But I don’t think it’s a bad thing that @DrowsyChaperone disclosed her D’s full ride. (I must say, my jaw dropped open and I silently cheered both your D and the WORLD CHAMPION CHICAGO CUBS HOME OPENER at the same time, but I digress.)
I think it’s a good thing that a full ride to such a highly regarded, public Ivy school such as U of M is out there as possibility. It’s a definite long shot for sure - but so is anything in this crazy field. Ya gotta have goals & dreams, right?
Thank you all so much! We are very humbled and thrilled at how it all turned out.
Regarding money, I was not aware that disclosing an offer was a bad thing. In fact, I would think it would let people know that it IS possible to attend schools cheaply; whereas I have been told not even to pursue certain schools because there was “no way” they were giving out any money. We went the route of “go ahead and audition, and we’ll figure it out later…” It just happened to work out well. At the end of the day it depends on your grades, talent, financial need and a few other factors. The info on BW and Texas State is right on their website and public knowledge.
People have routinely disclosed scholarship information, including specific amounts, on this forum as long as I have been a member. I am pretty sure that if my d had received a full ride, I would not have hesitated to mention it.
@HappyDancer98 Your point is exactly why people should share this information … first of all - it’s anonymous … secondly why are we giving the schools the upper hand in everything? If my kid was offered $10,000 but I am hearing every one else is getting $20,000 - that’s valuable information to have in making a decision where to attend.
I agree with that @japbmom! It’s no different than having confidential salaries in the work place. I worked for a very large international law firm who did not publish salaries (and you agreed not to disclose yours when you went to work for them). Some salary ranges have recently been publicized and WOAH I was underpaid It is useful to know what others are being offered.
Also - I think the coaches feel until you have made a commitment to a school - don’t share information on social media as you don’t want another school to see you received an offer and scholarship as they may choose to not offer you a spot based on that. Once the commitment is made though - I’m all for putting it all out there.
Yes, @japbmom and @artskids, it’s good to know for sure but that information can be shared via private message. The MT world is small. Of course, different strokes for different folks, but I stand by my advice.
@HappyDancer98 I respectfully disagree about not disclosing specific information.
Recently there has been a push to change the culture of the wok place–specifically for woman, minorities and those just starting their careers. By discussing salaries, workers gain an edge for negotiation. When workers do not communicate their salaries, you are giving an advantage to employers. How would woman know if they are underpaid for the same position as a white male in a culture that says don’t say a word about your pay? How would someone new to the field understand that they are being vastly underpaid?
Along the same vein, legislation is being considered so that employers cannot ask or find out one’s current salary–since that, too, keeps people pigeon -holed in jobs and unable to break out to get higher wages if they are underpaid.
With that in mind, people should discuss scholarships so that they can perhaps negotiate–or at the very least have realistic expectations–about the range of assistance. With that, people also need to be informed and understand that there are many factors that go into those numbers. They need to know that some numbers are pure merit aid–available to all, and that some numbers might be effected by need.
BTW–my older D who graduated from NYU Steinhardt MT class of 2012 is going back to NYU Stern for her MBA and received a full tuition scholarship. And I will tell EVERYONE who cares to hear how she got it–not to brag, but to help others get a $150,000 windfall!
I see no problem whatsoever in sharing scholarship amounts on a message board about colleges, if one wishes to. Some of this sort of information about need based aid and merit scholarships is even posted on some colleges’ own websites. I really don’t believe that colleges would mind if someone told others what they received. And do we really care that a college wants that to be a secret? I don’t. But I really don’t believe it is meant to be a secret anyway. In any case, sharing aid received and scholarships received has been done on College Confidential on its many message boards in the 15 years I have been on the site!
Congrats to DrowsyChaperone’s daughter on her acceptances and scholarships. I didn’t know that UMich offers full rides, but perhaps she is a Michigan resident. In any case, she done good!
Now that I think about it, my d’s public PA HS published all of the scholarships that their students received in the graduation program - they listed the specific dollar amounts that each student received from each school. Their graduation ceremony is a big deal and they fill most of the 2,900 seat downtown theatre where it is held - they certainly don’t seem worried about any stigmas about confidentiality in the arts community (and they are the second-oldest PA HS in the US). They pride themselves on the amount of scholarships received by their students each year.
This is a good discussion @uskoolfish, @japbmom and @artskids. I appreciate all the input. This CC world isn’t as anonymous as we all might think. Class sizes are small, and it’s not that hard to connect the dots and there are students on this board. I don’t hear of students sharing their scholarship details at school and I think there are good reasons for this.
Negotiating a salary in a workplace cannot be compared to negotiating a discretionary scholarship in a musical theatre program. Those scholarships are based on talent, type or specific needs of the program, all very grey areas, just as we know admission to a given program is very grey, very subjective, often difficult to understand. It’s not the same as hiring a lawyer in a firm with X amount of years of environmental litigation experience, for instance. I think it’s enough to know that a school gives scholarships that can make it affordable for a given family and that you can negotiate with the college or university to find your sweet spot. I’m all for sharing that information. But I don’t think sharing the AMOUNTS of a scholarship on a forum is going to help any other student get a better deal. Maybe some of you know of specific instances where this has helped in MT. I don’t know of any. Again, I think private messaging, on an as-needed basis, is the better way to go.
