<p>Thanks.......</p>
<p>My d will be auditioning at FSU Nov 14. Anyone else?</p>
<p>Wow...early audition. Good luck! I would love to hear your thoughts on FSU.</p>
<p>Thanks for the good wishes. It's her 1st major college audition. It coincided both with an event for me in Tally and a few days off from school for my daughter, so we jumped on it. I'll report.</p>
<p>OK we're back after a week of visiting. Some of our plans changed but this is my review. Let me stress here that what works for one may not suit another person at all, so these are just reports on how my daughter interacted with the different schools.</p>
<ol>
<li> SUNY Purchase. Loved the area. Beautiful setting. We had a general tour guide from a Sr student who did a fantastic job. He was very informative, yet funny enough to keep our interest. He also answered some tough questions very honestly. The school itself had some very quaint buildings, but also some that looked like they were in need of some renovations. The dorm setup was probably the worst one that we have encountered. The space would be small for 2 but most had 3 freshmen living in them. Community floor bathroom. </li>
</ol>
<p>The dance seemed pretty good. The building was very nice, although I suspect it sold get quite warm in the hotter months. We sat in on one freshman improv class. A little bit out there but the students were into it. The students seemed very nice and answered any questions we had.</p>
<ol>
<li> Fordham (Lincoln Center Campus)/Alvin Ailey Dance We took a guided tour of AA and then toured the campus on our own. AA is intense. We were able to observe several classes through the windows. The building is top notch and very inviting. I did not detect an overly friendly atmosphere. Every one seemed very wrapped up in what they were doing. There also seemed to be a bit of a wall between the students and the AAADT there. Quite a few places that were off limits to the students. Although the tour guide stated that sometimes the "pros" took classes with the students, I just keep getting the feel that there was very little association.<br>
No doubt some great connections would be made by taking class here.</li>
</ol>
<p>This seemed to be much more oriented to ballet then I had first imagined. But this may have just been when we attended. My biggest thought was that if you were going there it might be a bit of a waste to go to school.</p>
<p>The Fordham campus was a pleasant surprise. Enclosed by a wall and iron fences, it seemed like a step into a peaceful respite from the rest of the city. Things looked modern and clean. The few students we talked to were very helpful. It seemed like a very safe place. We did not get to see any dorms there.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>NYU/Tish First of all it took me 3 phone calls and 2 emails and finally leaving a message that my next call would be to the College Chair and/or President to get any response for a tour. And that response was that they could not give one on the day that we were there. After emailing back that we are from our of town and we would be visiting several schools and it would probably be our only chance to visit, they "squeezed" us in on a Friday. The Thursday night before we went to a performance by the students with their Second Avenue Dance Company. We even got there early so we could set in the first row and really observe the dancers. While we could see that there were a couple of very talented individuals, as a whole my daughter did not like the style of dance at all. She was so negative on the performance that she said no way would she go there. We got in late that night and she was not feeling very well, so we canceled the next days tour.</p></li>
<li><p>University of the Arts... After all of the days in NY (where BTW, NY wife's wallet was stolen!) the Avenue of the Arts in Philly seemed like a breath of fresh air. We arrived there on Sunday for a Monday tour. The entire area where UArts is based seemed very nice and clean. It was not overly busy with traffic and people and just projected a very safe, comfortable vibe. WE ran into a girl who we knew that was a Senior there. She had a 4.5 hour rehearsal that Sun night but we arranged to have her show us around after our tour Monday.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The dorms there were some of the most spacious that we have seen. In addition that all had kitchens where the student could take care of their own meals. Some of the buildings were a bit old, but they seemed pretty well kept up and safe. No air conditioning though. My daughter liked the curriculum setup. All students take the same core classes for the first 2 years before concentrating on their area of preference. That assured that everyone would get some training in all of the dance forms. We watched several classes and the students seemed both talented and having fun at the same time. This was our favorite of the 4.</p>
