I am sorry you have to go through this , it is one of the biggest problems with music out there, where it can be very, very hard to get good advice and answers, in large part because there is nothing concrete with music admissions, and also that to be blunt, a lot of teachers, whether in-school or private teachers, don’t really know what is required out there for admissions and such, but think they do. For example, if they told you that scoring high in the state all state program would count heavily towards scholarships and such, that tells me they don’t necessarily know the reality. With merit scholarships and admittance, it is all going to come down to your playing ability and usually, financial need as determined by the school (which may or may not reflect reality, but that is another story). All State programs are not necessarily a good indicator of how you will do in terms of admission or scholarships even from a playing level, it totally depends on the state and the quality of the students in it, in some states the top notch music students heading towards music school may not even participate, so you can’t know how good that puts you vis a vis the rest of the students auditioning.
GlassHarmonica is also right, that music scholarships are very, very hard to judge. At more than a few schools, both regular and merit aid are tied to financial need, so even a very talented student may not get a lot of aid. It sounds like from your description you are paying for this by yourself, that your family either can’t contribute or won’t, and the only thing I can suggest is to talk to the schools, explain the situation, and see what they will do. In cases where a family has the means but won’t pay for school, the only way I believe for a student to get more aid would be to declare themselves totally on their own, but that has I suspect a lot of strings to it.
The real question as to you making it really depends on a lot of factors, and it would be premature to count yourself out at this point. First of all, it depends on the instrument and the type of music, parameters are going to be different for someone studying classical violin and someone who is a jazz violinist; a pure orchestral instrument, like a tuba or bassoon, is going to be a different experience than a solo one, it all depends, if you happen to be on an instrument the school needs for its orchestra that is relatively rare, like an English Horn, it might make a big difference with aid then if you are let’s say on violin.
Okay, so you are pulling yourself back together, what do you do? First of all, as hard as it is, don’t let the reactions of your school music department and your private teachers get you down (and yes, it is hard, in some ways it has taken several years for my S to get over some of the negative things from his primary teacher). If they are counting on you to ‘make a name’ for themselves, that is not a good sign, for a lot of reasons, among which teachers first interest should be in helping their students achieve what they can. As we used to say in da old neighborhood “Consider the source”. Personally, the teachers you are talking about should be embarrassed, either they don’t know what the reality is out there and/or they didn’t prepare you well for it.
Secondly, the most important thing IMO is to try and get an idea where your skills are on your particular instrument to see what is going on. If there is a music college nearby with a decent reputation, could you arrange an assessment with one of the teachers there? Or is there are private teacher nearby who has a great reputation? I realize that money may be an issue, but you need to know where you stand. You didn’t mention the programs you got into, but for example, there are a lot of music schools out there of varying levels of competitiveness, and if hypothetically all the programs someone gets accepted at are 2nd or third tier, and they don’t get merit aid, it might reflect on what level they are on (I am saying hypothetically because I am not talking about you, the OP,). Plus if you decide you want to take a gap year to get stronger, you need to know what to work on, what the high points are, the low points and everything in between. There is no shame in doing a gap year, a lot of kids do it to get into the programs they wish to or get more merit aid and such.
It would be helpful to know more about yourself, OP. What instrument do you play? What kind of music are you applying for (you could have done all state orchestra and be applying for jazz)…that might help others give you more information.
