<p>I was just talking on this topic with a friend last week whose daughter is going into her Junior year at Juilliard now. A 4 or 5 on the AP English or a high score on the SAT II English will get the student out of the English composition courses there–either test will work there. Placing out of subjects would be the only advantage at a conservatory as the credits would not be applied. The AP Music Theory exam will not excuse you from any music theory courses at either colleges or conservatories, but prepping for it will up your scores on placement exams and you could succeed in placing out of conservatory and college music department theory requirements. As others point out, scholarships and teaching assistantships can result.</p>
<p>I feel a bit earnestly about this: kids today are over burdened. If you know you want a conservatory, practice 5-6 hours/day and forget the AP exams.</p>
<p>stringkeymom, my daughter got a message saying that every incoming freshman must take the writing placement exam (although maybe they did not send that message to kids with AP credit.) It seems that you can place out of the basic writing course if you do well on that exam, which from what we can tell seems similar to the writing portion of the SAT or ACT-- a standard five paragraph essay response to a prompt, which they supply to you in advance.</p>
<p>For a dancer, one top conservatory admissions office saw a GED as a sign of commitment. This is very far from an AP regimen! Not that they didn’t appreciate those who did take AP’s and were multi-faceted, just that they did appreciate the spirit in which a student might focus single-mindedly on his or her art.</p>
<p>A top music conservatory told our other child that the purpose of their required submission of an academic paper was just to “make sure applicants could speak English.” However, AP"s of 4 or 5 did take care of some humanities classes there, meaning credit. Again, for admissions it clearly made no difference: the audition was the thing. There was a slight benefit in terms of being able to get credit for classes, which would free up a little time each year.</p>
<p>Colleges vary a lot, and it is good to ask or otherwise look into it. For admissions, it could make a difference. Once there, many schools don’t accept AP for credit. Some allow you to be exempt from an intro course but then the student just has to take a more advance course for the credit, which can actually add to stress and demands on time.</p>
<p>I would vote for no AP’s and focus on music. Although AP Modern European History might be relevant to music studies for those interested in academic music, but that will be covered once there.</p>
<p>Just our experience, for what it’s worth: My son, a jazz guitarist, was mostly interested in university-based music programs at at least a couple of schools where grades/STATs factor in significantly. His progressive private HS does not offer AP’s but does offer many honors courses, so I was a bit concerned about the fact that (due to the high standards he set for himself musically) he only took 1 honors course in four years of high school. He kept his GPA strong, but not perfect.</p>
<p>While perhaps he might have gotten academic merit with more honors and a greater weighted GPA, it not seem to affect his admissions results. And he did receive music merit.</p>
<p>hi, glassharmonica; friend’s daughter took the test and was placed in a horrible writing class. she had not taken the ap’s or sat 2, but heard from friends not in the classes that they had been excused on the basis of college board scores (i think, even a high verbal sat I). she also later learned she could have been excused as she had taken a writing course at her community college. your daughter has had a rather eminent career in journalism and it might be worth a call to the dean of freshmen to see if submitting her portfolio would be sufficient to gain exemption from the horrid writing class.</p>
<p>stringkeymom, the letter from Juilliard starts with this paragraph:</p>
<p>Dear Students,
On behalf of Interdivisional Liberal Arts, I add my welcome to the others you have already received. Juilliard is a wonderful place to learn. I am writing to prepare you for the written placement exam that will be administered between 4 pm and 6pm on Monday, August 30. This test is administered to all entering undergraduate students and to international graduate students to determine your readiness for the Juilliard curriculum. If you are an entering undergraduate, the test will determine where you enter the Liberal Arts curriculum: with a writing course that will prepare you for the Liberal Arts core, or with the first course of the core, Ethics, Conscience, and the Good Life. If you are an international graduate student, the test will determine whether or not you are required to take a writing course in addition to your other courses.
/quote
Either they changed their procedure or they are not admitting that some kids are automatically exempt from the process. I guess we’ll see where she places on the test first.</p>
<p>glassharmonica…EVERY student at Boston University is required to take a freshman writing course. No one is excused from that requirement. BUT some very small %age of students get to take an “upper level” writing course instead of the one that almost everyone else takes. Even though DS got 8 credits for English literature courses because of his AP test score, he STILL had to take the writing placement test AND a freshman writing course. Not sure how other schools deal with this.</p>
<p>Thumper, it varies from school to school, as I learned from my oldest daughter’s college info session. At some schools everyone takes a freshman writing-intensive seminar, no exceptions; other schools allow you to place out. I suspect that in elite schools where every freshman takes a writing seminar, the overall quality of the seminars is more (how to put it?) invigorating, because there is more overall competence among the peer group. The freshman writing-intensive seminars at Penn (where I teach, although I don’t teach freshman writing) are often quite good. The freshman writing classes at my second daughter’s art school are pretty awful. She dropped the class and took it at a local CC this summer-- beyond awful. I hope daughter #3 can place out of the writing class at Jyard, but I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. They’ve already given them a link to the writing prompt. I hope she can write a formulaic and dry 5 paragraph essay that suits them. If not, she’ll have to put in her time in the writing seminar. :)</p>
<p>I just asked my S (who is home for a few blessed weeks!) His experience is many years old now, and his memory is foggy, but he remembers the placement test as very simple and basic, simply proving that he could read and write English, and not significant enough to make him remember it much at all. He had AP language arts, and a high SAT score, but Juilliard was specific back then in saying they did not consider those scores and did not need them to be sent. That may have changed. (We did send them, but he was still required to take the writing test.)</p>