Creative media is fine if you are driven as a filmmaker, but the school is not for artists, so you will be fighting an uphill battle if you do not want to work for a sports broadcasting company. I think most people in the school are happy with that, though.
The school is super affordable, especially if you do well on the ACT or are an in-state student. They will pay for your housing, and Alabama is affordable to live in compared to most, if not all, places outside the deep South.
I have never used the alum network.
I never worked on an internship at the school because I did not want to do TV or documentary work.
It is a mixed bag, with so many theatre kids bleeding into the film school. The collaboration is poor because they are kinda crazy. I would blame that on whatever was happening in the theatre building at the time. Be prepared to be a filmmaker, not a director. It is far easier to do more work than to depend on others here.
Coursework is whatever I would say it is not challenging because Alabama is afraid of giving students anything under an A. Take the independent study with film professors so you can make work for graduate school. If you want to work in the industry, get some gigs in Atlanta because you will not be getting any big jobs coming out of UA. Better making money and meeting people in Atlanta rather than working with people who will move back to a major city to work in their family's advertising company.
Okay, if you have read all this and still want to attend, find the film professors you want to work with and start working! If I had this knowledge at the start, I would probably have more directed short films than I already do. Go to Woods Hall and minor in art to build connections with the photo school.
Creative media is not a film degree; you have to make this place into a film school. If you do not have the resolve to do this, go to UNA (more structure and work with professors on projects they will direct), or, if you are an animator, USA (a great animation program in Mobile). That is all I got for you, and results will vary significantly from what I experienced. You will end up where you need to go, and you are the maker of your own destiny.
