<p>My d and I will be traveling to Westerville for her audition March 3 and I was wondering if any of you from this board will be there? She is very excited for this audition!</p>
<p>I'm not auditioning, but I intend to help with auditions--I'm a MT freshman, so I'll be helping with registration and speaking with parents and students and possibly sitting in on auditions! I'm very excited! Can't wait to see you and your daughter there! Safe travels!</p>
<p>Thank you for the welcome! We'll be driving up from South Carolina so I hope the weather doesn't turn bad. Everyone that we have spoken to at Otterbein has been so friendly and helpful. Debbie Byrne (whom I can't say enough good things about) called my D yesterday to remind her about the deadline for the President's schlorship and she was so easy to talk to. Speaking of scholarships, my d has been selected to apply for the community service scholarship. In your opinion, as an MT major, will she have time to pursue this scholarship? I would love for her to receive this but I don't want her to commit to something if she won't have time to fulfill her obligations to the community service program. TIA</p>
<p>Honestly, I'm going to go with no, she won't have time. The major is extremely time-consuming and not just with performance obligations and classes but also with out-of-class tech crew participation which be very time consuming. However, your daughter may be a much better time-manager than me, but my experience has been that my schedule and those of my BFA classmates don't allow for much free time, and when the schedule does let up, the time to wind down, relax, and wind back up is greatly appreciated and necessary to sanity-maintenance (jk--none of us are that close to the edge).<br>
If your daughter is accepted and attends Otterbein, she will have occasional opportunities to do community service projects (not to mention performance opportunities for the entire community for which she is not being paid, so it's considered service--and within a learning experience--BONUS!!) such as the quarterly Cardinal Corps outings (one day/quarter on a Saturday).
Also keep in mind that if your daughter is accepted, the theatre and music departments will make their best efforts to make it financially possible for her to attend Otterbein. Debbie is always a big help, and the money from the theatre/dance dep'ts helps immensely also.
In conclusion (to this hopefully helpful rant), if your daughter is looking for the community service opportunities, they're realistic for BFAs but not when a commitment is required--it's a spur-of-the-moment and occasional thing. If your daughter is looking for the scholarship money, it can be found in other ways that don't require a commitment of time that might conflict with requirements for her major.
Furthermore, you and your daughter know her abilities best--her classmates and teachers will support whatever decision she makes as long as it does not pose any obstacles to the major.
Does this help? Hope so, and good luck with the rest of the process! See you soon!
PS If you or your daughter has anymore questions, she can find me on Facebook with the screenname justsoicanbthere or AIM with that screenname : )</p>
<p>NanE, I want to second Linus2004's concerns about the community service scholarship and related commitments. My daughter is a freshman music major, and she finds that it's only because of her [excellent, in my opinion] time management skills that she's able to keep on track. She's currently rehearsing for both of the one-act operas being performed on campus this weekend, and the rehearsal schedule has been tough...she's generally at rehearsal from 7-10 each night (on top of a full schedule of 18 credits); this week is tech week, so it's 6-10 or later. She's feeling underprepared for her juries coming up in two weeks and knows that after this weekend, every free moment is going to be spent in a practice room.</p>
<p>Having said that, she does manage to volunteer once a week at one of the local elementary schools, working with ESL kids. She was introduced to this through her first quarter INST class, which had a service-learning component, and has decided to continue even though it's no longer a course requirement. She told me last night that she's already working with the ESL coordinator at the school on her third quarter volunteer schedule and feels it's likely she'll be doing this all four years. A lot of the classes at Otterbein have a service-learning component, so opportunities are readily available for all sorts of volunteerism.</p>
<p>And yes, if accepted, talent awards seem to be very generous. We were blown away by the talent award my daughter received from the music department; it was even more than what we thought was the maximum possible. Otterbein has a real knack for not only making you feel wanted, but for making it all possible.</p>
<p>Best of luck to your daughter...</p>
<p>Thank you both for your replies, and yes, I think you confirmed what I was feeling. As much as the extra scholarship would help if she is accepted, I don't want her spreading herself too thin her first year, although she is much better at time management than I am! ;)</p>