About Us | AisAD

History

Moved by the demand from advertising and design agencies for creatives who are capable of providing innovative solutions for brands, and realizing that the paucity of professionally trained practitioners has created a vacuum that encourage unqualified persons to trade in the industry, and also concerned about the consequences of such a situation, Christian Obeng Boadi founded the Accra International School of Advertising and Design (AisAD) in 2008. This was after he had led a full-service advertising agency as the founder and CEO for close to 8 years.

To offer Ghanaians and the people of Africa a type of education that is a total shift from the academic system, Chris, as he is popularly called, travelled extensively to North and South America, Europe, South-East Asia and South Africa to abreast himself about how advertising and design institutions run. He discovered that for employers in creative industries such as advertising and design, certificates per se do not matter. Creative Portfolios are what matter to them, not just degrees. For them, portfolios determine the creativity and employability of people looking to work in the two creative fields. Degrees per se do not. So Chris settled on portfolio school concept of education instead of the academic type. The global exposure and valuable insights Chris gained as well as the expert guidance given by some heads of leading advertising and design schools in the countries he visited helped him to create educational offerings he believed would help in providing solutions to corporate Ghana’s human resource problem of mediocrity in advertising and design.

In November 2010, the business of the school started with short courses. Courses offered included graphic design, photography, motion graphics design and film making. The school’s faculty were mostly South Africans who were brought to Ghana to teach the courses. In 2011, the school rolled out 18-month and 24-month portfolio programmes which attracted students from neighbouring countries including Nigeria, Cote D’Ivoire and Burkina Faso. Classes were held at the Accra campus until early 2020 when COVID restrictions forced the school to move about 99% of them online permanently. Courses are now delivered live online by the European, South African and Ghanaian faculty. AisAD still remains Africa’s only creative portfolio school. For nearly 15 years, AisAD has been providing education that is creativity-focused, technology-driven and industry-driven which continues to attract people from the continent of Africa.

Statutory Authorization and Certification

The Ghana Education Service and Ministry of Education have approved AisAD as a post-secondary professional training institution. Due to its concept of education, it cannot offer any training programme that leads to award of certificates, diplomas and degrees. Portfolio schools don’t offer certificate, diploma and degree programmes. Students of portfolio schools leave school with creative portfolios and Certificate of Course or Programme Completion. This kind of certificate does not fall into the categories of national qualifications framework. The school obtained authorization from the statutory bodies in order to operate as an educational institution.

Leadership

Unlike academic institutions, portfolio schools operate with lean staff. The school has a three-man board that includes Chris who is also the CEO. Two administrative officers support Chris to implement the activities and policies of the school with the guidance of the board.

Instructional Philosophy

Students will be given real world challenging projects and assignments typical of the advertising and design industries. High quality is expected and students will be given the chance to redo their work until it meets assessment requirements specified during instruction. All courses develop strategic thinking, conceptual and the necessary technical skills required in providing innovative solutions for brands.

Our Promise

We are serious with students who take our courses seriously. Students who take our courses seriously and successfully complete them leave with creative portfolios that demonstrate professionalism and excellence from a professional’s perspective.