CalArts, USC, Ringling Top U.S. Animation School Rankings

Animation Career Review‘s 2017 list of the Top 50 Animation School Programs in the U.S. has been released, with CalArts, USC and Ringling listed as the top three ranked programs -- comprising the top 1% of schools considered -- in the country.

Animation Career Review began compiling regional and national rankings in 2012 in response to myriad requests from aspiring animators and game designers asking what the best schools were in the U.S., a given State, or in a particular area of the country. In preparing the 2017 rankings, ACR considered hundreds of schools in the U.S. that offered programs geared towards animation or game design, using a set of criteria that includes academic reputation, admission selectivity, depth and breadth of the program, value as it relates to tuition and indebtedness, and geographic location.

In 2015, ACR began to incorporate school surveys into its information gathering and evaluation process. During the 2016/17 school year, ACR reached out to every school under consideration requesting information about their specific program, as well as their perspective regarding which programs they considered to be the most impressive, both nationally and regionally.

Here are this year’s top 50 animation programs in the U.S. as ranked by Animation Career Review:

1. California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California (top 1% of schools considered)
2. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California (top 1% of schools considered)
3. Ringling College of Art and Design, Sarasota, Florida (top 1% of schools considered)
4. University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California (top 2% of schools considered)
5. School of Visual Arts, New York, New York (top 2% of schools considered)
6. Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island (top 3% of schools considered)
7. Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, Georgia (top 3% of schools considered)
8. Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York (top 4% of schools considered)
9. Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (top 4% of schools considered)
10. New York University (NYU), New York, New York (top 5% of schools considered)
11. Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah (top 5% of schools considered)
12. School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois (top 10% of schools considered)
13. Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York (top 10% of schools considered)
14. The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio (top 10% of schools considered)
15. ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, California (top 10% of schools considered)
16. Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas (top 10% of schools considered)
17. University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (top 10% of schools considered)
18. Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, Illinois (top 10% of schools considered)
19. California College of the Arts, San Francisco and Oakland, California (top 10% of schools considered)
20. University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida (top 10% of schools considered)
21. The New School/Parsons, New York, New York (top 10% of schools considered)
22. Gnomon School of Visual Effects, Hollywood, California (top 15% of schools considered)
23. Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, California (top 15% of schools considered)
24. DePaul University, Chicago, Illinois (top 15% of schools considered)
25. Chapman University, Orange, California (top 15% of schools considered)
26. Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland (top 15% of schools considered)
27. Academy of Art University, San Francisco, California (top 15% of schools considered)
28. Digipen Institute of Technology, Redmond, Washington (top 15% of schools considered)
29. Full Sail University, Winter Park, Florida (top 15% of schools considered)
30. Animation Mentor, Emeryville, California (top 15% of schools considered)
31. San Jose State University, San Jose, California (top 15% of schools considered)
32. Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California (top 20% of schools considered)
33. Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston, Massachusetts (top 20% of schools considered)
34. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (top 20% of schools considered)
35. California State University-Long Beach, Long Beach, California (top 20% of schools considered)
36. The Digital Animation & Visual Effects School (DAVE School), Orlando, Florida (top 20% of schools considered)
37. California State University-Fullerton, Fullerton, California (top 20% of schools considered)
38. Laguna College of Art and Design, Laguna Beach, California (top 20% of schools considered)
39. Woodbury University, Burbank, California (top 20% of schools considered)
40. University of Texas at Dallas, Dallas, Texas (top 20% of schools considered)
41. Columbus College of Art and Design, Columbus, Ohio (top 20% of schools considered)
42. California State University-Northridge, Northridge, California (top 25% of schools considered)
43. Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Minneapolis, Minnesota (top 25% of schools considered)
44. Drexel University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (top 25% of schools considered)
45. Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana (top 25% of schools considered)
46. Clemson University, Clemson, South Carolina (top 25% of schools considered)
47. Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, Missouri (top 25% of schools considered)
48. Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York (top 25% of schools considered)
49. Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida (top 25% of schools considered)
50. Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio (top 25% of schools considered)

For more information on each school and their offerings -- including which studios graduates have gone on to work for -- head on over to Animation Career Review’s Top 50 Animation Schools and Colleges in the U.S. – 2017, and visit the 2017 Animation School Rankings page to see the list broken up by region.

For international rankings, visit ACR’s 2017 Top 100 International Animation Schools.

Source: Animation Career Review

Formerly Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network, Jennifer Wolfe has worked in the Media & Entertainment industry as a writer and PR professional since 2003.