About

SCAD Rising Star is a four-week, credit-bearing pre-college program for current high school juniors (rising seniors only), offered at SCAD's Savannah and Atlanta locations, running June 28–July 24, 2026. Students live in a SCAD residence hall and eat in a SCAD dining hall for the duration of the program.

Each student takes two courses — one SCADcore (general education or foundation studies) course and one major-specific elective — selected from separate course catalogs for the Atlanta and Savannah locations. Course placement follows submission of the program fee and seat availability, not guaranteed preference, so an admitted student's stated first choice isn't assured. Classes include demonstrations, lectures, studio work, and local field trips, with full access to SCAD's studios, computer labs, and libraries, plus Adobe Creative Cloud software; photography students must supply their own digital camera (minimum 6.1 megapixels), and all students buy their own course-specific supplies after arrival. Successful completion earns 10 quarter credit hours, transferable to SCAD or another accepting institution at that institution's discretion. Students who finish with a cumulative program GPA of 3.0 or higher may be considered for SCAD undergraduate admission (contingent on submitting standard first-year application materials); a GPA below 3.0 may affect future admission and scholarship consideration. High-performing students may also be invited into SCAD's joint enrollment track afterward, allowing up to 25 additional quarter credit hours before matriculating.

Admission requires a completed online application, a $100 nonrefundable application fee, an official transcript through the first term of junior year, a personal or phone interview, and proof of English proficiency for non-native speakers (a letter of recommendation and statement of purpose may be requested as supplemental materials). For 2026, applications opened September 1, 2025, with account balances due May 29, 2026. Total cost for the residential program is $6,620: $4,680 tuition, $1,590 for housing and meals, and a $250 program fee, on top of the separate $100 application fee. SCAD is test-optional, so SAT/ACT scores are not required at any stage of this process.

Rising Star suits a student who has already settled on art, design, or a related creative field and wants a genuine trial run of studio-based college coursework — two real classes, real credit, real GPA consequences — rather than a single sampler workshop. Its single-eligibility-year design (juniors only) and its direct pipeline into SCAD admission and joint enrollment make it a more consequential, higher-stakes credential than most pre-college design offerings, closer in weight to Boston Architectural College's UDP Studio than to a one-week exploratory camp.