<p>mcpcwhite - you mentioned callbacks that came out of the Thespian Festival. We had another thread that talked about different festivals, and those of us who don’t have these near by - our family included - were fascinated by this! So what did those callbacks mean? Does your son now set up an audition at these schools, or are the schools saying, if he applies, he will be admitted? Are they more like a pre-screening opportunity?</p>
<p>Hi Marbleheader— the callbacks at Thespian Festival vary in their purpose, is what we’ve learned. For instance, he received some immediate offers upon returning home from less selective schools such as St. Mary’s, South Dakota, William Woods, Santa Fe, AADA and AMDA. It is essentially a prescreening for higher tier schools like Hartt and Roosevelt - both of whom interviewed him on the spot and invited him to campus. He spent the better part of day with faculty from these schools and therefore was a great opportunity to forge relationships, get advice, etc. He has stayed in touch with faculty he met through email, and so far it has been very encouragaging with regard to his prospects at their schools. In one instance, it meant he did not have to audition on campus at all, only come to interview with other faculty. I would say it was worthwhile, for sure, but I don’t know of anyone who got a top-tier school offer on the spot – I don’t think it works like that at all.</p>
<p>Well, that still sounds great! As you said, he can make an impression by meeting with faculty, etc. And of course it will help him make the best decision when he finally picks a school - being invited to campus, meeting faculty members, hearing about the classes. </p>
<p>Best of luck to your son!</p>
<p>Here is a question about time limits on monologues, especially for parents who have been through this process. Some schools are very clear that time limits will be strictly upheld. Other schools just list the time limits. Although it would appear very clear that students should adhere to the time limits, in terms of schools that require very short monologues (such as one minute), do students tend to go over and do schools let it go? I am in the process of overthinking and wondering how much a student’s chances are hurt if they are really cutting a monologue down to size if schools aren’t that picky and if others are not doing the same. Thoughts?</p>
<p>Don’t go over the limit. The auditors are hearing hundreds of people, and they can get a sense of you in a surprisingly short time. Having a short monologue can help you get yourself across more clearly. And they’re looking for professionalism–which is to say, for people who do what is asked.</p>
<p>Agreed with Gwen–NEVER go over the time limit. Never, for any reason. If your monologue is longer, and you still want to use it, you can cut it so it reads less than a minute. Practice the short version too. But whatever you do, stay within the time limits and follow ALL rules. Basically, going over the time limit is a surefire way of telling the panel, “I’m not a professional and I don’t care about your rules.”</p>
<p>I would agree w/ Gwen - if a school has stipulated that they are strict w/ time constraints, abide by them. We’ve had 3 kids go through the process and only once was somebody present with a stopwatch at an audition. But it was good for our son to know going into that room that he was accurate with his time. We found that if you are a few seconds over at the other schools where they don’t overemphasize time limits, most will let you continue. Since so many schools are doing prescreens now, it seems that the oncampus audition groups are smaller and so there could be some flexibility for a few seconds over. I would imagine that there would be less flexibility at a Unified audition where the number of auditions is high thereby creating a time crunch. However, comfort translates into confidence which is critical in an audition. I would think it would be tougher to perform under the stress that you might run over the time limit. Instead, perhaps you can shoot for a different monologue that is short enough in its origin. Once you have to omit and shorten things a lot, it’s possible to affect the language, rhythm, etc. of the piece which won’t show the monologue in its best light anyway. </p>
<p>Finally, Gwen is right - following direction/instructions properly is key in this industry. Any student will appear more professional and “acceptable” if they can abide by the school’s guidelines for the audition.</p>
<p>Thanks for all of the comments. I figured that was the right answer, but I was starting to worry that cutting a monologue down to size, if others are not doing so, creates a disadvantage for those paying attention to the time constraints. You know how this goes, just something else for parents to obsess about!! But Gwen you bring up a really good point, they probably know really quickly whether they like you or not anyway. Thanks everyone!!</p>
<p>Waiting for pre-screen results is killing me. One school turned it around in less than 2 days, the other 2 are now 10 days in. I know it has to do with the Thanksgiving break, but it is tough going here! We really want to make plane reservations and have all our ducks in a row. Just needed to vent!</p>
<p>Vent away! It seems like such a cruel thing to make us all wait - if it’s for pre-screening results, actual acceptances, SAT scores, all of it! So many check lists, so many other people handling things we’d rather handle ourselves.</p>
