Elena Manferdini, Graduate Programs Chair
David Ruy, Postgraduate Programs Chair

ADMISSIONS CONTACT Angel Montes, Director of Admissions

SCI-Arc is an internationally renowned center of design innovation and one of the country’s few independent architecture schools. Offering undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate programs, SCI-Arc teaches architects to engage, speculate, and innovate, to take the lead in reimagining the limits of architecture.

The school was founded in 1972 as an alternative educational model that approached architectural education from a more experimental perspective than what schools offered at the time and continues its commitment to finding radically new responses to contemporary needs and aspirations. 

At the graduate level, SCI-Arc offers a professional Master of Architecture degree and five specialized Master of Science degrees. 

SCI-Arc’s Master of Architecture degree (M.Arch) is awarded to students completing the 3-year M.Arch 1 program or 2-year M.Arch 2 program. Both M.Arch programs are accredited by the National Architectural Accrediting Board, allowing graduates to pursue architectural licensure in the United States. 

M.Arch 1 is open to applicants who hold a bachelor’s degree in any field. Central to the program’s philosophy is a firm commitment to design excellence and building an intellectual understanding of the history, theory, technology, and professional practice of architecture. 

M.Arch 2 builds upon knowledge gained from undergraduate degrees in architecture, exposing students to the latest architectural theories and design methodologies for developing alternative contemporary design languages. 

MS in Architectural Technologies students develop entrepreneurial projects that connect advanced topics in computational research with innovations in machine vision, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, and platform design.

The MS in Design of Cities expands architectural design into urban and infrastructural problems through a collective studio research model.

MS in Fiction and Entertainment students work with professionals in film, animation, and game design to shape their individual creative practices.

The MS in Synthetic Landscapes examines how to integrate artificial and natural systems into innovative models of landscape practice that actively engage climate change.

MS in Design Theory and Pedagogy students produce new forms of architectural scholarship and gain hands-on teaching experience that expand the scope of architectural pedagogy.

Degrees Offered

Master of Architecture (M.Arch 1 and M.Arch 2)

MS in Fiction & Entertainment
MS in Architectural Technologies
MS in Design of Cities
MS in Design Theory & Pedagogy

MS in Synthetic Landscapes