and training to Clinton Community College's Graphic Arts Technology Program – part of the Eastern Iowa Community Colleges.

The Clinton Community College Graphic Arts Technology Program has expanded their program to offer packaging design as an important part of their curriculum, and Esko’s donation will allow students in the Graphic Arts Technology Program to create virtual mockups of their packaging designs.

CCC President Karen Vickers commented, “We are very excited to receive this donation from EskoArtwork; this is an incredible gift and we are so honored to be the recipient of the software.  The software will allow our students to gain additional skills that will serve them well in the workplace.  Our faculty have done an amazing job of expanding the curriculum and working with a software package that is used in so many packaging industries.  It is a credit to our faculty that this gift came to CCC.  We are looking forward to putting the software to use this fall and watching our students work with it.“

Esko is the worldwide market leader with software for artwork creation, structural design, pre-production, workflow automation, quality assurance and online collaboration.

Instructors Pat Cheak and Christopher Legel will introduce the software this fall to students in the Graphic Arts program. Cheak commented, “The internet has had a big impact on commercial printing and forced the consolidation of many sectors of the industry except packaging. All of the products that needed to be packaged in 1980 still need to be packaged today. The packaging industry is strong and in need of skilled workers. The Esko Studio suite is a unique set of tools for 3D packaging design made specifically for packaging artwork professionals. Studio will help you produce better artwork. Whether you are a designer trying out different ideas, or a prepress operator checking a back-match, with Studio you are virtually holding the pack in your hands.”

Cheak explained that Studio is also a powerful communication tool, “It lets you create exciting 3D visuals to show to the client, ranging from PDF files with 3D content to movies, or a virtual packshot. Other 3D tools can be complicated. It can take hours to model and render an image. Studio is fast and easy, because it integrates with your tools (like Adobe® Illustrator®), it works with your data and speaks the language of packaging.”

CCC Dean Ron Serpliss echoed the excitement of having this unique opportunity for CCC students.  “Esko solutions support and manage the packaging and print processes at brand owners, retailers, designers and packaging manufacturers.  We are one of the few colleges that they are supporting. Ninety percent of all packaging done in the world uses their software somewhere in the workflow from design to production. Our students will leave here with a set of skills that no other students within a few hundred mile radius will have and make them more valuable to employers in the packaging industry.”

In the summer of 2010 Cheak and Legel attended the International Graphic Arts Educators Association IGAEE Convention held at Illinois State University.  The presentation by Esko about their software and opportunities in packaging was impressive and they felt it would be a good fit into the CCC program. The instructors talked about adding a class in Packaging Design and decided to research Esko’s position in the packaging industry.

Cheak started integrating Packaging Design into classes and found that the printers were not big enough to print some student projects on one piece of paper. Serpliss was supportive of the packaging program as many CCC students had won awards but were limited in what they could do because of the printers.

With the purchase of the 44” Epson Printer in the summer of 2011, the program could print the students’ designs.

Cheak met with representatives of Esko at Graph Expo in Chicago in October of 2011 and asked them about donating their software to CCC and worked closely with them through the Spring of 2012 to finalize the details.

Part of their donation also included four days of training in their American headquarters in Miamisburg, Ohio, during May 2012.

For more information, contact the college at 563-244-7001.