For students considering enrolling to study design and graphic design there are important considerations to grapple with, not just thoughts of future pay cheques.

Ms Willhemina Wahlin, lecturer in graphic design in the School of Communication and Creative Industries at CSU in Port Macquarie said mentoring, problem-solving, and thinking about the role design plays in making a better, more sustainable world should be at the heart of design education.

"What is absolutely key is the contribution you make to the world with design and the ethics within your work," Ms Wahlin said.

Her observations follow comments by Mr Mike Monteiro, a visiting US designer who co-founded the Mule design agency in San Francisco and is addressing the 2016 Above All Human technology and design conference in Melbourne on Friday 29 January.

"I think Mike Monteiro has made some excellent points about both the expectations of what emerging designers are capable of and what recruiters are asking them to do, as well as, on the other end of the scale, what kind of steps designers need to take in their careers," Ms Wahlin said.

"Design is an incredibly diverse and exciting field to get into, but it's really important to remember that what designers do is solve problems, creatively. It's challenging and overwhelming at times, but it's seldom dull and you never stop learning."

Ms Wahlin said that in her specific discipline of graphic design, practitioners are really interested in effective communication, so their problem-solving tends to focus less on product design, for example, and more on representation.

"In our graphic design degree course, we understand that our students are going to need a good range of knowledge in the history of design practice and theory, as well as theories of visual communication, and how to apply these into their own project-based learning," she said.

"It's important that we present more possibilities to students in terms of what they can do with design in the future. We look at issues of sustainability in design and representations of communities, and these can really broaden the scope of thinking and ethical foundations of the people who will become the designers of the future."

Ms Wahlin said by offering students the opportunity to explore and learn through a wide variety of projects they can begin to identify which area of design they'd like to move into.

"Even within graphic design, students and practitioners have so many fields and options available to them," she said.

"I urge my students to be realistic about what they can achieve and learn through their purposefully selected projects, rather than becoming overwhelmed by all of the possibilities at once. Having said that, sometimes a random ramble along the path to learning can be really fruitful­ - you just need to know when to reign it in!

"That doesn't mean that you should be afraid to jump in at the deep end sometimes too. Give a monster project a go! Some of the scariest projects I've said 'yes' to have changed my life, and steered me into a field of design that I truly love. It's really a great thing to love what you do, and know that it also makes a difference."

Ms Wahlin designed the exhibition Unearthed: Stories of Courage in the Face of Sexual Violence for the New York-based non-profit organisation PROOF: Media for Social Justice, which opened in New Delhi in December 2015 and is touring India in 2016.

Yesterday Ms Tania Ritchie a graphic design student in the School of Communication and Creative Industries at CSU Port Macquarie was announced as the winner of the 'Arts and Education' category of the 2015 Pearson Student of the Year Awards. You can view Ms Ritchie's award winning video clip on YouTube.