<p>Thanks halflokum-I was thinking of posting it seperate also. We started to get serious about looking at schools her sophmore year and I have stuggled with safties this whole time.</p>
<p>Broadway 95, your best bet to find out about safety and backup schools with MT programs is to go to the 4th thread on this thread list “Big list of MT programs” and read post #2. It ai very comprehensive list, by state, of most of the MT programs in the U.S. You should also read about the last 2 pages of posts that may have some new additions. All the schools on your list are wonderful, but all have hundreds auditioning for them and are very well known. You need to add some on that are not so well known, little gems still in the rough, and that will either not require auditions or have many fewer kids auditioning for them. Good luck!</p>
<p>We used Muhlenberg as a safety - it’s a bit of a reach academically, but we felt like the talent scholarship audition could push her over - and then, for a safety, safety - again because her tests scores aren’t awesome - we picked a non-audition BA theatre (not MT) that we knew she could get into - Drew. Frankly if she didn’t get into any BFAs or Muhlenberg I don’t know if she would have gone there, or would have trained, trained, trained and tried again next year, but we figured we’d want a college option - and Drew is close to NY and is supposed to have a pretty good Drama program - and I KNEW she’d get in academically.</p>
<p>In past years there’s been a “Final Decisions” thread, in which people post their entire list, acceptances and rejections, and the final decision with comments about what criteria drove the decision. You might find that thread interesting!</p>
<p>I searched for last year’s Final Decisions thread, but failed to find it. If anyone finds it, it might be worth posting a link.</p>
<p>^^</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1036114-mt-acceptances-hs-class-2011-college-name.html?highlight=class+of+2011[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1036114-mt-acceptances-hs-class-2011-college-name.html?highlight=class+of+2011</a></p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1036105-mt-acceptances-hs-class-2011-member-name.html?highlight=class+of+2011[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1036105-mt-acceptances-hs-class-2011-member-name.html?highlight=class+of+2011</a></p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1112124-final-decisions-hs-class-2011-college-class-2015-a.html?highlight=class+of+2011[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1112124-final-decisions-hs-class-2011-college-class-2015-a.html?highlight=class+of+2011</a></p>
<p>@alwaysamom!</p>
<p>Thanks! </p>
<p>Unfortunately none of those threads are what I was remembering, as they’re just short lists. I was thinking there was a thread where each person posted the entire list of schools they’d applied to, where they were accepted and rejected, and then a brief discussion of what criteria they used in making their final decision.</p>
<p>Maybe the thread I’m remembering was on the Theatre/Drama board instead of MT, though I remember some MT folks posted there. I’ll keep looking.</p>
<p>Maybe such a thread could be started for MT this year in addition to the short Final Decisions list linked above, as it’s a different format and has additional information that might be useful/interesting to future students like the OP.</p>
<p>Ok… finally found it as it WAS on the Theatre/Drama board, but some of the folks who posted are MT folks as well.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/theater-drama-majors/1096832-class-11-theatre-decisions-thread.html?highlight=momcares[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/theater-drama-majors/1096832-class-11-theatre-decisions-thread.html?highlight=momcares</a></p>
<p>This year maybe we can start a thread with a similar format on the MT board, in addition to the Final Decisions SHORT list, as I think it might be helpful to folks like the OP.</p>
<p>This was D’s info from last year from that thread…</p>
<hr>
<p>Applied to:
…Northwestern, Yale, Brown,
…University of Michigan, CCM, CMU, NYU,
…Penn State, Syracuse, Evansville,
…U of Oklahoma, Emerson, Webste
…University of Washington, Willamette University
Pulled Applications:
…In Dec, pulled all applications after ED to NU
Accepted to:
…Northwestern (ED - BA w/ MT Certificate), Evansville (BFA Perf), Santa Fe (BFA MT)
…University of Washington, Willamette University
Rejected from: None
Waitlisted at: None
Final Decision: Northwestern University (BA/BS dual major w/ MT Certificate hopefully)</p>
<p>Thought process: After falling in love with UMich during MPulse last summer, and getting several early BFA offers after the summer Thespian Festival, D gave serious thought to what she wanted from her college years. She decided she wanted a traditional college experience, including a “real” campus, challenging academics, world-class a cappella groups, the opportunity to double major, PLUS a BFA-style theatre and MT program. She wanted a class size larger than 20 people, and wanted close contact with future writers, directors, designers, straight actors, MTs, etc. She also wanted VERY strong acting training. She found the best fit for her at Northwestern, followed by Yale and Brown.</p>
<hr>
<p>Our original list above wasn’t complete as D also had a couple academic safeties where she was also admitted – University of Washington and Willamette – so I added those (there may have been others, I’ll go back and see if I still have any acceptance letters), plus a bit more info about her criteria.</p>
<p>i totally agree that the hardest part of this process is finding true safeties. I also think if your pocketbook can afford it, looking at schools before the audition can be very valuable. We have seen several schools already (Hartt, BoCo, Roosevelt, Columbia, MMC, U Arts, Temple) and more to come in the next few months.
