I am a high school sophomore who has no idea where I to go to. I want to be a graphic (maybe fashion) designer that will work up to an art director. Every time I go search up different colleges, I end up getting overwhelmed and stop looking.
MUST HAVES
.has a great program in graphic/fashion design
.medium sized school (being in a big enough space without feeling isolated or too small)
.diversity is a big thing (not an HBCU, but a diverse sense of inclusion in the student body)
.residential campus
.interships are highly available
.in a big city (for example Dallas) no suburb or rural
.a school that has good nightlife
.hopefully offer credit for AP Classes
I’m not worried about price now since I want to keep my options open. I’m not worried about regions yet, but I don’t like the extreme cold.
I’m ranked 6th in my class currently with a GPA of a 101.71
I don’t fully expect yall to find my top 5 (although that would be mighty helpful!). But how do I take this list and actually narrow down thousands of school to my top picks?
From IPEDS, these are non-profit schools offering degrees in both graphic design and fashion design, in cities (not suburbs) > 250k inhabitants, with more than 1,000 students:
239390 Mount Mary University
198950 Meredith College
110370 California College of the Arts
215099 Philadelphia University
194578 Pratt Institute-Main
168005 Suffolk University
144281 Columbia College Chicago
225627 University of the Incarnate Word
193654 The New School
212054 Drexel University
166674 Massachusetts College of Art and Design
191126 Fashion Institute of Technology
174066 University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
(The code is the IPEDS code, which makes it a lot easier to get additional data.)
If you want, I can also get you the graphic design but no fashion design and the fashion design but no graphic design lists. There are also a handful of other related commercial art classifications; I think it might be more helpful for you as a sophomore to cast a wide net, then narrow it down on other factors. For instance, a given college might have a program you really love, but call it commercial art rather than graphic design. In my experience, having a very narrow range of acceptable majors makes the list really, really short really, really fast.
Widening the list of acceptable majors produces this list:
193654 The New School
191126 Fashion Institute of Technology
144281 Columbia College Chicago
194578 Pratt Institute-Main
201885 University of Cincinnati-Main Campus
190655 CUNY New York City College of Technology
120403 Otis College of Art and Design
169442 College for Creative Studies
212054 Drexel University
215099 Philadelphia University
163295 Maryland Institute College of Art
166674 Massachusetts College of Art and Design
190664 CUNY Queens College
110583 California State University-Long Beach
202170 Columbus College of Art and Design
122597 San Francisco State University
122755 San Jose State University
110370 California College of the Arts
199193 North Carolina State University at Raleigh
145600 University of Illinois at Chicago
174066 University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
209807 Portland State University
110662 University of California-Los Angeles
167358 Northeastern University
216339 Temple University
127565 Metropolitan State University of Denver
196130 SUNY Buffalo State
138947 Clark Atlanta University
236948 University of Washington-Seattle Campus
199102 North Carolina A & T State University
204796 Ohio State University-Main Campus
144740 DePaul University
207324 Oklahoma Christian University
228875 Texas Christian University
192864 Marymount Manhattan College
168227 Wentworth Institute of Technology
110556 California State University-Fresno
211440 Carnegie Mellon University
139755 Georgia Institute of Technology-Main Campus
215105 The University of the Arts
225511 University of Houston
125897 Woodbury University
164988 Boston University
110617 California State University-Sacramento
156125 Wichita State University
122612 University of San Francisco
236577 Seattle Pacific University
225627 University of the Incarnate Word
202134 Cleveland State University
219709 Belmont University
148335 Robert Morris University Illinois
236595 Seattle University
146719 Loyola University Chicago
159656 Loyola University New Orleans
227845 Saint Edward’s University
152336 University of Saint Francis-Fort Wayne
448840 University of South Florida-St Petersburg
121309 Point Loma Nazarene University
228778 The University of Texas at Austin
112075 Concordia University-Irvine
168005 Suffolk University
198950 Meredith College
127060 University of Denver
219976 Lipscomb University
131159 American University
156286 Bellarmine University
150163 Butler University
165671 Emmanuel College
173328 Concordia University-Saint Paul
195809 St John’s University-New York
137847 The University of Tampa
242653 Inter American University of Puerto Rico-Metro
190637 CUNY Lehman College