<p>Again let me say that this may be completely different for someone else, and I really don't want to offend anyone who likes some of these colleges or who might attend one. For example at UArts we met another parent/daughter doing the school rounds. We mentioned Cal Arts that we really liked (they were from California) and they said yes it was a great school but it was in the middle of nowhere. We kind of laughed because we had thought the location was perfect (about 30 miles north of LA), so not too crowed.</p>
<p>So that's it until the next saga...</p>
<p>Thanks for your report, pjsss. </p>
<p>I know a couple of dancers who went to Fordham/Ailey. The dance majors also have to take core curriculum classes as well as dance classes, which makes for quite a bit of additional stress, as opposed to a school like UArts, which doesn't have the same educational emphasis.</p>
<p>I know you've already done your east coast visit, but I would just like to add two schools about whom I have heard very good things dance wise: Goucher and Sarah Lawrence.</p>
<p>Goucher has professors who also teach at the prestigious Peabody Institute in Baltimore.</p>
<p>Barnard also has a serious dance department, as do Smith and Mt. Holyoke.</p>
<p>I'm afraid to say this, but I've lived in the NY area all my life, and worked there on many occasions and have not had things stolen. I did have my wallet stolen in Paris though.</p>
<p>My d is a junior at Barnard and is very involved in dance there, though she decided not to major in it. The academics there are quite intense (a plus for my d...she loves neuroscience :) ) but not many places that I know of offer that level of academics along with serious dance training and performance/audition opportunities even while pursuing an academic major. Not for everyone, certainly, but has been ideal for my kid who would love to have performance opportunities (and has done so by pursuing auditions in NYC), but does not plan to make dance her only, or even her primiary, career option.</p>
<p>Just thought there might be others out there with similar interests...</p>
<p>pjssssss...what were some of the tough questions the tour guide answered at Purchase?</p>
<p>Some people asked about drinking, was alcohol allowed in rooms, were there any minority problems, were there any crime problems, the "real" student to teacher ratio, etc. I am sure there are some that I can't remember, but he seemed to give real world answers as opposed to many "everything is perfect here" standard responses. He was very believable. </p>
<p>Don't misunderstand and think that he was giving negative answers, but he was using personal examples and a few common sense "let's be honest" answers. It was one of the better tours that I have taken.</p>
<p>Thanks..i wasn't sure if it was pertaining to dance or just the college in general.</p>
<p>Goucher has a very strong dance dept and is a lovely campus.</p>
<p>We had one guy giving the general college tour and then 2 other girls giving the more specific programs tour. With the latter we went trough a could of programs until we got to the dance. They said we could just stay there and ask questions if we preferred, which we did. I asked one teacher if we could observe her class and she said it was fine. We learned more on our own than we did with the tour.</p>
<p>Having done the college tours a couple of years ago with a special interest in the dance programs, I would advise that anyone looking at dance programs arrange for a tour through the dance program. When we took that approach we usually got to talk with the director of the program, to view dance classes in action, and to talk with dance students. We found this much more informative and helpful in finding the school that might be a good fit. We found if we signed up for a regular tour with the admissions office (particularly at a university) we learned little or nothing about the dance program, though you get information about the dorms and the like, you really should go directly to the dance department to get inormation about that program.</p>
<p>I agree that something should be set up through the dance department, as it will show you much more detail in the dance program. I also think that, if possible, viewing a production by the students is an excellent indicator of the program. </p>
<p>But I also think you should do a general school tour to get a feel for the dorms and general campus life. After all there will be a couple of hours during the day that they are not dancing ;-)</p>
<p>Quick disclaimer - I'm just a highschool senior in a pre-prof dance program, but I've seen a lot of my classmates go on to various colleges to dance.</p>
<p>Have you thought about LINES Ballet's BFA program with Dominican University? It's a pretty new program, but I've trained with most of the faculty members in their pre-professional summer program, and, in my opinion, they are some of the best in the country. </p>
<p>The University of Arizona is also good, especially if you can get classes with Sam Watson. </p>
<p>I'm sorry you had such a miserable experience at NYU. That program has definitely cranked out a bunch of amazing professional dancers, but if it's not what she liked, there's no point looking further, right?</p>
<p>Point Park is also supposed to be decent. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>