Performing Arts
The Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts is one of the world's leading performing arts academies, recognised nationally and internationally for the quality of its graduates.
Find out moreWhy ECU?
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ECU top in teaching quality For the fifth year in a row, ECU has received the top undergraduate teaching quality ranking of all 37 public universities in Australia.
Over 85% of ECU students participating in the government’s QILT survey, rated their teaching quality positively. ECU was also the top-ranked public university in Australia for undergraduate skills development for the sixth year in a row.
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Good Universities Guide In the 2020 Good Universities Guide, ECU graduates have given us a 5-star rating for:
- Teaching quality
- Skills development
- Student support
- Learning resources
- Median salary (based on the starting salary for new domestic graduates under age 25, and in their first full-time job.)
The 5-star rating for teaching quality has now been achieved for 13 straight years. We're the only public university in Australia to have achieved such a consistently high endorsement.
Read more about the Good Universities Guide.
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THE Young University Rankings ECU has been ranked in the world's top 150 universities under 50 years old in the 2019 Times Higher Education (THE) Young Universities Rankings.
Young universities are measured on their teaching, research, citations, international outlook and industry income.
These are the same performance indicators as measured in the overall THE World University Rankings.
Courses
Study world ready
WAAPA provides world-class teaching, concert facilities and performance opportunities for aspiring professionals in acting, dance, classical, jazz or contemporary music, and musical theatre.
Download a guide
If you prefer paper over pixels, please download one of our guides.
Become World Ready
Experience Performing Arts at ECU.
Scholarship opportunities to reduce your expenses
Scholarships recognise those whose life journey may have been challenging, as well as students who've shown outstanding academic excellence and endeavour.
A scholarship can help you realise your ambitions by paying for fees, text books and living expenses.
WAAPA stars are born
Our graduates excel in their chosen professions around the world, confirming WAAPA's well-earned reputation.
Many well-known actors, dancers, musicians and music theatre stars, including Hugh Jackman, Meg Mac, Frances O'Connor, Jai Courtney, William McInnes, Lisa McCune, Lucy Durack, Dacre Montgomery, Emma Matthews, Jamie Oehlers, Eddie Perfect and Tim Minchin have called WAAPA home.
Student
stories
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"The Bachelor of Performing Arts has given me the skills to maintain, develop and practice as an independent artist"
Mariah O'DeaWAAPA Performing Arts graduate The Bachelor of Performing Arts is the type of course that doesn't confine you to one specific artistic form. Instead it opens doors, windows, to numerous forms of performance art and how it exists in the world, broadening your own horizons of how you can be a part of it.
It has let me experience what was once unknown practices such as the Suzuki Training Method and Butoh, it has even taken me to Singapore to train with many different cultures from all around the world at ITI. But most importantly, it has taught me what it truly means to be an artist – and that is knowing who you are and what you want to say.
I have uncovered an authenticity in myself and this will forever be the base, or the truth, of all my work for years to come – whether that be performing or creating. Three years later, and I have not only grown as an artist, but also as a person.
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"The WAAPA Musical Theatre course was an unbelievable launching pad for me and my fellow class mates into this crazy industry we call the performing arts"
Mackenzie DunnWAAPA Music Theatre graduate One of the many invaluable opportunities we were given, and a personal highlight for me, was working with professional creatives (choreographers, directors and writers).
Even at the end of a sweaty fourteen-hour day – that could have possibly included a keyboard spot test, a high stakes scene presentation, a song repertoire performance, show choreography rehearsal, a ballet class and a costume parade – WAAPA was constantly buzzing with passion and was an amazing place to study for three years.
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"WAAPA is so rigorous, it prepares students to handle pretty much anything"
Harry RichardsonWAAPA Acting graduate Being able to study in the safe environment of WAAPA gave me the opportunity to be able to fail miserably and learn from it – plus it was such fun each week getting to see mind-blowing dance performances, glorious musical theatre and the grooviest jazz because it inspires you to pour more into your craft.