Columbia can be an excellent experience, but one must be extremely self-motivated and willing to work if one wants to succeed here. Do not attend Columbia expecting a proper art school, you will not find it. Columbia serves as more of a somewhat creative trade school, especially with regard to the film school. If you're looking to get a good, well-paying, non-creative job in the film industry, especially in Los Angeles, Columbia and the contacts it provides will serve you very well. But if you have dreams of directing shorts or features outside of college, or receiving a top-tier education in theory, spending a large amount of your time studying and discussing less practical but much more interesting aspects of the art, this school is not for you.
I'm thankful for the lessons I've learned at Columbia, but given the chance to go back, I would have chosen a more art/theory based school
Columbia College is a great school to go to if you want to learn from teachers who are actually working in the field. Since it focuses so heavily on the arts, especially film, television, theater and dancing, evaluations and tests are project oriented instead of paper driven. Teachers at Columbia must be currently working in their fields. It is also a great school to go to if you want to make connections and network before graduating. They offer great internship programs that help most students secure jobs after they graduate. If I had to do it over, I would have gone to Columbia again, however I would have taken more advantage of the internship experiences offered. Also, it is important to network heavily with students in your classes because this also will help you with future jobs as well.