I am looking at schools mostly on the east coast and middle east, and am hoping to add some schools from west coast (Utah, Arizona, Colorado, California, Washington) because I live near there. My mom wants to do a road trip to visit a couple schools, so that knocks off all schools on the east coast. We live in CA, and she says we can only visit schools from “colorado over” so if any one has any personal stories or info about schools in those states PLEASE let me know! thank you so much!!
Middle East?
A few to consider:
University of Utah
University of Arizona
Arizona State University
University of Northern Colorado
Cornish College of the Arts
AMDA -Los Angeles
possibly University of Southern California - they are supposed to be starting an MT BFA
UC Irvine
If you can look a little further east I’d definitely look at Texas State. I think it is the strongest MT program closest to CA. It is also one of the more affordable options. But it is very difficult to get in.
Also a little further East but not all the way to the East Coast would be several schools in Oklahoma that have good programs including:
Oklahoma City University
University of Oklahoma
Central Oklahoma University
Another in Texas I forgot to mention earlier is Texas Christian University. It has a nice MT program also.
@elledaspitzer - fewer schools on the West Coast will have exclusively MT programs but many have fantastic acting programs and MT certificate or minors.
In S. Cal I’d recommend looking at:
UCLA
UCI
Chapman University
Cal State Fullerton - very good reputation and easy to get into but it’s a cut program and v-e-r-y competitive. They go from 75+ Freshman to about 10 Seniors.
Another thing to consider while you are visiting schools is there are many great acting programs at schools where you can take dance and voice electives. If you end up visiting the southland I would add on…
CalArts
USC
UCSD
(By the way, my D and I did a junior tour but she didn’t want to stay in CA for college so our trip took us from Boston to Philly. It was really useful - it’s really different “back there” and you might want see if your mom won’t consider flying to wherever your top schools are for a tour. My D only applied to schools that did the “Unified” weekend in L.A. so that trip was the sole chance we had to check out campuses and cities and it definitely made up her mind not to apply to some. Just something to consider.)
We’re from California so initially my D wanted to try to stay as West as possible, but honestly you need to focus on FIT over everything else. Don’t worry about visiting too many schools ahead of time but those that you do, make sure they are diverse in type so you know what is important to you: (academic/conservatory, big v. small school, BA v. BFA v. BM), etc. I personally think it is great if you can audition on-campus for what you “think” are your top two schools. Then AFTER acceptances, if you can, PLEASE sit-in for a day on MT classes…contact the department directly and emphasize this over touring the campus (looking at big buildings is not an indicator of where you will be happy). My daughter was accepted to 8 schools, mostly West Coast focused, and she chose TCU (Texas Christian University) and is thrilled with her decision….we had spreadsheets to infinity on what she wanted in a program, and tears about making the right choice, but sitting in on the classes and then personally meeting the department head really made it a deciding factor for her. Of course, we don’ t get to choose our acceptances, but visiting those final choices will really help you know what you want and what to look for in a program. Being on the West Coast makes the whole process very expensive, so really try to schedule your trips “back to back” so you can do a run and save a little on flights, and definitely do at least one Unified option. BTW, If you are not from California, the UC and CSU options don’t really offer any financial aid and can be your most expensive choices West of the Mississippi. Even for CA residents they ended up being not even close to the least expensive options.
Totally agree with loribelle. We visited my son’s top 2 after acceptances. He really connected with the auditioners for both programs, but the visits could not have been more different. It was crystal clear where he wanted to be after sitting in on classes.