We discovered that although D initially said she didn’t care at all where she went, as long as she could study MT, she really does care, and had strong reactions (both positive and negative) to some schools which is helping to shorten/modify our very long list. Really seems to prefer an urban environment with tons of diversity. </p>
<p>She did not like the safety we found for her, and it is off the list. It led to a heart to heart about what happens if she does not get in anywhere. She is clear that she will take a gap year and do it all again. However, we (her parents) are still working on finding a college safety.<br>
To me, that is reason enough to at least visit the safety schools and see if your kid could be happy there.</p>
<p>I LOVE Momcares’ idea about having a second thread that lists everyone’s whole “history” in addition to their final decision. It would have been really helpful for us when D was a Junior to see all of that information together in one place. It also really highlights (for most people) just how random and crazy the acceptances and rejections can be as you start to see that there’s no predictable rhyme nor reason why one kid is accepted at UMich and rejected from “Small town University” and someone else is accepted to every program EXCEPT UMich (Just using UMich as an example. Could be CCM, CMU or whatever the flavor of the month is)</p>
<p>But I certainly wouldn’t want it to replace the standard listing of just the final decisions by both school and member name. That’s EXTREMELY helpful (and fascinating).</p>
<p>Who’s going to start??? Anyone made up their mind yet? I know there are a couple of kids who went ED, so their decisions are made! Let’s get this party started!!</p>
<p>My d had a really short list; mostly because she didn’t realize how many schools the average MT applicant applies for. </p>
<p>That said, she definitely wanted to be in or near NYC, as her goal is to live there, so she chose schools there or close by. </p>
<p>Finances were part of it; some schools on her list were eliminated right off the bat because they were just too expensive. </p>
<p>She also chose based on the ability to actively audition while being a student; some colleges do not permit that, at least the freshman year. It was important to her to be able to begin auditioning right way, at least for the experiences, if not an actual job,lol.</p>
<p>We initially had narrowed things down a list of 13 schools (wanted 10 but couldn’t sacrifice any!) But then she did several walk-in auditions at Unifieds, so she ended up auditioning for 17 schools! It was too many.</p>
<p>Baldwin-Wallace
Ball State*
CCM
Coastal Carolina
Hartt*
Montclair
Muhlenberg
Northern Colorado
Otterbein
Rider
Pace
Penn State
Point Park
Santa Fe*
Texas Christian*
Texas State
Western Carolina</p>
<p>*Walk ins</p>
<p>Wow!!! I am glad my d kept her list small,lol.</p>
<p>@tracyvp -</p>
<p>I just started the BACKGROUND Final Decisions thread in case anyone is ready to post there yet. Maybe someone can also add the SHORT LIST Final Decisions thread, as I agree that’s also interesting!</p>