Emerson College

Quick Stats

120 Boylston Street
Boston, MA 02116-4624: [map]

Phone: (617) 824-8500

2011-2012 Tuition

$32,658: tuition and fees

Students

3,461: enrolled

40%: male /

60%: female

Admissions

Jan. 5: application deadline

47.2%: accepted

More Information

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U.S. News Rankings

Ranking score and category

U.S. News rank	Category Name
#14	Regional Universities (North)

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Summary

Emerson College is a private institution that was founded in 1880. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 3,461, its setting is urban, and the campus size is 8 acres. It utilizes a semester-based academic calendar. Emerson College's ranking in the 2012 edition of Best Colleges is Regional Universities (North), 14. Its tuition and fees are $32,658 (2011-12).

Emerson College is an urban school that focuses on writing, communications, and the liberal arts. The school offers unique majors including Writing, Literature and Publishing and Political Communication: Leadership, Politics, and Social Advocacy. Minor options include Fiction, Music Appreciation, and Business Studies for Communication and the Arts. Fittingly, the literary-focused school has a wide variety of student publications, including the Emerson Review, a literary magazine, and Gangsters in Concrete, a publication that showcases student poetry and photography. There is also a club, Undergraduate Students for Publishing, which meets to speak about career opportunities with publishing professionals. There are about 80 other student organizations, including a handful of fraternities and sororities.

Students may also get involved in Emerson College athletics, a group of teams that compete in the NCAA Division III Great Northeast Athletic Conference. Sports teams include lacrosse, basketball, volleyball, and soccer; the school does not have a football team. Freshmen and sophomores must live on campus, which puts them near Boston Common, a popular spot for relaxation and recreational activities. Notable alumni of Emerson College include talk show host Jay Leno, actor Henry Winkler, and makeup artist Bobbi Brown.

School mission (as provided by the school):

Emerson College is committed to excellence in education for communication and the arts. Since its beginning in 1880, the College has been a place for those unique students for whom thought and experience overlap: thinking is linked to doing. At Emerson, students discover their perspectives and put them to use. A rich liberal arts curriculum is paired with concentrated studies in communication sciences and the arts, giving students the perfect balance of knowledge and know-how.

Located on Boston Common in the heart of the city's Theatre District, the Emerson campus is home to WERS-FM, the oldest noncommercial radio station in Boston; the historic, 1,200-seat Cutler Majestic Theatre; and Ploughshares, the award winning literary journal for new writing. Emerson's 3,600 undergraduate and 800 graduate students come from across the United States and 45 countries. There are more than 80 student organizations and performance groups, 14 NCAA teams, student publications, and honor societies. The College also sponsors study and internship programs in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C.; study abroad in the Netherlands, Taiwan, and Czech Republic; Beijing; London; and course cross-registration with the six-member Boston ProArts Consortium.

Emerson students have access to the highest quality visual and media arts equipment, including sound-treated television studios, digital editing labs, audio post-production suites, film screening rooms, a sound stage, and a professional marketing suite/focus group room. There are seven on-campus facilities and programs to observe speech and hearing therapy, an integrated digital newsroom for aspiring journalists, and an 11-story performance and production center which houses performance and rehearsal space, a theatre design/technology center, makeup lab, and costume shop. There is a fitness center, athletic field, gymnasium and campus center. Current construction projects include the building of a permanent home in Hollywood for the College's Los Angeles study and internship program.

General Information

School type	private, coed college
Year founded	1880
Religious affiliation	N/A
Academic calendar	semester
Setting	urban
2010 Endowment	$106,328,308

Applying

When applying to Emerson College, it's important to note the application deadline is January 5, and the early action deadline is November 1. Scores for either the ACT or SAT test are due January 5. The application fee at Emerson College is $65. It is more selective, with an acceptance rate of 47.2 percent and an early acceptance rate of 61.5 percent.

For more information about the tests, essays, interviews, and admissions process, visit the Applying to College knowledge center.

Selectivity	more selective
Fall 2010 acceptance rate	47%
Application deadline	January 5
SAT/ACT scores must be received by	January 5

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Academic Life

The student-faculty ratio at Emerson College is 12:1, and the school has 64.7 percent of its classes with fewer than 20 students. The most popular majors at Emerson College include: Radio and Television; Creative Writing; Cinematography and Film/Video Production; Marketing/Marketing Management, General; and Drama and Dramatics/Theatre Arts, General. The average freshman retention rate, an indicator of student satisfaction, is 88.2 percent.

