Good College List?

College Majors Visual Arts and Film Majors
1

<p>D is currently a junior and plans on becoming an art teacher. She has always wanted to teach, and has decided that art is the subject she enjoys the most and wants to be involved with full-time. Her goal would be to teach on the high school level if possible.</p>

<p>She has shown her portfolio at Nat'l Portfolio Day and has taken portfolio development classes at both Pratt and FIT. She has gotten positive reponse from several schools. She attended the NYSSSA program last summer at Fredonia College and loved it. She felt her work was in the mid-range of talent, but I believe she was being hard on herself.</p>

<p>She can either try for an art education program on the undergrad level, or become a (fine) arts major for undergrad and immediately enroll in an art education master's program...preferably as a 5th year option. </p>

<p>She is also a talented singer and actress. Because she has always had the label of being a music and drama kid (it is a whole social network in her high school), she feels slightly unsure of how she would fare in a super intense art-school only environment (like SVA). I think for her it is a matter of wearing a different label ("the artist") and feeling secure with her talent in art. For that reason she is primarliy focusing on schools that offer art education (she feels it is more like a double major and that she will find more like-minded students with similar goals) or liberal arts schools with strong art programs. </p>

<p>She will probably have about a 90 average (weighted) with honors classes or AP classes in the humanities and social sciences.</p>

<p>Her latest SAT score is 560 math (trying to break 600), 590 writing (should be much higher--scored a 710 on the PSAT) and a 670 in reading.</p>

<p>Her ACT is a 29 combined with a 35 in English, 24 in math, 27 in Science and 29 in reading. She will probably get recognition as a National Hispanic scholar. (Grandmother is Argentinian.)</p>

<p>She is taking both tests again.</p>

<p>Her current list (in no particular order) is:</p>

<p>Pratt, NYU, Skidmore, BU, New Paltz, Goucher, Syracuse, Brandeis, FIT, Parsons (?), GW and American.</p>

<p>I welcome all imput in terms of your knowledge of these schools/ programs/ student-body as well as your thoughts on any other schools that are not on our list. She would prefer to have access to a city or nice town.</p>

<p>Thank you!</p>

2

<p>One thought, without knowing your personal circumstances, but if she definitely wants to teach I would suggest avoiding the high priced private schools and/or pick the school with the lowest tuition fees. As a beginning teacher the lower debt load she carries the better.</p>

3

<p>USK!!
long time no see
how you(rself) been?</p>

<p>I have only one concern, I mean she’d get in all and pick and choose.
when I was digging, teaching license had some binderies between states, like SMFA would award Mass license that somewhat work in NY, UNCG would work only in the south kind of thing.
where does your D eventually wants to live/teach?
If private school, anything a go, I bet you don’t even need license but public schools, esp NYC system is like morasess mountain in the candy land. They’d prefer homegrown (Hunter, Bklyn, Queens cuny grad school) art-ed teachers, not an “artist” -mening team players, picket keepers, good union members, and never retire until can’t function(doesn’t mean can’t make art-they are far gone, but don’t budge.
might make your D’s life miserable.
I did not know that teaches had to deal with more with system than kids, and there their energy would be sucked into.
just 2cents from my nosy spying stories.</p>

4

<p>smarty, you beat me AGAIN!!!</p>

5

<p>hi usk
I missed you listed AU
have you been following this?
there this (very) devoted art mom named cadmiumred, who is actually a legit art mom from years back in this forum, is causing havoc. and this mom/dad pair shared poster named bully mini (music parents) the way they went on and on in old AU thread then, this new one made me wonder whole AU business. No I never visited nor interested in until I bumped into this thread looking at something else.
gawd
I thought taxguy VS rainingagain was fierce enough…</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/american-university/809150-new-au-parents-thread.html?highlight=cadmiumred[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/american-university/809150-new-au-parents-thread.html?highlight=cadmiumred&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

6

<p>uskoolfish - As I was reading your post, I was thinking Syracuse and was glad to see it on the list. It sounds like your D has diverse interests and the list you have includes schools where she could take courses outside of the visual art curriculum. If you have not already consulted it, you may want to pick up a copy of the Peterson’s guide for visual art majors. When my D was a Junior, we used it to help ID schools with the right kind of campus, size, location, cost, etc. Even then, schools we had on the top of our list at the end of Jr year, didn’t make the list for applications. I didn’t find the College Board site much help for selection, but did use it to get all the background criteria (ave SAT scores and such) together for comparison.</p>

7

<p>Hi! Thanks for your responses!</p>

<p>As of right now, D would probably want to live in NYC and would work there or commute to the surrounding suburbs for a job. But she is only 16 and who know what happens later? She does love the city and has enjoyed our suburban Long Island area. She isn’t one of those kids who wants to get as far away from home as possible.</p>

