Look at their alumni list. Ringling has people who actually do art for a living. SCAD's high placement rating comes from hiring their own grads in admin positions.

Picking a school depends a lot on what you want to do, what you want out of it, etc...

If you're not sure what you want, that's okay too. But you should have a some ideas of what areas you think you'd like. And keeping that in mind when deciding on a school. Or you could waste a lot of time and money.

One of my housemates switched majors six times after his third year as a physics major. He changed to creative writing, because he wanted to be a science fiction author, then a teacher told him he was passionless and devoid of any imagination, so he changed to technical writing because he thought somehow it would allow him to keep the writing dream alive, while not having to hear teachers tell him he was too much of an emotionless robot and couldn't do it, then when that was too hard for him, he switched to a Math major just to graduate finally because it was the easiest major to do with most of the credits he had with his original Physics major.

The guy ended up taking six years to get a bachelors degree in MATH that he never used because he ended up making a career out of his work-study job in the college admissions office. Applying for the first paying assistant clerk gig they had available, and never left.

Ok...here's where I am.

I'm currently at the junior college who's art dept. has a better rep than the actual University out here.

I'm a double major which includes going for an A.A.S Degree in Graphic Design and an Art. A.A. degree so I can continue on towards a bachelors. A good amount of the clases cross over so that's why I chose becoming a double major.

Now there's talk and it's pretty damn near possible talk about my school becoming accredited to start a Bachelors degree in Graphic Design.

While S.C.A.D and Ringling, but mostly SCAD is the hot school most people transfer to, and a good amount of the faculty have graduated from there, that's a big move for me with a family of four, not to mention alot of what Allen here has described. He's not the only one to have reservations about SCAD. A few other alumni's have mentioned, you get what you put in there, and if you really want the teachers to push you and not just pass you, you gotta let them know. That's a concern. I don't want a degree just handed to me. I want to get better as an artist and know I worked my way to the top for that piece of paper.
I'm having strides right now at my current drawing 2 class. I tend to stand out. I've joked often that I have to put my work on the internet here and post on message boards to get more of a scathing critique because there's a hundred more cats who tend to draw better than I do, that also have no reservations about telling me if my stuff sucks.

SCAD has a few degrees programs that I think I'd enjoy taking and would do well in, (keeping in mind, I'd have to push myself). Job wise? I don't know how often does Cartoon Network or a company like that recruit out of there?

I wouldn't mind character conceptual design...story boards, or even animation.

I need to bone up on my photoshop skills to really give an honest opinion on the digital aspect of art though.

I like making characters, telling stories about those characters and I want to get paid to do it.

Did any of that make sense?

If you're interested in animation, if you haven't already, why not try to track down artists who work on the shows you like, I'm sure a lot of them are online somewhere, website or have a blog or a gallery.

See where they went to school or ask them what schools they'd recommend.

I just ran across a guy on deviantART who worked on Ben10 the other day and I know there are a lot more. Sites like deviantART or Linked in are pretty good for tracking down pros for advice, you can contact them through the site, and some list the schools and work experience on their profiles.

Couldn't hurt. Might even get some good contacts in the industry.

Good advice thanks! I'm on deviant art, just haven't had anything to put on my deviant page I thought was decent enough.

I'm Dorkpimp on there btw.

And that's the reality!

CIA is $28,100, SAIC is $34,100

Point is, you could go to a real art school in NYC or LA for the same money SCAD wants. It was only (only!) fifteen grand a year when I went and I felt ripped off.

Unless you've got someone else paying for it, I guarantee you will regret going to SCAD.

Yeah, but the cost of living in NYC or LA would be ridiculous. Don't they have art schools in Jamaica? Or Mexico, I bet the cost of living in Mexico is pretty low. The burgers there are amazing! Really fresh beef.