The Department of Creative Arts Therapies (CAT), the world's first such department (established in 1974) provides our students with the most comprehensive and the highest-quality education in their respective disciplines (art therapy, music therapy or dance movement therapy).

Through an integrated blend of classroom, experiential and practical learning in the field, students learn side-by-side in a cohort model with future colleagues in the other creative arts therapy specialties.

Program courses are taught by faculty that are national and global leaders in their respective disciplines. Students also benefit from being part of Philadelphia’s lively arts community, which nourishes the artist, dancer and musician within and enables them to continue delving into their art form while pursuing graduate study.

Department Vision (Our Goals)

Our vision is to cultivate authentic leaders in the Creative Arts Therapies who drive creative and culturally responsive change and who inspire and enact growth in individual and community health and well-being.

Department Mission (What we do)

We seek to provide exemplary and innovative professional preparation for our students to become ethically informed, clinically competent, critically engaged and socio-culturally responsive practitioners and scholars.

The Department Culture

The College of Nursing and Health Professions (CNHP) and the CAT Department are dedicated to creating a cultural climate in which all members of the community feel welcomed, respected, valued and included as participants. We seek to create a community in which our faculty, staff and students reflect the diversity and complexity of our city and the global community. We are committed to reflection, connection and action to advance innovation and equity in our education, research, practice, policy and civic engagement initiatives. We seek to be inclusive and creative in meeting the needs of the differing populations whom we teach and collaborate with as we work together to promote health and eliminate health disparities.

Programs

The Department of Creative Arts Therapies offers three Master of Arts degrees: Art Therapy and Counseling, Dance/Movement Therapy and Counseling, and Music Therapy and Counseling. The 90 quarter-credit curricula can be completed in two years on a full-time basis. We encourage full-time enrollment, yet alternate plans of study are also available.

We also offer a PhD in Creative Arts Therapies, an innovative and unique research degree for art therapists, dance/movement therapists, and music therapists who are interested in focusing their careers on scholarly pursuits and academic leadership in their specific discipline.

UNDERGRADUATE

Human Development and Counseling

GRADUATE

Master of Arts in Art Therapy and Counseling
Master of Arts in Dance/Movement Therapy and Counseling
Master of Arts in Music Therapy and Counseling

DOCTORAL

PhD in Creative Arts Therapies

Creative Arts Therapies Faculty