<p>As for our circumstances, I would love to pay less rather than more, but since older D is at NYU studying vocal performance (she has an $11K merit scholarship)…I have already shot myself in the foot by letting oldest do the private school thing. I want younger D to be open minded, and consider a program like New Paltz, but I can’t totally discount privates (hopefully with some merit aid.)</p>

<p>Bears and Dogs: I have read cadmiums posts on American, but was not sure what to think about all those posters. Mini, etc. would say unbelievably cruel things, but cadmium kept coming back for more abuse! Also, older D got over $22K in merit aid from American but we walked away from it because the music head kept talking about all the red tape and how her ideas were not happening. So I do take American with a grain of salt in terms of their arts programs.</p>

<p>I do have Petersen Guide and have found it helpful. I was hoping to get some poster’s first hand experiences with some of the schools and programs if possible. There is a real overlap between schools that are good for music and those that are strong in art. So we have visited many of these schools, but through the lens of a potential music student.</p>

<p>I do agree that going to local grad programs seems to be what NYC/ Long Island school are looking for. I myself went to Hunter for grad school when I switched to teaching as a second career.</p>

<p>Right now I am mostly concerned that the program will be strong enough for her to be challenged, but not too stressful that she gets overwhelmed. I want a school that is an overall good fit for her.</p>

8

<p>Hello, other’s may know more than me, but my S was considering the 5 year combined BFA/MEd at MICA. I think they have some hispanic scholarship money, but it may be need based.</p>

9

<p>You should already know for sure about the hispanic scholar designation… If not, then contact the college board immediately because the GUIDANCE counselor had to know that your D had a Argentinian grandma and confirm this with the college board. It isn’t enough to just check the box when kid takes the test. Talk to your GC and check out the hispanic students forum on CC …entomom is the guru and will be quick to tell you how to get your D’s designation corrected. Do not delay. </p>

<p>Big money for national hispanic scholar available…big…so go for it–15,000 at RIT just for getting the designation! I don’t know whether RIT offers the teacher cert program or not. OSU --OOS tuition waiver for some kids, etc. My son also was intrigued by the MICA 5 year program that they boast has 100% placement (but may take 20 years to pay off debt) but I think that is often placement in college setting not k-12. What about Temple? Great art school, good university, millions of inner city public schools desperate for art students/teachers to volunteer.</p>

<p>My son’s ex gf is doing the dual education/BFA at Virginia Commonwealth University and is loving it. She started volunteering her first semester at a school in Richmond (like philly–big, poor inner city population) and built some huge sculpture with the kids. She worked at an art summer camp this past year and will have an impressive teaching/camp resume by the time she leaves which will give her a leg up on other graduates in a very competitive field…there is so little demand for art teachers…1/2, one or two per school. Her sister is doing an MA at VCU in special ed working with autistic kids and they have an MS program with therapeutic art. </p>

<p>All my son’s art teachers have seemed some of the most professionally satisfied people I have met. His hs art teacher was an investment banker for a few years, quit and is now a decently paid public school teacher --teaches Art II, IB Art and IB Art History with 2 planning periods per day. She does her own art on the side and can go home to Japan every summer. </p>

<p>If your D applies by Dec 1, VCU has quite a few scholarships including waiving OOS tuition and they love to have kids from other parts of the country. I don’t know if it was the hispanic designation or a killer essay but S got a full tuition waiver and into the honors program. My son was really torn between CMU and VCU…the deciding factor was the engineering/robotics program at CMU because he wants to do a dual major or minor in these areas and, frankly, VCU has a lousy engineering program. If he had been interested in the dual BFA with teaching cert he would have chosen VCU in a heartbeat.</p>

10

<p>Sounds like New Paltz would be a perfect fit for her. It has a great art education program as well as excellent studio arts and the student body will be, for the most part, the offbeat theater/music/art types she is used to. </p>

<p>My son is in the art school here, so if you have any questions feel free to ask.</p>

11

<p>Hi Fineartsmom…D is a junior, so she just got her PSAT score in December. She scored 192. My understanding is that the cutoff for NY is 184. I expect that guidance will be notified this spring in terms of her designation and that we get confirmation some time later. At our junior meeting with her guidance counselor, we showed him husband’s birth certificate which shows his mom’s place of birth as Argentina. I am hoping I am not missing anything in terms of the timeline of events. Let me know if I am.</p>

<p>I will look into VCU. </p>

<p>Lilymoon, New Paltz is high on her list. We visited last spring and I was very impressed with it. Liked the town and the fact that it is not too far from NYC and home on Long Island. </p>

<p>D’s top choice may still be NYU–especially since D1 goes there and she has had a taste of what it is like to live in the city. Not sure if her grades will be strong enough…and hard to judge her portfolio at this point. She just applied for their summer arts intensive, so that will probably give us an indication.</p>

<p>She is also very interested in Pratt, but we had to cancel our visit there this week because she was sick and we didn’t want to do it in teeming rain.</p>

<p>Thanks all!</p>