I graduated from CSU's film program right before they revamped it to include a BFA option. I was mostly interested in screenwriting and that wasn't really an option at the time so I took the one screenwriting class offered and then took playwriting classes in the English department. My biggest critique of the program at that time was that there really weren't that many classes to have a well-rounded education in film and they mostly taught film as a trade, so you'd learn how to be a camera operator at a sports event as opposed to how to be a really good director of photography.
They had pretty decent equipment but none of the instructors were knowledgeable about how to use it, in fact they would at times use the equipment for their own personal projects and I thought that was annoying. That said, if you wanted to go to the equipment cage and play with the equipment and figure everything out yourself, they were okay with that at the time but that may have changed since they revamped the program. I ended up working in the equipment cage and got really good with a lot of the lights (cameras never were my strong suit). The other cage employees also had a ton of knowledge about the equipment and could teach you more than the faculty they had at the time. But some people may really like being able to use the equipment and figure it out for themselves. They also had a pretty good editing bay with Adobe Suite and Avid, you could sign up to use the computers and teach yourself to use all of that software and be pretty damn good at it if you wanted, a lot of students did that.
The faculty was kind of a mess. Most of the old faculty is still there and I think that's unfortunate because the older male faculty members really weren't good instructors. They had the energy of guys who didn't make it and were falling back on teaching, which sucks because you want people who are really passionate and knowledgeable about teaching. They also played favorites a lot, and usually, that benefitted the white male students. You'd often times learn more with a younger adjunct, I was happy to see that the new program promoted some of the former adjuncts like Maria Gigante and Sal Cardoni to faculty, they were both really good instructors and I enjoyed taking their classes.
The program itself wasn't very diverse when I went. Almost all of the teachers were old straight white guys, except for one white woman. I don't think that that has changed too much if at all. So if you're not a white guy, you might not feel seen. And there was an incident where one of the male students said some pretty homophobic stuff to me and it was brushed under the rug because the male faculty members vouched for him. It happened in my last semester but it definitely soured me on the program. Those faculty members still teach there so that's something to be wary of.
The best aspects of the program to me are how affordable it is, if you're an Ohio resident it's dirt cheap and almost everyone there was covered with grants and scholarships. You're not gonna leave with a ton of debt. So even though the faculty and curriculum weren't great, you could in theory go to the program for nothing or next to nothing, spend time learning how to use the equipment in the cage, and teach yourself how to be a pretty good director/cine/editor by the time you leave. If you're good at learning that way, you'd probably like the program.
Cleveland has a pretty good film industry because of Ohio's film tax incentive. A few movies shoot in Cleveland every year and you can find your way onto a set interning if you really try. I had to do it for myself because the school didn't have any sort of internship connections but maybe that has changed now. The lack of any internship opportunities or career development within the program at the time meant that almost none of the alumni went on to work in film. This means that the alumni network is pretty much useless and that's a huge detriment to the program.
The last thing I'll say is that if you want an undergrad basis and you know that you're going to pursue an MFA later, this program is good because the classes were so easy that you'd leave with a really competitive GPA and a decent portfolio from having access to the equipment (again, if you teach yourself how to use it).
