1. The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art
The Cooper Union is our pick for the best undergraduate art school in the United States for many reasons: it has great programs, affordable tuition, and notable retention and graduation rates, not to mention a stellar location.
Located in the heart of the East Village in New York City, Cooper Union offers undergraduate programs in architecture, fine art, and engineering. The BFA in Fine Arts include studies in drawing, film and video, graphic design, painting, photography, and more. Students are able to exhibit their work at the Cooper Gallery and can see excellent art exhibitions throughout the city at world class institutions including the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Brooklyn Museum, The Whitney Museum of American Art, the New Museum, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It’s hard to beat a New York school with such a great program that is also located in a city that is arguably the art capital of the world.
Not to mention, Cooper Union is among the most affordable options compared to other New York schools that we researched. While the school is on track to restore its, historically offered, full-tuition scholarships for all undergraduate students by 2029 (a plan it kicked off in 2016), it currently charges tuition. With a small student body of 899 undergraduates, and an overall price tag of $46,820, every student receives an average grant aid package of $39,305. Cooper Union offers many art-based scholarships from various organizations including the Creative Capital Foundation, Creative Time Fellowships, Ford Foundation, and Pollock-Krasner Grants.
In terms of diversity, the undergraduate population is 31% Asian, 5% Black or African American, 12% Hispanic/Latino, and 28% White.
The school is very selective, with an acceptance rate of 22%. And those that do attend Cooper Union tend to stay there: we found that 93% of first-year students return and 83% of students graduate within eight years. Notable Alumni include Daniel Arsham, Wangechi Mutu, Elizabeth Diller, Lee Krasner, Daniel Libeskind, Shigeru Ban, Augusta Savage, and Alex Katz.
