Animation Career Review — an online resource for aspiring professionals in animation, game design, graphic design, digital art and related fields — named Cal State Fullerton as the No. 9 School in California for Graphic Design in 2025.
CSUF ranks No. 11 on the West Coast and No. 35 among public schools in the United States. Animation Career Review also ranked CSUF No. 10 in California for animation in 2025.
CSUF’s Department of Art within its College of the Arts offers Bachelor of Fine Arts, Master of Arts, and Master of Fine Arts programs in art with a concentration in graphic and interactive design.
Animation Career Review’s 2025 Graphic Design School Rankings cited the CSUF degree program’s strengths — workshops and seminars, visiting artists, access to state-of-the-art production facilities, professional career development services, internship opportunities, and portfolio critiques by leading artists and designers.
CSUF graphic design alumni work and lead at Amazon, Nickelodeon, Lucasfilm, Saatchi & Saatchi, NBCUniversal, Apple, Disney Interactive, ABC, The Jim Henson Company, Electronic Arts (EA), Cartoon Network, PBS and the Los Angeles Times.
“What sets our program apart is the focus on ‘experience’ — whether it’s in a game interface, a digital installation, or a brand identity,” said Chen Wang, professor of art. “We guide students to use graphic design and digital art as powerful vehicles for storytelling and user engagement.”
As artificial intelligence reshapes the landscape of game design and digital art, CSUF’s program and coursework go beyond teaching technical proficiency to foster a deeply human-centric approach to graphic design, Wang said.
“We teach students that while technology evolves, the core value of design lies in empathy and human connection,” Wang said. “This philosophy prepares our graduates to not just adapt to AI, but to also harness it — ensuring that the future of interactive media remains grounded in a meaningful human experience.”
Animation Career Review’s 2025 Graphic Design School Rankings list features 695 colleges. The criteria used for their rankings include: academic reputation, admission selectivity, employment data, depth and breadth of the program faculty, value, graduation rate and retention rate. The graphic design school rankings have been published since 2015.
The company has published regional and national rankings since 2012 for aspiring animators and game designers considering degree programs in related fields.