The first term for enrollment in the Dance: Creative Research, Culture, and Practice, MFA is fall 2026.

The Dance MFA Creative Research, Culture, and Practice named option is a 60-credit, two-year program with a summer term in between academic years. 

This terminal degree program is designed for experienced dance artists seeking a critically and culturally focused academic program within a multidisciplinary international community. Creative artists admitted to this program will gain the critical, aesthetic, technical, and interdisciplinary tools needed to innovate, create, and lead in the rapidly evolving global dance field.

The program welcomes dance artists with professional experience and with varied backgrounds and approaches to dance, spanning culturally rooted practices, popular, and contemporary forms, who are prepared for graduate-level inquiry, and driven by innovation and leadership in the dance field. Students will develop and refine their teaching and creative research while exploring their unique contribution to the dance and contemporary performance.

This in-residence, on campus MFA program has intentionally small cohorts and is highly selective. Students entering the UW–Madison MFA in Dance program are offered tuition remission, generous monthly stipends, access to UW–Madison health benefits, and other annual funding opportunities.