@mtmcmt I just read through the wait list threads from past years and this process could go on for a while. Sigh. @Guppie, I read an opinion piece by a Yale alum who now refuses to do interviews for Yale. He said he loved his experience at Yale and gladly signed on to help with interviews some years back. He won’t do it anymore because he says it is so depressing. He interviewed so many kids that would have thrived at Yale but they didn’t get in. He opines that the schools should set a certain numbers bar and then choose by lottery. He says the interview makes it feel like an admissions decision is a very personal, intimate decision and so when you are denied, it feels very personal and intimate. But, the truth is, it is not personal at all. There are just too many qualified candidates for the number of spots. It seems very akin to this situation. When you are talking about a school that has 400 audition for 8 slots, you would think that at least 40 (probably 100) would be an amazing fit for the program. So how do you cut it to 20? Or 10? or 8? I don’t know.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. What makes “performing arts” selection even harder and impossible to make it more quantifiable one (like the Yale alum was suggesting by setting a higher bar) compared to academically harder schools to get in is this is so subjective. Anyway it is what it is. We have one more audition this Sat. Then I know 3 likely more schools will release the decision by the end of 2nd week of March. (D is in acting not MT).
Having been through the Ivy/super-competitive liberal arts process and the performing arts process twice, I have to say that the Ivy process is just as subjective. When you have a student who is competitive academically (105+ GPA, 2300 SAT, AP Scholar with distinction, etc), and she is in the pool with thousands of others just like her, the process to choose which ones should be admitted is just as subjective. When everyone is a high-achieving student, the numbers fall by the wayside and other subjective measures are used to determine admittance.
The important thing to remember is that there are many paths to successful outcomes and nearly all of our kids will find their way.
@lovetoact - I’ve done the Ivy/LAC thing and am now doing MT and agree with you, but with one big difference. For my son - who had stats like your student’s, although the uppermost rung was completely subjective and his results reflected this (got into one tippy top Ivy, rejected from the other 4 - including one he applied SCEA to, some perceived as “easier to get into” than the one he did get into – got into 3 of the 4 top LACs, WL at the 4th) - the big difference was the “safeties”. Right below that very top group, my son got into each and every one of the ones just below that group - and I’m talking 12 for 12 or something like that at no slouch places like Tufts and Emory. His stats and his across the board strengths and interests practically insured those results, and that’s what transpired. He also got a some very strong financial aid grants from multiple institutions. I’ve been convinced that with the Ivies, etc. it all comes down to that very first admissions officer who reads the file. If the background and the essay move or intrigue that one person, the doors open up. If not, no chance.
For my daughter, whom I feel, and with assessment from current working professionals backing me up – is a strong MT applicant, there are zero guarantees of any kind of similar results. For audition-based schools, there is no “middle tier” or, in my opinion, any true safeties. Her only safeties would be via academic, non audition-based schools. And she doesn’t want those at this point - she’d prefer a gap year. There is every likelihood she will get into very few or even none of the schools which she aspires to, and that’s the reality. And there’s a 100% certainly she will get a fraction of the aid he did, if she is lucky enough to get into one. Two kids, both self-propelled and with talent, each worked very hard and one was kind of guaranteed a certain level of success in the admissions/financing arena while the other may wind up with nothing to show for the effort and/or nothing to help pay for it. BUT - there’s a whole lot of life there beyond the college years and whatever happens, as you say, there are so many outcomes and paths and any particular college is not the be all and end all.
@rampions, That hit-or-miss characteristic of MT admissions is what is so scary for many of us during this prolonged waiting period. It’s possible that a kid is in the top ten picks of each of the schools applied to, but gets in nowhere, since each school only takes 8. It all comes down to choosing a good range of schools at the outset - and even then you can still guess wrong. And my son, like your daughter, prefers a gap year to attending his “safeties,” so there go two wasted applications. On my worst days, I think of the outcome of getting into a great (but expensive) school–with no scholarships or financial aid. This happened with my older daughter and we had to compromise and send her to a second tier school so that she could graduate without loans. She still has regrets. I’m hoping to avoid living through that decision again.
@claire74 - I hear you on ALL counts. And so hard to explain to those outside this little MT circle.
I was an alumni interviewer for a very selective university for over a dozen years and yes, while I enjoyed doing it, it can be depressing to learn in April that often none, or maybe one, got admitted, even though many were fantastic applicants.
Highly selective (academic) colleges are also subjective!!! Those can be a crap shoot and given the odds, have to be put into “reach” category for ANY applicant.
Yes! What I was going to say when I read the comment about academically selective schools not being subjective. A huge chunk of the applicants to highly selective (academic) colleges have the “stats” to be admitted. It is all the subjective stuff that sets these students apart from one another. The acceptance rates are VERY low at top universities and they reject tippy top students all the time. One of my kids applied to highly selective colleges (non-MT). She landed at an Ivy.
