<p>Lots of tips for everywhere but Western…inquiring minds want to know all we can!</p>
<p>I know nothing about the school, but my son just finished being in a professional production of West Side Story as A-Rab with a recent graduate of Western Michigan who played Baby John, and he was GREAT! I’d say they are doing something right at that school.</p>
<p>I’ll admit to not knowing a lot about Western Michigan either (which I think draws from a more regional pool of students). When I read the post, I was thinking similar thoughts to Ericsmom but did not post. However, similarly, my D is on a national tour and one of her castmates who has a significant role and is in scenes with my D’s character is a graduate of Western Michigan. I’m going to see the show tomorrow and will have to reserve my opinion, but figure she must be pretty talented if cast in this part in NY. That person is originally from Chicago. I have not known kids who have applied to Western Mich and imagine many come from the MidWest.</p>
<p>Yep, Western Michigan is on the radar for MT students in the midwest and kids from our Chicago-area high school regularly apply there for not just theatre, but many programs. I have not been there but the campus is considered quite beautiful.</p>
<p>My daughter’s good friend is a sophmore in the MT program at Western and is very happy with the program.</p>
<p>Maybe you guys who know people could see about getting them to start a thread…would be helpful to lots of kids, I bet.</p>
<p>Someone has posted about Western Michigan under the MT programs with good dance thread.</p>
<p>I think Lauren Zakrin was a student at Western Michigan University but left when she was a finalist on the MTV show “The Search for Elle Woods”. We saw her in the role of Elle Woods (she was the understudy) with the touring production of Legally Blonde in East Lansing and she was terrific!</p>
<p>I am working on getting a couple of moms of recent graduates on College Confidential to share their thoughts, so I’m trying to keep this thread toward the top and easy to find.</p>
<p>My son’s friend who graduated from WMU has recently landed in a great show!!!</p>
<p>I hate to bump such an old thread, but…</p>
<p>My friend just got in, and he’s going to audition for the theatre/MT program in February. It’s his passion, and he wants to be an actor later in life. I’ve always heard good things about the program from people, so I recommended it to him. Is it as good a program as I hear? I’d hate to recommend it without the good word of people who are most informed about the topic.</p>
<p>I just got done playing Jesus in a regional production of Godspell, and our Joanne was a Western Michigan graduate having been an MT performance major. From what I understand she applied to many MT schools and had been accepted, but she liked Western Michigan the best. She was very pleased with it and she is quite the performer, however she isn’t currently getting a lot of work. ( I think she graduated 2 or 3 years ago… maybe.)</p>
<p>this program is at the top of my list! can’t wait to audition/transfer!</p>
<p>I am a WMU student! I am having trouble finding anyone else out there like me, too! The Musical Theater program is extremely competitive! I am having such a stressed-out meltdown about auditions this February! HELP!</p>
<p>LaLa…you are currently an MT student or you are currently a student in another major and trying to get into MT? Do you know how many they audition vs. how many they will take?</p>
<p>I am currently a WMU student waiting to audition this Friday for the program. I do not know the ratios as to how many students they let in and how many they will take. I know it is few to none. They specifically say that they don’t have to accept anyone. It’s also a one-and-done process, so that is more than intimidating.</p>
<p>I auditioned for WMU yesterday…they expect to choose only 12 -14 kids from about 300 kids signed up to audition. My audition was the usual two 16 bar songs and a monologue, then if you made the initial cut, you were asked to sit for a theory exam (OMG!) and then have a tough, but fun, dance audition. My mom and I estimated that they called back a little less than half the people. The campus was cool (although they had just had like a mini-blizzard in the area…not so much fun and something to think about!) and they have housing that sounds cool… a lot of the fine arts kids get housing together in halls that have soundproof rehearsal rooms on each floor and dance space in the basement.</p>
<p>I really liked it…it really moved up my list after visiting.</p>
<p>I auditioned the day before yesterday, too! What was your number? Mine was 87. Did you get called back to the dance audition? I currently go to WMU. the rehearsal rooms are not sound proof, by any means, but they are nice to have in the dorms. I love WMU and would not want to go anywhere else. Although I’ll have to if I don’t get into this program! No big deal though. They seem really concerned with your success in that department. Not true or other WMU departments, though.</p>
<p>I am trying to “resurrect” this thread. We saw a terrific rendition of “Chicago” at Western Michigan tonight, and met some great kids from the program. It’s really got us thinking, and curious for more information if anyone’s out there.</p>
<p>I know some of the older threads bashed the program a bit, but I wonder if that might be running on old information. From what I understand, they’ve have a recent changing of the head of the department, and we liked what we saw. Looking for the good, the bad, and the ugly…</p>
<p>My son auditioned yesterday for Western Michigan’s MT program and it has moved way up on his list! We were very impressed with the facilities and the faculty. And I think every current theatre student was there throughout the day, mingling with the parents and kids, answering questions and just talking about the program. I was very impressed with the entire process. As stated in other posts from last year, it appeared about 50 kids were called back for the dance. My son said it the dance audition really separated the dancers from the nondancers!
I would love to hear thoughts about Western’s program!</p>
<p>Got accepted into the 2015 MT class a couple days ago. SO excited!</p>