NYU Tisch Special Programs Dramatic Writing Summer High School Program

Tisch takes current high school sophomores and juniors who are at least 15 when they apply and have at least a 3.0 cumulative GPA on a 4.0 unweighted scale, and it gives preference to juniors. Freshmen and seniors can't apply. If your school doesn't calculate a GPA, you estimate your own on a 4.0 scale and Tisch checks it against your transcript. Homeschooled students have the parent in charge of their schooling email a record of their coursework instead.

Places are tight. Tisch receives more than 800 applications across all its summer high school tracks and admits about 24 students to Dramatic Writing. The tracks offer about 313 places between them, so fewer than 2 in 5 applicants get in overall, although Tisch doesn't publish odds for each track. It says the most competitive applications include every component, and it strongly recommends against using AI tools in your answers.

• Written responses

  Three answers of up to 250 words each, plus any prompts specific to Dramatic Writing.

• Creative résumé

  Your training, awards, projects, community service and work, with links to your writing or other work if you have them.

• Transcript

  Grades for every year of high school as a PDF, including fall 2026 grades if they're available.

• Two recommendations

  At least one has to come from a high school representative, and Tisch suggests giving recommenders one to two weeks.

• English proficiency

  A test score if English isn't your native language, unless you've had three or more consecutive full-time years of schooling taught only in English.

Classes run Monday to Friday, 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., in two three-hour blocks, one of playwriting and one of screenwriting, with a lunch break in between. The group is split into two sections that swap subjects between morning and afternoon, and the screenwriting course also brings in guest lecturers in TV writing and holds several film story analysis sessions.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays you have dinner at 5:00 p.m., meet the program assistants at 6:00 and head out for a theater night from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. in weeks one to three. In week four those evenings become rehearsals for the final showcase on the last Friday. Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings are free, and everyone is back by the 11 p.m. curfew. Weekends are set aside for assignments and writing, and Tisch warns that evenings and weekends are often as busy as class time. This timetable is a sample from previous summers, and admitted students get their actual schedule at orientation.

Both courses are taught by working writers from the Rita and Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing. Summer Screenwriting is led by Joe Vinciguerra, an associate arts professor and the department's chair, who wrote the films Mall (2014) and Machine, Learning (2023), co-wrote Don't Go In The Woods (2011) and is a member of the Writers Guild of America.

Summer Playwriting is led by William Electric Black, also known as Ian Ellis James, who won seven Emmy Awards writing for Sesame Street between 1992 and 2002 and writes and directs for the stage, including recent productions at La MaMa in New York. He has taught in the department and the Summer High School Program for some 20 years.

You leave with 6 NYU units, 3 for Summer Screenwriting (DWPG-UT 15) and 3 for Summer Playwriting (DWPG-UT 16), each graded A to F. Within NYU they count as elective credit in the Department of Dramatic Writing, and if you later enroll at NYU as an undergraduate they're applied to your degree automatically, with the grade counted in your GPA. Any other college decides for itself whether to accept them, and whether they can replace a required class depends on its own rules.

Grades are posted by September, but NYU doesn't send a transcript automatically, so you'll need to request one from the Registrar if a college asks for it. You also take home the writing itself: an outline and partial draft of a full-length screenplay, and a ten-minute play you've rehearsed, rewritten and performed.

Tisch's 2027 charges for tuition, the program fee, housing, the meal plan and the Dramatic Writing ticket fee come to $15,841 for the four weeks. Housing and the 10-meals-a-week plan aren't optional, because every student lives in NYU housing, though you can pay more for a bigger meal plan. On top of that comes the $75 nonrefundable application fee, and you can ask Tisch to waive it by emailing an explanation of financial hardship.

To accept a place you pay a $1,500 deposit, which counts toward the total but is never refunded. Tisch doesn't take credit cards for the final payment, and NYU says payment plans aren't available for most of its high school programs. If you drop no later than four days after classes start, you get tuition and fees back apart from the deposit, although NYU Housing may charge its own cancellation fees.

Travel to New York, laundry and personal spending are extra, and domestic students need their own health insurance. International students also pay a $115 international student fee and are automatically enrolled in NYU health insurance, which cost $392 for the month in 2026. US visa fees come on top of that, so check them with the official sources.

Tisch's need-based scholarships generally cover tuition, fees, housing and meals, but there are only a limited number and they're open only to students who depend on a parent or guardian who files US federal tax returns.

Every residence hall floor has its own program assistant, an NYU college student who's your main point of contact, and professional staff run the building and supervise them. You must be back in the hall by 11 p.m. every night, hand your NYUCard in at the front desk and be in your room for quiet hours by 1 a.m., and you can't leave before 7 a.m. Breaking curfew can lead to anything from a warning to parental notification or dismissal.

You share a double room in a four-person suite with one bathroom, and NYU assigns roommates at random. Guests, family included, can't go past the lobby, and nights or weekends away are allowed only in extenuating circumstances, when your emergency contact requests it in advance. NYU's campus isn't enclosed, so while staff go with you on program events, you're free to leave campus on your own in your free time. NYU asks families to agree on expectations for getting around the city before you arrive.

The Student Health Center deals with urgent concerns but has no pediatricians, so some under-18s are referred to outside care. Students are also expected to manage their own medication. There's zero tolerance for alcohol and drugs, which means dismissal without a refund. The full rules are in the NYU High School Programs Handbook.