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Examples of Art Program Mission Statements

Skidmore College
Mission and Goals Statements for the Studio Art Major

The studio art program offers a rich and diverse range of investigations across the disciplines of art making and art history. Integrating extensive liberal arts offerings with a broad studio experience, majors choose to balance exploration with focus in a particular area as preparation for graduate school or future work in an art-related field. Critical thinking, imaginative problem solving, and self-reflective evaluation are key components in the development of the theoretical and technical aspects of art making. Through art courses students gain competency in visual language, an increasingly important skill in contemporary culture. Visual and verbal analytical and organizational skills learned in the studio apply to thoughtful practice in many arenas of our complex world.

California State University at Los Angeles
The Mission of the Department of Art

The mission of the Department of Art is to serve the needs of an urban and diverse university community by providing courses in a liberal arts foundation and in undergraduate and graduate programs in art that are designed to prepare students for careers in various professional fields or for further study in visual art and as lifelong producers or consumers of art.

Tisch School of the Arts, NYU

The mission of the undergraduate film and television department is to educate our students in the art, craft, and technology of film, television video, animation and sound production. Our program offers intensive hands-on production experience coupled with a broad exposure to the liberal arts. We nurture individual talent and skills, and encourage students to become creative, and thoughtful practitioners in the world of media.

Brigham Young University
Department of Visual Arts

The mission of the Department is to promote excellence in the creation, appreciation, and education of the visual arts. The Department offers a distinctive blending of the intellectual, the aesthetic, the ethical, and the spiritual through study of the various visual arts disciplines that is in keeping with the mission and aims of Brigham Young University and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Department affirms the importance of art in life and society and acknowledges its role in facilitating understanding of the human experience. The Department believes that the visual arts can be an exploration of ideas, a dialogue with cultures and traditions both past and present, and can involve the expression, communication and reception of spiritual values.

The Department of Visual Arts, through its unique orientation to creative and scholarly contributions, is dedicated to the belief that “The Glory of God is Intelligence.”

University of Hawaii at Hilo
Art Department

The Art Major (B.A.) Program in the College of Arts and Sciences in the University of Hawaii at Hilo wasinaugurated in January 1986.The B.A. Program in Art is based upon the creative, experimental, and developmental aspects of art. The programprovides students with an understanding of the history of art, the role of art as an expression of our cultural heritage,and of the practice of art in the studio environment with an emphasis on drawing, printmaking, and painting. Theprogram offers opportunities for students, the university, and the community to experience attitudes and forms ofvisual art in regional, national, and international contexts.

University of South Florida
College of Visual and Performing Arts

The college mission is to provide a broad and thorough education dedicated to:

developing professional excellence in those who are interested in a career in the arts;
fostering a high level of aesthetic understanding in those preparing to teach; and
enriching the life and overall cultural environment of the community.

(This statement is periodically reviewed and modified in keeping with the on-going search for excellence by the college and the university.)

Howard University

The Department of Art at Howard University is committed to defining and shaping an evolving, creative language system of visual art, multimedia and interactive design. This visual language system, its grammar and syntax, calls for a synergy of image, text, sound and movement. Through effective visual information design, the Art Department's strengths lie in the faculty's ability to interpret and communicate the quality and quantity of thought across disciplines and to the general public. We view the College of Arts and Sciences as a microcosm of the African American and global community, defined by its intellectual and core values exposed in leadership, research, critical analysis and service.

The challenge for The Department of Art is to create a program of study that is anchored in traditional art media and flexible enough to keep pace with the tempo of change and embrace new media and technologies. In addition, our students experiences in the General Education curriculum, backed by the University Core values will position them as visual design research leaders, able to serve their local and global communities.

Carthage College, WI
Art/Graphic Design Department

The art program serves three purposes:

To acquaint students with fundamental concepts of design, materials and tools of the fine arts and crafts;
to allow students to develop skills in controlling media and to work creatively according to their individual abilities;
to give students a general background in artistic traditions that will inform them of the creative products of this and other ages.

The program serves four types of students:

non-majors wishing to expand their knowledge through contact with art media and art theory in studio and/or lecture;
art majors wishing to prepare for graduate study in studio areas and/or for careers as professional artists;
art majors wishing to prepare for graduate study in art history;
major in graphic design.

College of Arts and Media Design
Graphic Design

The Graphic Design Program is a pre-professional career preparation program that helps students excel in:

Developing unique, innovative, and effective solutions to design problems.
Clearly communicating concepts and solutions.
Understanding philosophies, theories, and terminology of design.
Rendering, executing, and producing design.
Presenting concepts and solutions orally and in writing.
Developing high standards of professional practice.

Kansas State University
Department of Apparel, Textiles, and Interior Design

The Department of Apparel, Textiles, and Interior Design's mission is to offer instructional, research, and extension programs of the highest quality for undergraduate and graduate students in apparel, textiles, interior design and housing which-

Teach through innovative pedagogy and experiential learning, problem-solving, critical thinking, and ethical practice skills, as well as the technical knowledge required for advancement in their chosen professions.

Create new knowledge, products, and processes to advance the human condition relative to apparel, other textile products, interior design and housing.

Facilitate broad public access to knowledge, and build strong bridges with business and industry in apparel, textiles, interior design, and housing.

Instill a life-long commitment to learning and public service.

Florida State University
Department of Art

The Master of Fine Arts is considered to be a terminal academic degree for studio artists. The curriculum offers the student the discipline, training and artistic understanding required for life as a practicing artist. It is designed to develop the student’s capabilities for creative thinking and a sense of open inquiry, together with a thorough awareness of the multiplicity of new and traditional principles. Such capabilities may further enable an artist to make a valuable contribution as a teacher or arts administrator, should those vocations be future goals. Graduate students are chosen on the basis of artistic accomplishment and potential, evidence of conscientious work habits and sense of commitment.

Michigan University at Flint
Art Department Assessment Plan, May 2001
Bachelor of Science in Art Education

The Art Department seeks to offer a curriculum emphasizing analytical processes and competency in art techniques such that the art student becomes, to some extent, a viewer, creator, communicator, theorist, and historian. This curriculum prepares students with knowledge necessary for activity as creators of art, and as artists in related fields, such as art education, exhibition coordinating/curating and criticism.

Linfield College
Art Department

The faculty members of the Department of Art seek to provide technical, historical, and philosophical instruction in the visual arts. Linfield students may elect to major in studio art, or to minor in studio art or art history. In addition, art history courses and lower-division studio courses will introduce various aspects of the visual arts to students seeking to fulfill the requirements of the Linfield Curriculum. We are committed to instilling visual and conceptual literacy, and to providing the technical and intellectual skills necessary as a foundation for a wide variety of careers in the fine and applied arts. A major goal of the faculty, as practicing artists and scholars, is to impart an understanding of the life-long vitality of artistic development and practice.