Wondering if any Canadians (or other international students) on here who have enrolled in competitive US MT BFA programs could discuss experience with financial aid? Not eligible of course for US federal aid, and unless some miraculous talent award or academic money, our journey might be over before it begins, just SO expensive for us. I see Berklee has one full ride scholarship just for Canadians but not transferable to BoCo (I checked). Wondering if anybody has other experience or information that they could share?
Hi CanaDad! I went through the audition process about 5 years ago, and wound up at Viterbo University. The strategy that worked for my family was to apply only to schools where the total COA was under 40k yearly before scholarships (ideally under 35k, but to be honest, that wouldn’t even be possible at Viterbo these days). Additionally, I had excellent academic stats and only applied to schools where I knew I was going to get good merit aid (in the $5-10k range). I’m not going to lie, it meant that my list looked VERY different from some of my friends’, and it meant leaving off a LOT of excellent programs. I would suggest looking at EmsDad’s post on what schools with well-known MT programs give the best merit aid (here: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/musical-theater-major/1745140-which-schools-give-the-best-merit-aid-another-freakonomics-post-p1.html). It’s a few years old, but it’s a great starting point.
Also, I fully recommend trying to negotiate with financial aid by leveraging other offers. I was able to get a few thousand dollars more out of my financial aid office by coming to them with an offer from another school where I was awarded a larger merit scholarship.
Thanks for the input! One of our concerns also is whether or not the US training and connections is worth it, especially as I would see Canadians at a disadvantage for MT jobs without a US work visa post graduation. If you didn’t mind, I’d love your input on that too, as you’ve been through the process…
And when these boards refer to merit aid, does that mean academic grades/test scores, or “talent” money?
Merit aid mentioned in individual posts here on CC generally refers to academic awards. However, the university-wide, average numbers that you can find by researching on college data dot com include both academic and talent awards (“non-need based merit awards”), i.e., the numbers listed in this thread:
Talent awards are much more difficult to estimate and forecast than academic merit.
Great info, thanks for all your work putting it together.
Merit aid is academic money. Talent money would be separate. Be aware that some schools will let you combine (commonly called “stack” here) merit aid and talent aid, and some schools will not. Additionally, be aware that though @EmsDad has done a FANTASTIC job mining common data sets to find average merit aid amounts, in some cases, international students are NOT eligible for the same merit scholarships that domestic students are. You’ll want to check that closely as you build a list.
Whether or not it’s worth it is a complicated question! Broadly, I don’t know that I would have gone to the US if I knew that I was going to incur student debt (this is part of the reason why I chose one of the least expensive private universities in the US. Full disclosure: I do not have student debt. I know that I am VERY fortunate and that this is not the norm). The fact of the matter is that many Canadians who go to the US to get a degree in MT will eventually return to Canada, and when they do, they will probably be living in Toronto or Vancouver (I have friends making a living working in theatre in Montreal, Halifax, and Calgary, but nowhere near the amount of people who are making a living in Toronto or Vancouver). With housing costs being what they are in Toronto and Vancouver, I wouldn’t even want to imagine trying to pay rent and pay down debt. I definitely don’t think that the degree is worth it if the student debt you incur to get it means that you don’t have the financial freedom/security to take a low-paying theatre job as you establish yourself in your chosen market.
However…My experience in the US was fruitful for me. I got good training at my university that I felt prepared me well for the industry. I had the opportunity to double major in Arts Administration, which made the experience of going to the US a lot more valuable for me than had I just come down here for MT (my arts admin degree makes me very employable). I had the opportunity to take internships at major regional theatres in the US (both in performance and administration), internships which led to further full-time employment–I booked a national tour before graduation. Is that going to be everyone’s experience? No. And is it frustrating when I walk into audition rooms in Toronto and most people don’t recognize the names on my resume, that the connections I’ve spent years building can’t help me as much on the Canadian side of the border as they would if I were still in the States, or that my EMC points that I’ve earned at US theatres mean nothing? Absolutely. A degree in MT from the States does not give you a leg up in Canada. But I do believe that I will still be successful in Canada if I keep at it–which, really, is not different from what my Viterbo classmates are experiencing as they move to New York/Chicago/etc and try to establish themselves. I think if you want to go to the US for a degree, you have to know what you want out of it and how that’s different from what you could get from a Canadian MT or acting program, and temper your expectations that you will be able to stay in the US post-graduation.