Class sizes

Student-faculty ratio

12:1

4-year graduation rate

76% - High

Five most popular majors for 2010 graduates

Radio and Television	19%
Creative Writing	17%
Cinematography and Film/Video Production	16%
Marketing/Marketing Management, General	14%
Drama and Dramatics/Theatre Arts, General	6%

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Student Life

Emerson College has a total undergraduate enrollment of 3,461, with a gender distribution of 39.6 percent male students and 60.4 percent female students. 55.0 percent of the students live in college-owned, -operated, or -affiliated housing and 45.0 percent of students live off campus. Emerson College is part of the NCAA III athletic conference.

See what students are saying about life at Emerson College.

Total enrollment	4,344
Student gender distribution

Undergraduate men who are members of a fraternity

Undergraduate women who are members of a sorority

Collegiate athletic association	NCAA III

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Campus Info & Services

Emerson College offers a number of student services including nonremedial tutoring, health service, and health insurance. Emerson College also offers campus safety and security services like 24-hour foot and vehicle patrols, late night transport/escort service, 24-hour emergency telephones, lighted pathways/sidewalks, and controlled dormitory access (key, security card, etc). Alcohol is permitted for students of legal age at Emerson College.

Students who have cars on campus	N/A
Health insurance offered	Yes
Students required to own/lease a computer	No

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Paying for School

At Emerson College, 57.9 percent of full-time undergraduates receive some kind of need-based financial aid and the average need-based scholarship or grant award is $15,444.

Paying for college doesn't have to be difficult or devastating. Go to the Paying for College knowledge center to get advice on raising cash and reducing costs.

Tuition and fees	$32,658 (2011-12)
Room and board	$13,422 (2011-12) - High
Financial aid statistics

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Student Reviews Ratings data provided by Unigo

Emerson is definitely an acquired taste. I've met a lot of kids who were unhappy here and ended up transferring, generally these were jocky or preppy kids who came here for the broadcast journalism or marketing majors and ended up horrified by the community of quirky "artsy" kids. For the most part though, people tend to find their niche pretty easily, even though they can be a little socially awkward at times. The thing is, it's such a specialized school that if you're not really 100% sure you want to do something in the film, journalism, tv production, radio, creative writing, marketing, theater, musical/dance realm, [insert creative communication field here] then this school probably won't be for you. It attracts a certain type of person--for the most part, creative, liberal types who idolize the Beat generation or the Punk generation and name-drop all sorts of obscure references not necessarily out of a desire to be elitist so much as out of a genuine enthusiasm for their chosen field of study. Kids here are really passionate about the subject they're pursuing....even the "so called" druggy stoners get *** done.

Anonymous Senior

The best thing about Emerson is that you can someone to collaborate with on anything you can think of, whether it's music, film, writing, a community service project- anything. The one thing I would change is the fact that Visual Media Arts majors can only have one concentration and can't double major. Emerson is a very small school. I like that there's a relatively small number of students, because it's easier to form connections and network, but you do have to be willing to venture a little further out into the city on your own, because the "campus" is tiny. I spend most of my time on campus in a dorm building. There really isn't an on-campus hangout, but there are plenty of places right off of campus, like the Common, which is just across the street. Boston isn't the biggest city ever, but unless you're from New York or LA, you'll probably find that you have plenty of options of things to do in your free time. There are several movie theatres in the area, the Aquarium, Fenway Park, tons of affordable restaurants, Newbury Street and plenty of other shopping, and some pretty good concert venues. There tends to be a lot of school pride. The Orientation Leaders are great about making incoming students enthusiastic about the school, and the few people that really aren't proud to be at Emerson are pretty much the ones not coming back Sophomore year (and that's not a lot).

Danielle Freshman

I transfered to Emerson College in 2007. The process of transfer was very difficult. As a transfer, you are forced to sign up for semester classes after the entire school has been given the chance to design their schedules. This made it impossible to take anything outside of broad requirements for my first semester. The film department/visual media arts department seems to be saturated with students. Though this makes for a good community of working film students (there are always student film shoots to work on), it makes it impossible for the school to meet any equipment needs.

Ben Sophomore

More student reviews

* Overview details based on 2010 data

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Summary

General Information

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