Preparing Talent For Opportunity: About the Building

“The arrival of digital technologies has transformed every aspect of communications and media – from making movies to making music. The new building for the School of Media Arts will make Santa Barbara City College one of the most advanced and prestigious digital arts programs in the country. Having a center devoted to emerging digital arts occupations is good for our students, good for the College, good for the community and good for the economy.”
— Kevin Costner, Honorary Chair

Profoundly Connected Like Never Before
The School of Media Arts and Santa Barbara City College now have an incredible opportunity to construct a 65,000 square-foot unified, state-of-the-art building to locate the community of digital arts media together at last. Currently, various departments are scattered throughout the campus. Housing all the concentrations together will generate synergies, make possible an interdisciplinary approach, and optimize use of the latest equipment. Students specializing in creating, importing, manipulating, and exporting text and graphics will converge and intersect in dynamic new collaborations, with cost efficiencies.

Strengthening Our Community
There is remarkable engagement between the College and the community, a bond between students and faculty that translates to civic pride and success. Local businesses partner with us – 85 participate in the Media Arts department alone – to offer student internships that integrate book learning with hands-on skills. This facility has the potential to make the South Coast a hub of new media economic activity.

Features of the New Building
•  LEED certification –Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
•  160-seat state-of-the-art film exhibition theater and lecture hall
•  Photography studios, digital dark rooms and print labs
•  Digital arts gallery and open lab
•  Digital media classrooms
•  Sound Stage
•  Editing Suites
•  Television broadcast studio
•  Audio recording studio
•  Journalism news room
•  Faculty Resource Center
•  CAD studio

The Future is Here
Rapid advances in technology have made us an increasingly networked society where access to communications technology is critical to success. Santa Barbara City College had the foresight to combine disciplines that were formerly separate by establishing the School of Media Arts in 2001.

The School of Media Arts is one of the premier programs in California for communication arts and technologies. The popularity of the School of Media Arts – over 2600 students enroll annually – is correlated to our graduates’ immediate and realistic path to employment. Graduates have worked for Lucasfilm, NBC, ABC, Disney, and Newsweek among many others. Our students are at the forefront of the digital revolution, a vast opportunity waiting to be fully realized.

Here, students learn:
•  Journalism
•  Photography
•  Graphic Design
•  Film & TV Production
•  Film Studies
•  Game Design & Simulation
•  Web Design
•  CAD (Computer Aided Design)
•  3D Animation
•  Audio Production

For more information on how you can support the School of Media Arts campaign,
please contact the Foundation for SBCC at (805) 730-4401.