Students in the Visiting Student Program participate in course offerings at appropriate levels as regular full-time students. There are no majors, defined courses of study or required courses. Students choose their own curriculum (with the assistance of advisors) to achieve their individual artistic goals and areas of interests.

Student Life
Visiting students are fully incorporated into the student body at the Museum School. All services offered to matriculated students are made available to visiting students, including: orientation program, housing assistance, student activities, visiting artist lectures, New York City bus trips, student groups, and more.

Upon depositing, all visiting students are issued a school e-mail account to facilitate communication of important information. Read more about student life.

Courses
The curriculum offers beginner, intermediate, and advanced courses in the following disciplines:

Animation
Ceramics
Drawing
Film
Glass
Metal/Jewelry
Painting
Performance
Photography
Printmaking
Sculpture
Sound Art
Text and Image Arts
Video

The content of individual course offerings ranges in varying degrees from conceptual, to technical, to critical theory and professional practices.

Please note: students at the Museum School are not guaranteed dedicated studio space. Studios are limited and must be petitioned for at pre-registration or the start of the academic term. Space is usually reserved in studios each term for advanced students who are new to the School.

Course Loads
Courses are offered as 'one block' (morning or afternoon) or 'two blocks' (full-day), depending upon the length, nature, and content of the class; a block is comprised of one three-hour period of studio instruction. Full time students are expected to complete 7 blocks of studio coursework per semester for which they are eligible to receive 14 credits at their Review Board. International students are required by U.S. Federal law to attend full time. All work from the term is presented at the Review Board and credit is awarded as a block based upon the entire body of work completed; credits are not issued for individual classes or coursework; the Museum School does not award letter grades.

Visiting students receive a transcript and Review Board record at the end of each semester. Students should receive prior approval from their home institution to ensure credit transfer will be accepted before applying to the SMFA.

Awarding of Credit: Review Boards
The Review Board is the culmination of each student's entire semester's work. It is the student's only opportunity to present the accumulated work of one semester to be assessed for studio credits. Each student is allotted a one-and-one-half-hour time slot, during which two instructors and two student reviewers evaluate the student's work. The student being reviewed participates fully in the evaluation. During the review, each student is given advice and criticism on the work presented. At the end of the review, the faculty review team assigns full, partial, or no credits. A written evaluation from all four reviewers is placed in the student's permanent Review Board file. In addition to attending one's own Review Board, all students having a Review Board are required to sit on the Review Boards of two other students.