DAD’s first diversity update.
We’re big into transparency around here, even when the thing we’re being open about doesn’t exactly reflect us in the most positive light. The below data is truthful, even when it hurts, and as we continue to grow it is our intent to dig deeper with this report (we plan on including instructor data in 2022) and use it as a means to get better while also giving the industry as well as prospective students more insight into life at DAD.
All of the following data is based on 105 enrolled students from a little over our first two years in existence, Fall 2019 through Spring 2022.
Diversity Representation
Gender Representation
The future is female, no doubt. The majority of our students in the first two years were 61% women compared to 39% men.POC Representation
72% of them are white while 28% identify as POC. As a small school just starting out, we were grateful to have as much diversity as we did with little to no brand awareness or advertising. But yeah, the data here sucks.Race/Ethnicity
Which means there's obviously room for a lot of growth and focus here, so we need to be better in the coming years as we continue to grow..
Financial Insights
Tuition Breakdown
When we say money should not be an obstacle and we'll find a way for every student to attend DAD, this is what we mean. A little more than half our students paid full tuition, which changed four times in our first two years to keep up with our rapid growth. First at 14k, 16k, 18k, and then our current price of 27k.The other half either enrolled through our BCM grant program which is funded primarily through DAD with some outside agency funding, through an agency partner scholarship (2 were awarded in this time), or through a privately arranged deal with us that we offer to students with financial hardships.
Agency contributions in 2020 for our Black Creatvity Matters fund
Agency contributions in 2021 for our Black Creatvity Matters fund
Tuition Assistance
Our biggest diversity initiative was the launch of the Black Creativity Matters (BCM) fund, offering free tuition to all young Black creatives who were accepted to DAD. Funded in part by 10 agencies and a 100% match by DAD, we had enough in 2020 to cover the costs of admitting 10 students. The next year, however, saw only 2 agencies choose to contribute and the BCM fund was drastically slashed.Despite having no money left, we admitted 4 more students before eventually deciding in late 2021 to begin charging BCM recipients a reduced tuition cost of $12,000.
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Student Body
Origin Story
Surprising even us, 66% of our students moved from out-of-state to attend DAD. Two of our biggest pipelines came from the University of Colorado Boulder and Indiana University, two schools that are among the country's best college advertising major programs.Creative Roles
Our visual prowess was established early on as copywriters (40%) and strategists (3%) were well taken care of with the incredible design output from our art directors who made up 57% of our student body.