THIS. Having also had one child apply to highly selective colleges and one who applied to ONLY BFA in MT colleges, the big difference was that the first child had a list of Reach, Match, Safeties. My MT kid’s list, due to being all BFA programs, all would be considered Reach odds! That was the scary part. Even though my kid did not apply to any BA non-audition safeties, as a college counselor, I do recommend that MT applicants have those. My kid was only interested in BFA programs, but that kind of college list is quite chancy, even though I felt she had a decent chance to get into at least one (worked out way better than that, but ya never know).
Thank you all so much for speaking my language! You understand where we are … D decided to forge ahead with both BFAs and tough academic admits, like Ivies. I’m not sure she will go to her safety (Skidmore - applied because they have a BS in theatre – many theatre credits) and it might be too much money in the end anyway. Nothing else can be called a true safety. A gap year may be what happens. If it does, I take comfort in knowing that she’s a go-getter and she will pick herself up and figure out a plan after she sheds her tears. I’m not gonna lie – it will be rough around here.
I had no idea how extremely competitive & subjective the super selective schools’ (i.e. ivies) admission was… My D has never brought up an idea of taking a gap year. If she did, my husband and I probably would have a very hard time to accept her going that route. Her love for theatre is wide, very genuine, and long-term. She is totally ok (or at least she tells me so) if she doesn’t get in any of the auditioned programs she applied. She is already in more than a few non-auditioned program at academically solid schools, where she wants to double-major in outside of performing arts. She knows she can continue to stay involved in the community of theatre on the side when/if she chooses to pursue other career.
@rampions, while I agree that there are no true audition safeties, I do think there is a “middle tier” of schools. Or, maybe a more accurate statement would be that there are a number of schools that fall somewhere below the top tier schools. Now, we - as parents - may never be able to agree WHICH schools are top tier, I think everyone would admit that there ARE top tier schools, and by definition then, the schools next on the list would be middle tier. Ask 10 people on this board to list them, and you will probably get 10 different answers. But they can’t all be top tier by definition, and therefore some have to be middle tier.
And, I don’t know who the “current working professionals” were who assessed your D’s strength as a college candidate…maybe they know what they are talking about. But I’m not so sure that current working professionals have any idea what the college scene is like now. (Please don’t get me wrong…I am not disparaging who you used…I don’t know who you used…I am just saying that the good college coaches probably know a lot more than someone who has been on Broadway for 10 years, and I don’t want people thinking that if they do a master class with, for example, Sutton Foster, that is not a substitute for getting advice from someone like MTCA). Even those who graduated 5 years ago were in a completely different world than the kids who are in college now/auditioning for programs. I would urge everyone to get an assessment done from someone who knows how competitive the college audition process is, and knows what the schools are looking for.
Finally, I think for the most part (95+% of the time), schools get it right. You see the same handful of kids getting into all 12 to 16 programs they apply to each year, including the top 3. You see a whole bunch of kids get into about half the schools they applied to, some really strong top tier schools. And you see kids who get into one or no programs. So it seems to me that the schools are pretty much seeing the same thing when they look at kids. It is highly unusual to see a kid get into CMU, for example, and nowhere else. So while I agree that arts are subjective, I really think that these schools are able to assess the talent/potential of these auditioners pretty well. Again, they DO make mistakes, but not usually.
Of course, there are kids who go in to the auditions unprepared, singing the wrong songs, not understanding or appreciating the competition level, etc., and these kids can do poorly even though they are very talented. I think though, for the most part, the people on CC are pretty well prepared. If they found CC, and take the advice of people who have forged the path before them, they are pretty well prepared.
I guess my point is that I don’t want people thinking it’s a TOTAL crap shoot. Yes, talented kids will get rejected from lower tier schools b/c of yield issues, or simply b/c of type. But for the most part, I think the schools do a really good job of recognizing what’s before them. If they didn’t, the “Acceptance” threads would look very, very different.
@monkey13, “I am just saying that the good college coaches probably know a lot more than someone who has been on Broadway for 10 years.” I’ll second this comment when a personal experience. My son, who had been with an excellent classical teacher for several years, fell in love with a very well-known MT teacher (ex-Broadway, great director credits and a wonderful person). We got a bit carried away and went with her suggestions on repertoire for prescreens. They were a bit off the wall and he loved the pieces, but her advice was that the prescreen was only about getting the callback and if she were casting from that prescreen, he would definitely get the callback.Big regrets when our classically trained son failed all-but-one MT prescreens. I still adore her and respect her opinions, but we found out the hard way that college panels are an entirely different animal than professional theater castings. My gut feeling is that, although they talk-the-talk about wanting a contemporary sound (since that is where MT is going), college panels still want to hear classical voice singing a golden age pieces, with lots of vibrato and sustained notes. The songs we picked for prescreens didn’t deliver that and we paid the price. We changed songs after prescreens and are hoping for the best. If my son does a gap year next year, I’ll put him with a male classically trained teacher with success in college placement, and use our lovely MT expert for occasional “acting-the-song” coachings, for which she has enormous talent.
