Graduate Profile: Rebecca Miller
For Rebecca Miller ’09, the smell of printing inks and light axle grease wafting in daily from the printing press floor are the scents of her dream career.
After graduating from Alma College, she followed her passion—and her nose—to Boxcar Press, the largest letterpress printing company in the country, where she is a pre-press professional. She also is a freelance illustrator.
Rebecca Miller ’09
“I am smitten with preparing press-friendly layouts and illuminating design, technical and printing solutions,” she says. “I also enjoy the challenge of finding the balance between both the creativity of a graphic designer and the technical practicality of pre-press.”
Going from growing up and attending school in Michigan to living and working in New York might seem like a jump, but Miller was no stranger to the state. While studying art and design at Alma, she interned at both Welcome Books and Rappy & Co. in New York City.
“Both internships balanced out a thirst for practical design experience with a firsthand look at the publishing and graphic design boutique industries,” she says. “Attention to detail, craftsmanship and ingenuity were skills that I honed during this time and still carry to this day.”
Miller also honed time management skills at Alma while participating in the International Club, Pine River Anthology, WQAC 90.9 FM and Kappa Pi, the art honorary. She says Alma offered exactly what she needed, but not in the way she thought she did.
“I was immediately drawn to the intensive academic and practical application-centered experience at Alma,” she says. “There are never identical experiences while attending Alma, and that’s the real secret to why students at the school become so successful after graduation.”
