Hi Michael.
Since Northwestern's School of Communications doesn't offer B.F.As, you'd be working toward a straight B.A. or B.S. in Theatre there. The grad program is small but strong; as the primary designers of the departmental shows, the graduate students will (with some prodding) mentor undergraduate designers and recruit them to assistant-design the mainstage shows.
NU's real benefit for the undergraduate designer is the student theatre community. There are 40+ student-produced, student-directed play on campus each year, plus over a dozen acapella groups, 10+ dance troupes, a smattering of improv shows, and so forth. In short, around 80 non-department shows per year on campus, and since NU isn't really known as a "good tech school," the rare undergrad designer has her pick of projects. I was able to start designing lights as soon as I hit the ground; I'll be a Junior in the fall, and I've already got more than a dozen design credits under my belt, for everything from dance shows to musicals to greek tragedy, not to mention a boatload of assistant work, TDing, being the CFO of a student theatre organization... there's lots to do.
If you want more info on student theatre at Northwestern, it has its own wiki, at
nustudenttheatre.org. And feel free to PM me if you'd like to know more.
73, and apologies for the "I like my school a lot" post. But it's true, I do like it a whole lot.