I wouldn’t disclose financial info to that extent ( I.e specific amounts of what was received in aid etc) on this forum but that’s just me. I agree private messaging is probably best. I don’t think it would really help someone to get more money from a school, knowing someone else got a full ride etc. I mean my daughter got into a school that her friend that is a guy also got into and I’m friends with the mom and I didn’t ask her how much they were offered in scholarship money and she didn’t ask me either. I didn’t bring it up because I have a feeling we got more offered to us and I was afraid of hurting her / her sons feelings.
It seems some take issue with my assertion that MT programs don’t like the scholarship dollar amounts shared in a public forum like this. Perhaps you’re right and they don’t care and perhaps it doesn’t matter if they care, as @soozievt asserts, but I don’t think it’s a good idea, and I don’t think it helps anyone in this process. Again, these are very small programs, this is a VERY subjective process, these are teens, and the MT world is very small. You can’t liken it to an MBA scholarship nor a scholarship to some other undergrad program, where the program numbers are larger and the scholarships are based on more objective criteria. Finally, in my opinion, publishing scholarship dollars in some school’s graduation program does not have the same reach as CC and shouldn’t be used as justification for sharing those amounts on this forum.
Honestly, that’s all I’ve got on this topic but it’s good to hear everyone’s views on this. CC is good for these discussions. Thanks for chiming in!
It’s super fun reading the Final Decision Thread, hearing all the stories and CONGRATULATIONS on getting here! That’s a HUGE accomplishment!
@HappyDancer98 The admissions process is very subjective–it is not just MT–although MT is one the way high side for subjectiveness.
Personally, I think the more knowledge you get heading into a process, the more you can anticipate the outcome. And the more you can anticipate something, the more you can make educated decisions and plan for certain outcomes.
Personally, I would rather hear that someone got a $15K a year Presidential Scholarship–knowing that that was a realistic expectation for high merit aid, than hear people talk vaguely about getting a “top” scholarship or lots of money.
In the first scenario, it would allow me to see that even with a top scholarship, I would still need to pay $50K a year to a school. In the second scenario, I might apply, hope for a lot more and be very disappointed with my outcome.
Yes, there are aid calculators and Common Data Set and sometimes published awards–but sometimes it can be helpful to hear about the process from parents who are here as a community trying to help one another.
So by all means, do whatever you feel comfortable with. But I personally don’t think it is necessary to appeal to the CC community to heed your warning.
I think part of the issue in these conversations has been the concern of disclosing to much finical info or personal info about a family or a child. I suspect that those who get major changes in scholarship packages know this is an option without checking out any internet sites…ie they are so in high demand that the schools are calling:) On all the school websites we could pretty quickly figure out our potential merit aid, the talent was harder. When someone talks about their talent money on an internet site like CC how can you as a prospective student use that information? All the rest of the money is laid out on every college website. I agree the more info the better but the financial stuff, at least in my experience is right there on all the schools website, public or private. They are vague on the talent part… but not sure you can do anything about that:) I have to say, some people have talked about negotiating better scholarships, but they did that not based on what they knew others had but in a frank call about we can not afford to come here can you give us any more support conversation with the school.
It’s a tough call about sharing the $$. Most academic scholarship amounts are listed on websites a long with the requirements to qualify, so no secrets there. Honors scholarships often depend on an essay or interview and can vary in amount but not by much - and again they are generally published on websites. Colleges have a pretty set formula for academic scholarships so once you get one, the amount isn’t very negotiable. You can write an appeal letter and even provide them with offers that other colleges gave you, but you aren’t going to go from $10 or $15,000 to a full-tuition scholarship.
But I don’t think anyone has an issue with sharing academic scholarship awards. You hear that someone with an outstanding academic record got a lot of money, and your response is: well my kid didn’t get that because his/her grades were not that good, and you move on.
The tricky ones are those whimsical talent awards. Subjective? Yes, to a degree. But on the other hand, I think that most of us know the comparative talent levels of our kids - having watched them develop over the years. And having seen and heard many other student performers. So we can predict the likelihood of them getting a huge talent award, verses a modest one. Some of this is also published on websites, but amounts are usually wide ranges so you just don’t know – and again, it’s subjective.
So, I think the issue here is that knowing that someone else got a huge talent award to lure them to a college when our kid didn’t get much makes us feel cheated just a little. Because really, that college is saying to the awardee “You are so talented that you are more valuable to us than another student.” And maybe, that makes us feel a little jealous too. It’s just human nature. Is that any reason for those lucky talented ones NOT to share their good news? Maybe we’re just being over-sensitive about this.
What about athletes? Lots of colleges give full rides to athletes - almost without consideration of their gpa’s and I’ve never heard anyone criticizing those kids for telling about their scholarships.
Why should it be any different when the talent isn’t catching a ball, but singing or dance or acting?
I’m not trying to say what is right or what should or shouldn’t be posted here. I’m just sharing my rambling thoughts here because it’s the middle of night and no one else is up at my house. Your welcome.
I was very specific in my postings that I believe there is nothing to be gained from sharing AMOUNTS of talent awards. I have ZERO trouble with sharing scholarships based on academics/GPA formulas, etc. And, I think many, most, on here give advice and warnings about how to proceed in this environment because it’s a difficult one and every reader has the power to heed the advice given, or not, because that’s all it is --advice from one human, and, in this case, this is my advice based on my life experience.
It is useful to know what others are being offered.