<p>I’m just really thankful that there are so many parents/students who went through this in past years who are quick to remind us that they did survive it all! LOL! I guess we will too. Hang in there, Shaun!</p>
<p>shaun0203,</p>
<p>If you do not hear from a school a week beyond their estimated time frame for their decision, I would respectfully call or email the department to be sure communications are going through. Last year our son had to prescreen for two schools. With the larger school he heard back in a normal amount of time by email that he’d passed. The smaller school took a bit longer and, since he had seen that his prescreen audition had been viewed many times, he finally called the department. They apologized and said he’d been sent an email a while ago that he’d passed, but it never showed up, not even in junk mail. He was glad he called as the audition was in December and we had to book the flight immediately.</p>
<p>Break a Leg to all of you as you go through your audition season!</p>
<p>Thanks abparent, we will call on Monday!</p>
<p>Enjoying the discussion. I’ve been out of the loop helping D schedule auditions. We have three left to schedule, waiting on the colleges to reply after she submitted her applications. Still waiting on Michigan, Cincinatti CCM and Ithaca. She’s going for acting BFA programs, so I have great respect for all of the additional demands on you MT folks. Does anyone have experience with how flexible colleges are at unifieds if you’re tied up at one school and are running late? We plan to attend both Chicago and LA unifieds.</p>
<p>Their process may have changed, but when my daughter auditioned at Chicago Unifieds two cycles ago, the Ithaca audition was a 4 hour time slot, but what they actually did was meet with kids and parents and then just kids for a total of about an hour; before they dismissed the kids, they gave them their individual time slot and told them to be back around that time. As long as they were back before the end of the 4 hours, it was not a problem if they were a bit late - they would go to the next person who was there. The audition order was based on when you scheduled your audition. </p>
<p>In general, the schools are flexible - they know kids have multiple auditions and when schools get behind, there’s a domino effect. If you are going with your D and she is held up in one audition that will make her late to the next, you can go to the next school and let them know that she’s running behind. We found it helpful to scope out the audition rooms the night before so we didn’t have the added stress of navigating the Palmer House maze.</p>
<p>Heartsongmom, we were able to schedule the Ithaca audition before the application materials were sent. We called in August or whenever the schedule was first posted and they scheduled over the phone. You might try calling. One less school to wait on.</p>
<p>^^Yes, unless something has changed, Ithaca is a school that allows you to schedule an audition before you send in your application, and so you should call and schedule one as soon as possible.</p>
<p>One other tip which the mention if Ithaca made me think of. Sometimes being really on top of things and scheduling early doesn’t always give you the full picture of a school’s audition schedule. Ithaca was one of the most challenging auditions for us to figure out how to fit in. When I spoke to them early in the game, they made it seem like they would be leaving LA on the last day of Unifides at mid-day which meant we couldn’t catch them there. (Couldn’t get to Unifides at all except to fly down that morning). In the end it turns out they were there the entire day which I guess they decided to do later in the process. Had we known that, we could have avoided having to do an on-campus audition at Ithaca which if you look at a map, is not an easy place to get to for a one-off audition from the west coast (well, from anywhere for that matter). Schedules can change. If you are early in making your arrangements and the dates don’t work, keep checking especially with respect to how long they will be at Unifides. That is probably somewhat demand driven.</p>
<p>You can definitely schedule Ithaca before applying, but they want your application to be submitted before the actual audition takes place. Hope that’s helpful and not confusing. ;)</p>
<p>Our scheduling for unifieds is a little screwed up. D is going to call to get a few things moved around tomorrow hopefully. We are hoping to reschedule a dance audition. Does anybody know or have experience that the dance portion of an audition can be on a different day than the vocal/acting portion?</p>
<p>Our experience would agree with halflokum - if you checked audition locations and dates early on - check them again. My S went to LA unifieds last year and originally Pace was not coming to LA - they only had on campus auditions. Fortunately we went back to the website later last fall and Pace had added two days in LA (not officially part of the unifieds but in a nearby location). Also, I have seen comments about LA only being two days - and this may be the case for official “unifieds” but last year my S auditioned over 4 days in LA. Several schools (including CMU, BoCo, NYU, Penn State…) were auditioning for at least 3 days and NYU was in LA for a total of 6 days (additional days also added at a later date in the fall). </p>
<p>@ Walker1194 - it may depend on the school but Pace did allow my S to split his audition over two days due to his audition schedule. The vocal/acting call was one afternoon and the dance call the following morning.</p>