NSCAD University is a public art and design university in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia, founded in 1887.
NSCAD University is a public institution governed in accordance with the University Act of Nova Scotia. It operates with a bicameral governance system, with a Board of Governors and a Senate. The university is located at 5163 Duke Street, Halifax, NS B3J 3J6, Canada. NSCAD describes itself as Canada's longest standing specialist art and design university.
NSCAD owes its existence to educator Anna Leonowens, who relocated to Halifax after her years in Asia. In 1887, Anna Leonowens, Helen Furniss Kenny, and sisters Ella and Eliza Ritchie founded the Victoria School of Art and Design. In 1925, under the direction of the school's first female principal, Elizabeth Styring Nutt, it was renamed the Nova Scotia College of Art and incorporated by the Provincial charter. In 1969 it was renamed the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (NSCAD), and it gained degree-granting status. In 2002 NSCAD acquired the Academy Building, adjacent to the Halifax Citadel fortress.
NSCAD's mission is to nurture transformative experiences that challenge conventional thinking through art, craft, design and media. Its vision is to ignite and spread creative innovation across the world. Students have been shaping art, design and craft in Canada since 1887.
NSCAD has one campus with three sites in downtown Halifax: the Fountain Campus, the Academy Campus, and the Port Campus. Listed facilities include computer labs, the NSCAD University Library, the Visual Resources Collection (VRC), the Anna Leonowens Gallery, fabrication shops, shops and studios, and the Writing Resource Centre. The Library is Atlantic Canada's largest academic resource centre dedicated to research and creative practice in fine arts, craft, design, and art history.
According to its Why Study page, NSCAD had 854 undergraduate students and 55 graduate students. In 2020-21 NSCAD was awarded its first CRC Tier 1. Undergraduate applications are submitted via Slideroom, and applicant routes include first-year foundation high school applicants, International Baccalaureate Diploma applicants, CEGEP / Quebec applicants, and General Certificate of Secondary Education applicants.