That said, when you are on a student visa in the US, when you graduate you are generally eligible for 12 months of Optional Practical Training (OPT)–work authorization to be used in the field of your study. I was not eligible for OPT (because my national tour interfered with my eligibility–I am not the norm, however), but many of my friends used it to work at regional theatres in the US for a year before returning to Canada. Additionally, once you get your Canadian Equity card, CAEA and AEA have a reciprocal agreement that allows CAEA members to work on Equity contracts in the US. From CAEA’s website:
I will say that most of my friends who have worked on P-2 visas in the US as CAEA members have paid for the visas themselves, rather than having their employer pay.
I don’t know that I would do it all over again if I were applying today. I wouldn’t trade the work experiences that I’ve had as a result of my US education for anything, and for that it’s been worth it, but I also know that I went to the US for a very specific reason–I wanted professional training within the context of a broader liberal arts education. When I was applying for MT programs in 2013 and 2014, the Canadian MT post-secondary options that were available to me were Sheridan, St. Clair, St. Lawrence, and to a lesser extent, Dalhousie (I didn’t want to go out west for university, although I know there are similar programs in Alberta and BC). The first three programs were pretty much exclusively conservatory-style training, and I knew I would drive myself crazy if I went to school for 3 or 4 years and had to focus solely on musical theatre and couldn’t take an English class or something. Going to the US, at the time, was the only way I could get the “well-rounded education” I was looking for. Now? Take the new joint program between Queen’s and St. Lawrence, where you do your first two years at St. Lawrence in conservatory-style MT training, and your last two years at Queen’s in a more liberal arts environment, and you receive a degree (not just a diploma) from Queen’s. That program would have ticked all my boxes. In fact, I think if this program had been available when I was a high school senior, I wouldn’t have felt the need to look outside of Canada for university.
I encourage your family to first get familiar with all the Canadian options for post-secondary study of Musical Theatre (they are all included in the Big List that is pinned at the top of this forum, and might I suggest also looking into Performance Creation at Concordia, the Theatre/Music double major at Bishop’s, and the Musical Theatre concentration at the University of St. Thomas, though none of these programs are technically MT programs), and examine how they meet your child’s needs. If, after looking at all the “home” options, you find nothing is quite right, then it’s time to have a conversation about what kind of US school could fill in those gaps, what your family can afford in a US education, and begin building a list from there.
Additionally, I really recommend applying to Canadian schools in addition to US schools, even if you don’t think they are exactly the right fit. Yes, the admissions timelines are different, and it’s a total pain to get to April and be auditioning for Canadian schools while you already have all your results from US schools. But it provides you with a “safety net,” especially if your child applies to a school that they can attend without an audition. When I was a senior in high school, I got into a MT program in the US that I thought my family was going to be able to afford, but the financial aid package I was awarded was not what we expected it to be. My parents were not in support of me taking a gap year, so I went to Ryerson for a year (in a non-performance program), got some credits out of the way, saved some money, reauditioned for a new set of schools, and then transferred into Viterbo. Of course, being a transfer student has its own host of problems, but I will never forget the absolute dread I felt when realized I couldn’t attend the US school I thought I was going to go to, and that I might not have a university to attend at all that fall.
Thank you so much. I could have searched the forums for a year and not gained the helpful insight and experience from your post above. Sheridan is definitely on the top of our Canadian list, and will be exploring the SL/Queens program (although first 2 yr in Brockville), and Dal’s combo program also looks interesting.
As we have no real world experience as parents in the performing arts, we are trying to balance whatever “prestige” or connections might come from a top-tier US school, versus the huge costs and more limited employability in the US, and LACK of connections if our kid wanted to return and work in Canada. And being fully aware how competitive all of these programs are and acceptance chances are a crapshoot.
Thanks for taking the time to write such a thoughtful and informative post.
@CanaDad I’m out of the country for the next few months (returning sporadically for auditions in TO) but would be happy to meet with you and your family for coffee sometime in 2019, if you’re in the GTA!
Appreciate it. Enjoy your travels