@MTMCMT Do you have a link or more information about the Amherst podcast?
I agree that while there are no BFA schools that are Safeties, that one can craft a balanced list of BFA programs that have varying degrees of selectivity (ROUGHLY top tier, middle tier, etc.), and should do that. Even so, the odds at any BFA program are pretty tough odds and are never sure bets. I also agree that someone who really has what it takes to get into a BFA in MT program, and crafts a well balanced college list, rarely get shut out of every school on their list.
When my daughter was a Freshman in high school she told me she wanted to major in musical theatre. Well as a parent the first then I did was google the top MT colleges and universities. Of course the list started of with Carnegie, U of Mich., and NYU. So those three I immediately began making plans and figuring out the best way for my child to prepare to be accepted at one of them because I wanted nothing but the best for my child and I definitely wanted her to succeed at accomplishing her dream. Well several summer intensives, MT college information sessions, mock auditions and coaching sessions later I realize the best thing for my child was to find the schools where she felt like she “fit”. What did she want out of the school and be honest. So her list included three academically selective schools, 2 non-audition safeties, 2 MT BFA Reach schools, 1 MT BFA “Fit” school, 1 BFA acting program and one BA theater program (audition). Now of the original three I researched in her Freshman year she only applied to one and that was Carnegie. So far she has gotten into her 2 non-audition safeties, the MT BFA Fit School and the BFA acting program. We’re still waiting to hear from the rest. I must admit her list did freak me out a little bit because she didn’t apply for that many MT BFA programs. However my daughter was happy because she would be fine with any of the schools that she applied to. She did have stand outs and those were of course her MT BFA schools but if she didn’t get into any of those, although she would have been disappointed, she still felt like she picked places where she would still be happy nevertheless.
@HappyDancer98 I think it’s like choosing tile for floor. Once you have several unbroken and really nice pieces, you just start arranging them until you get a nice pattern. The others you store in case you need to replace but really any of those tiles would have made a great floor.
@zazz81 - short version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-OLlJUXwKU
Long version: http://www.npr.org/2011/03/28/134916924/Amherst-Admissions-Process
@OHMomof2 You beat me to it.
Wow wow wow - thank you you for posting this! Unbelievable and imagine how much more subjective it is when you toss in height, hair color, range, acting, belt, legit etc
I have a kid in a top 20 lottery school and one MT kid … and by far my MT kid had the harder process.
But honestly, even though I felt like I had high blood pressure & hives most of the audition season, in hindsight it was the BEST time with my daughter. We had some great road trips, great conversations and made great memories … I wouldn’t trade that time for anything. (And I miss it for certain!)
I’m thinking great thoughts for all of you still in the thick of this year’s audition season. But someone start a Final Decision/Background thread already … I want to read all the great stories of the 2020 class.
Break lots and lots of legs!! ;))
“And, I don’t know who the “current working professionals” were who assessed your D’s strength as a college candidate…maybe they know what they are talking about. But I’m not so sure that current working professionals have any idea what the college scene is like now. (Please don’t get me wrong…I am not disparaging who you used…I don’t know who you used…I am just saying that the good college coaches probably know a lot more than someone who has been on Broadway for 10 years, and I don’t want people thinking that if they do a master class with, for example, Sutton Foster, that is not a substitute for getting advice from someone like MTCA). Even those who graduated 5 years ago were in a completely different world than the kids who are in college now/auditioning for programs. I would urge everyone to get an assessment done from someone who knows how competitive the college audition process is, and knows what the schools are looking for.”
@monkey13 Actually, I agree with you on the “what are colleges looking for” component of this. We live very near NYC and the current working professionals are just that - no one we paid – doesn’t include her teachers, etc – just people, of varying ages - probably from late 20s through to late 60s who have successfully made a living from appearing in or producing/music directing MT and who have seen my D perform - no master classes, etc. But you’re right - all the “she will have no problem working” and “why doesn’t she just skip college and start auditioning?” things said do not necessarily translate to the very specific world of success at college auditions and that’s what I’ve learned these past few months. Because we had all these valued opinions, as well as a strong personal background in musical repertoire, etc. I don’t think we quite figured out that “what colleges are looking for” angle of it all - and still haven’t! Probably feel more confused about it now than at the start! Won’t know until the end of this extravaganza how it will all turn out, as haven’t received decisions from the vast majority of schools applied to, and we have a yes and a no thus far, but for the first time I am second guessing the not hiring a coach - which in D’s case wouldn’t have necessarily been for assessment, but would have been for monologue and song choices in the very recent “looking for” realm.