How Important Is Theatre Experience For Drama School?

I had an old thread a while ago but I felt like updating the information to fit the current situation.

I’m an aspiring actress who wants to attend drama school, specifically somewhere like NYU, Depaul, or something like that. I have the grades for it (4.0) My performance resume is decent, as I am involved in speech and debate and perform monologues all the time. I’ve found a lot of success with it and am constantly getting judge comments about how I should go into acting. That said, my school has a strong cinematic program and I act a lot in short films and things. The question here is; do I have enough experience to get into a drama school? Or should I take a traditional drama class/ do a school play? My only concern is that high school drama would limit the aforementioned activities I do. Will my unconventional resume stand out positively, or will it be detrimental? Should I pursue a traditional route? Is the audition more important than the resume? Mind you, I can always enlist the help of the drama teacher to prepare my monologues come audition time.

Have you visited the Theatre/Drama and Musical Theatre message boards? They are in the Majors section. You will find lots of information about the process for getting into a drama program.