The Department of Film and Media Arts is a top tier production and studies program, offering bachelor of arts, bachelor of fine arts master of arts, and master of fine arts degrees. With an enrollment of over 500 undergraduates and about 40 graduate students, the Department of Film and Media Arts trains engaged artists, who are also critical thinkers and scholars, attuned to the issues facing media makers.

Film and media arts projects by our students have received top prizes in every major student competition in the United States and abroad, as well as major professional recognition, including Hollywood’s coveted Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting, several Oscar nominations, and awards from both the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. Students also have received nationally competitive University Film and Video Association production grants, National Endowment for the Arts media fellowships, Eastman Kodak Scholarships, and the Princess Grace Award, among other awards.

Undergraduate Program

The undergraduate programs educate students in the development of creative and technical skills in film, video, audio, and new media, and in the theoretical understanding of film and culture. Students learn to conceptualize and craft creative work, informed by scholarship, research and personal vision. By learning independent and commercial approaches to production and theory, graduates are prepared to produce their own independent film and media arts projects, and/or to assume creative and leadership roles in the motion picture and television industries, as well as to pursue film and media arts scholarship and criticism in all of its forms. 

With an emphasis on experiental learning and internships, the Department runs a well-established and respected full semester and summer session study away program in Los Angeles, as well as offering a summer study away program in Venice.

The Bachelor of Arts degree program includes concentrations in Cinematography, Producing, Post-Production and Screen Studies. The Bachelor of Fine Arts degree program offers concentrations in Directing, Media Arts and Screenwriting. 

Graduate Program

The Master of Fine Arts program in Film and Media Arts is one of the country’s foremost programs in alternative film, video and new media. It trains filmmakers, videomakers, screenwriters and media artists to innovate artistic practices that interrogate dominant media forms. The MFA brings together students with strong creative ideas, experiences and critical depth, from diverse backgrounds and training, and provides them with critical, creative and technical skills to become professionals of the highest caliber. The program encourages openness to all media art forms, with special attention to contemporary documentary, independent narrative and works arising out of both an artistic and social consciousness. 

The Department of Film and Media Arts also offers a MA in mediaXarts: Cinema for New Technologies and Environments, a one-year 30-credit degree program.

The program also offers a certificate in Documentary Arts and Ethnographic Research and scholarly exchanges with the University of Pennsylvania.