243832 EDP University of Puerto Rico Inc-San Juan
131469 George Washington University
207582 Oral Roberts University
199412 Queens University of Charlotte
151263 University of Indianapolis
120883 University of the Pacific
199272 William Peace University
482705 Northeastern University Professional Advancement Network
181002 Creighton University
204617 Ohio Dominican University
131399 University of the District of Columbia
219833 Christian Brothers University
117627 La Sierra University
441900 Nevada State College
238193 Alverno College
114813 Fresno Pacific University
173045 Augsburg College
151786 Marian University
175005 St Catherine University
228796 The University of Texas at El Paso
225399 Houston Baptist University
131520 Howard University
134945 Jacksonville University
192439 LIU Brooklyn
193900 New York University
224147 Texas A & M University-Corpus Christi
181394 University of Nebraska at Omaha
206622 Xavier University
Sort order is by the number of kids with commercial art type majors in 2016, so the schools at the top of the list are more likely to have lots of students in your program. The majors I included are:
50.0401 Design and Visual Communications, General
50.0402 Commercial and Advertising Art
50.0404 Industrial and Product Design
50.0407 Fashion/Apparel Design
50.0409 Graphic Design
50.0499 Design and Applied Arts, Other
@OGOCLASS As a sophomore, you have plenty of time to consider schools. Many students at this point either don’t know where they want to go, or know but are going to change their mind once they start looking closely at schools.
Many of your must haves are met at a very large range of US universities (diversity, residential campus, credit for AP classes, …). If you are in a big city and at a university your chance of finding a good nightlife seems very good.
I do think that you need to take cost into consideration up front. There is a HUGE range of costs between different schools (we saw prices ranging from about $15,000/year to about $70,000 per year, total cost for everything).
I think that your criteria “has a great program in graphic/fashion design” is of course very reasonable if that is your desired major, but will narrow down the list a lot. My suggestion is that you take this plus cost as your primary criteria. I am suspecting that these two issues will help you narrow down your list to something manageable.
I think that as a potential graphic/fashion design major, you should try very hard to avoid or minimize debt for your undergrad studies.
Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) in Richmond, VA sounds just like a good choice. Richmond is a hot city. The Fan, the downtown nightlife district, is very close to campus. It is one of the better arts schools in the country (and also has a med school and is strong for pre-med). It has a diverse student body. Weather is relatively good–can be cold in winter but often not for long stretches, little snow. Only thing that appears not right up your alley is that it has an urban campus. A lot of people get turned off arriving for a visit, including one current student I know who did not want to get out of the car on their first visit and now completely loves it there. Every one we know who’s attended has really loved it. Good luck!
@TTG is right – VCU is wonderful and one of the top public art schools in the nation. Richmond is a thriving city with lots of night life and great opportunities. Also is very diverse and beautiful weather (mostly). It’s an urban campus with lots to do and see. I would recommend visiting.
Another great art school is SCAD, located in Savannah, Georgia. It’s diverse and attracts students of all areas of design. A few grads from my high school attend and absolutely love it and are thriving. I follow a girl on instagram who goes to SCAD and she has an AMAZING blog and youtube. Here’s the link if you want to check her out (she also posts about SCAD specifics on her youtube I think): http://www.allthoselittlethings.com/
Definitely check those out! Good luck & hope this helped!
I know you don’t want to worry about money just yet, but you should have a Money Talk with your parents. Lots of parents are surprised at how expensive college can be. Each college and university has a Net Price Calculator right on its website. Pick out three or four places including at least one public college/university in your home state, rustle up your parents’ preferred adult beverages and a box of very soft tissues (tears often are involved), and help your parents run the NPCs. They will whine and fuss and tell you it is too soon, but be brave and strong. Your parents need this information as much, if not more, than you do.
you need to seriously consider (VISIT) VCUARTS in Richmond , VA . D attends is a GD with an intent to be a fashion GD. The program has been great for her plus Richmond is a cool artsy town. It also happens to be the #2 ranked program in the country behind only Yale for mfa. So much going on there. Check it out.