Universities in California, and opinion on what should I do

<p>Hey! I wanted help with choosing a good school for me. I'm an international student from Brazil. I've always been undecided on what to major in, but I always leaned towards Arts. Since I moved to Los Angeles one year ago, I became more and more interested in Cinema, like being a Set Designer, Costume Designer and even being an Actress. But I never had the opportunity to try any of this things during my high school (school in Brazil is a lot different). I know that I'll probably go into Design or Theater Arts, so I wanted to know what are some good schools with these programs?
I have average grades (I studied in a really hard private school in Brazil) my SAT is 1680 (I'm going to retake) and ACT 26. I dont have many extracurriculars
I do have some schools in mind, and I wanted opinion on them and more suggestions. (Also should I go to a CC?)
CSU Long Beach
CSU Fullerton
San Diego State
CSUN
San Francisco State
DePaul
ASU</p>

<p>More suggestions? (I would like one in California, but I accept suggestions from other places)
Thanks :)</p>

<p>CSUN is a great choice…</p>

<p>CSUN, Chapman, Emerson (LA Campus). USC and UCLA may be too much of a reach if your scores don’t improve much on a retake. Try to spend some significant time with native-english speakers prior to talking the tests (and, of course, study!), they are all around you, but you may need to get out of your comfort zone to interact with them.</p>

<p>How is CSUN out of reach? Check out Fullerton College’s Theater Department…they have a huge variety of courses and a great reputation.
<a href=“http://theatre.fullcoll.edu”>http://theatre.fullcoll.edu</a></p>

<p>?? Who said CSUN is out of reach? If I were OP, I would really want to go to USC or UCLA, but they may be out of reach. Better match schools would be CSUN, Chapman, and Emerson (LA Campus). CSUN is great, beyond great, for cinematography, I do not know about set design, costume design, or acting.</p>

<p>Sorry @ItsJustSchool I didn’t see the period after the bracket. I thought it was all one sentence. Chapman is out of reach for sure.</p>

<p>Cal Arts </p>

<p>Thanks guys! Yes, I’m going to try my best to raise my scores, but I don’t know… UCLA was always my dream school, but I know I’d never get in. What about CSU Long Beach and SDSU? Are they good?</p>

<p>I’m sorry but what’s OP? @Itsjustschool</p>

<p>It’s commonly used vernacular on message boards. OP is an acronym for “Original Poster”, i.e. you, @anaclara, the person who made the original post in the thread.</p>

<p>Your scores won’t get you into SDSU; it is one of the most popular universities in the Cal State system and they are very difficult to get admission.</p>

<p>something to bear in mind- do you need to create a portfolio etc for any of these programs, and if you do - does a portfolio/interview weigh into admission as well as grades/scores. That is often the case for performance majors- idk about design majors. For example, I vividly remember a BFA student at carnegie mellon (which requires really high stats for most majors) talking about is 2.5 gpa in HS and 23 on ACT… at CMU the audition is what matters. No idea if that would be the case for UCLA or SDSU in design, but worth checking into…</p>

<p>Oh! Thanks, I’m going to search for more colleges, I thought I could have a chance in SDSU… But is it good for arts?</p>

<p>If you can get into SDSU, it would be a good place for you to go, I think. They have both BA and MFA programs in your areas of interest. Also, if it matters to you, there is a sizable Brazilian community in San Diego. But SDSU is a nationally ranked university, so you do want some other CSU options.</p>

<p>Really? Jesus! There are Brazilians everywhere haha. I thought SDSU wasn’t that good on Art Majors… I’m just open to any school, as long as it’s good. Also, should I try finding a specialized school in this field? </p>

<p>Oi Ana Clara! Eu também sou brasileira e estava numa situação parecida com a tua há dois anos atrás. Atualmente eu estudo teatro na CalArts, que é uma excelente escola tanto para performance quanto para design. Me manda uma private message se quiser trocar mais ideias e ouvir opiniões de outra brazuca que já passou por isso ;)</p>

<p>wow, milkshakespeare, that’s awesome, and guess i can read Portugese, at least well enough. Good luck Ana Clara! </p>

<p>@anaclara I’ve heard that RISD is pretty good for arts and design I think if you improve you’re sat to 1800+ you have a good chance of getting in</p>

<p>@anaclara if money is the issue try to score above 1900 and try for brigham young university its really cheap oos</p>

<p>Ana Clara, your written English is very good. however, if you are still mastering English, a CC might not be a bad starting place. i do not know enough about CCs in the Southern Cal area to know which to recommend. Even if you get into a 4 year program, if you are struggling to understand your non arts classes, that could be frustrating. Although as milkshakespeare noted, CalArts, at least i think it was CalArts, would work just fine. but that is a hard school to get into although perhaps you being from Brazil would make you a more unique applicant and help with admissions, assuiming you do well on the arts portions of your application. </p>