Walt Disney World opens Disney University to cameras as it plans 5,000 new jobs over five years

By entgrove · September 17, 2026

Walt Disney World brought Orlando TV crews inside Disney University on September 16, the orientation campus where all 80,000 cast members start with the Traditions class, and said it plans to add more than 5,000 jobs over the next five years. Disney put numbers behind the pitch: four in five cast members stay, three in five leaders started hourly, 1,500 costumers run 46 wardrobe locations, and more than 300 people apply every day.

Walt Disney World says it will create more than 5,000 jobs over the next five years, and on Wednesday, September 16, it let Orlando television crews inside Disney University, the training campus where every one of its 80,000 cast members starts. The tour took in the Traditions orientation class, the rooms where housekeepers learn to make a bed to Disney's specification, and the costuming operation Disney calls the largest working wardrobe in the world.

80,000 cast members, and four in five choose to stay

The figures Disney put in front of the cameras are the ones it publishes on its Disney in Florida fact sheet, which calls Walt Disney World Central Florida's largest employer. The resort employs 80,000 cast members across thousands of roles, from park operations to professional jobs in engineering, technology, finance and human resources. Disney says four out of five cast members choose to stay with the company, and it presents that retention rate as its answer to the hospitality industry's usual churn. The company's own framing is that cast members are its greatest investment, and that its biggest competitive advantage is not a ride, a resort or an attraction but the people who run them.

Two more numbers were aimed at anyone who still thinks of a theme park job as a summer gig. About three in five Walt Disney World leaders began in hourly roles, and among full-time cast in professional, leadership and skilled positions the average tenure is 12 years, which Disney says is roughly three times the national average.

Kylee Withers, one of the current Walt Disney World Ambassadors, made the company's case to News 6; WFTV Channel 9 covered the same day.

"We invest in our cast members. We not only provide incredible benefits and perks to working at Disney, but it's such a support community," Withers said.

Traditions is day one for every new hire

Disney University is the orientation facility where every new cast member's employment begins, and WFTV described the visit as the first time the resort has opened its training and operations to cameras this way. New hires start in the Traditions room, surrounded by Disney history, where they are taught the company's culture, its core values and its approach to the guest experience before moving on to job-specific training. Traditions is also where a cast member is handed the oval name tag that guests will read for the rest of their career.

The class is older than the Florida resort. Van France set up the first orientation program for Disneyland's opening-day staff in 1955, the school that grew out of it became Disney University, and Walt Disney World has trained its own cast the same way since the resort opened in 1971. Traditions is where the vocabulary comes from: guests rather than customers, onstage and backstage, a role rather than a job, a costume rather than a uniform.

Bed-making drills and concierge role-play

Once Traditions is done, cast members move into instruction built around the role they were hired for, and the resort showed a few of those rooms. Housekeepers are trained to make up a resort bed to Disney's own standard. Concierge cast members work through hands-on practice scenarios, playing out the questions and problems they will meet at a real front desk. WFTV's video also shows a table-service dining room in use, with a chef in whites standing by as plates go out to a seated guest.

The scale of the pipeline came from WFTV too: more than 300 people apply to Walt Disney World every day. Most start in hourly roles, and Disney's pitch is that the hourly job is the start of a career rather than the whole of it. Its fact sheet lists starting rates of $19 to $23 an hour for part-time and full-time roles, with many skilled roles starting above $23.

1,500 costumers across 46 wardrobe locations

Some cast members move from the front line into Costuming, which Disney describes as the largest working wardrobe operation in the world. About 1,500 costuming cast members work across 46 costuming locations around the resort, keeping every onstage cast member in the right outfit for their role before they step out in front of guests.

Michael, a costuming cast member who spoke to News 6, came in through the Disney College Program, the paid internship that brings university students to the resort for a semester of hourly work.

"I actually started in the Walt Disney World College Program. This is the only place I have ever dreamed of working," he said.

He said costuming lets him bring his own interest in storytelling and the creative arts to the job.

From dishwasher to director of culinary

Brian Piasecki, Walt Disney World's director of culinary and concept development, was the resort's example of how far an entry-level food job can go. He started in restaurants at 14, washing dishes, and told News 6 that the energy of the business kept him in it.

"That environment of energy and family and passion, I just never got out of it," Piasecki said.

Piasecki came up through the resort's own culinary apprenticeship program and has since led concept development for projects including the food and drink of Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge at Disney's Hollywood Studios. Kitchens, restaurants and quick-service windows remain one of the biggest ways into the company, and Disney's point in putting him in front of the cameras was that the path from dish pit to director exists here.

Pay, health centers and Disney Aspire

Disney backed the career pitch with its benefits list: medical, dental and vision coverage, on-site health centers, educational programs and wellness resources. Two health centers currently serve cast members and a third is planned to open in 2027. The Disney in Florida fact sheet adds two on-site childcare centers, several Partners Federal Credit Union branches, back-up care for children, seniors and pets, and complimentary park admission and discounts for cast and their families.

Disney says career growth is one of the main reasons people apply, and it points to leadership development programs and to Disney Aspire, which pays 100 percent of tuition up front at a network of partner schools. Disney said in December 2025 that more than 5,900 cast members had graduated through Aspire as of August 2025, with 9,800 active students, and that one in four applicants to hourly roles in the U.S. named Aspire as a main reason for applying.

5,000 jobs over five years, with the roles and timing still unstated

The hiring number is the news for anyone job-hunting in Central Florida, and it lines up with what Disney is building. The company has announced a Villains Land and the Cars-themed Piston Peak for Magic Kingdom, a Monsters, Inc. land called Monstropolis for Disney's Hollywood Studios, and Tropical Americas, with Indiana Jones and Encanto attractions, for Disney's Animal Kingdom. New lands need ride operators, custodians, cooks, merchandise hosts and costumers, and Disney said in December 2025 that expansion at its two U.S. resorts would create about 10,000 jobs between them.

What Disney did not say is which of the 5,000 are new attraction roles and which are growth in existing operations, how the hiring is spread across the five years, or where the third health center will be. Nothing announced on Wednesday changes anything a guest will see on a park day.

The practical takeaway for guests is smaller: the cast member at the front desk, the housekeeper who folded the towel animal and the skipper on the Jungle Cruise all sat through the same first morning at Disney University, and the name tag on their chest was handed to them in that room. Job seekers can search Walt Disney World roles on Disney Careers, and the Disney College Program takes applications separately.