Im not planning to move too far away from my home state NY (Mid atlantic/New England including Michigan, Illinois and Ohio), staying in state is also an option. I really love music, but I know I cant really have it as a full career choice so a minor is a good alternative right? Anyways, Im not exactly sure what schools I should be looking at, at all. Suggestions regardless of entry requirements would be greatly appreciated!
If we’re disregarding both admission selectivity and costs, as well as any constraints on this major-minor combination, then top schools to consider might include:
Yale
Johns Hopkins
University of Rochester
Oberlin
Michigan
Indiana
Example:
https://www.oberlin.edu/admissions-and-aid/double-degree-program
You can estimate your costs by running Oberlin’s online net price calculator. You can look up average entering admission stats for Oberlin’s College of Arts & Sciences on collegedata.com or in the Common Data Set, section C.
Most universities and LACs offer majors and minors in music and CS. If the above don’t seem realistic (w.r.t. cost or admission expectations), then you might want to check out offerings at some of the SUNY schools. I suggest you describe your qualifications, budget, and personal preferences in more detail if you want the most appropriate recommendations.
Dont have exact specifications but for now: GPA is 3.92, havent taken SAT so my psat score is 1340, general budget is around 25000 a year or less. More urban areas are preferred.
I’m not that familiar with music programs, but for CS I’d suggest applying to CMU. They have a couple of music minors you can look into and one of the top ranked CS programs. In my experience, they are also a bit more generous than Johns Hopkins or Michigan in terms of financial aid.
Run the online net price calculators for any schools that interest you. See if the Expected Family Contributions are within your $25K budget. If not, you’ll need to adjust your cost management strategy accordingly.
CMU does have an intercollege degree program (https://www.cmu.edu/interdisciplinary/programs/bcsaprogram.html).
However, the CMU/SCS acceptance rate for 2017-18 was 7%; their SAT-M mid-range was 770-800
(https://admission.enrollment.cmu.edu/pages/undergraduate-admission-statistics).
If your SAT score is in line with your PSAT (< 1400 CR+M), then CMU (for CS) or JHU may be out-of-reach.
You may want to post in the music majors section of the college majors forum. Even though you don’t want to major in music there are lots of posters there who have a lot of experience with the music offerings at various schools.
Consider what you want to do with your music. How do you want to be involved with music while you’re in college? Look at what is involved with being a music minor. What courses will be required? What performing groups will be open to you? If you are at a college that has either a conservatory or a school of music and lots of music majors, you may find that some groups are not open to you or spots are taken up by the students majoring in music.
Lots of students remain involved in music without minoring. You can continue to be involved in performing groups and/or take lessons without minoring or majoring at lots of schools.
You may want to look at colleges first in terms of the computer science major and then look at what is available for a student who wants to stay involved in music.
Just as one example- University of Michigan has a top notch, conservatory like school of music but you would likely not be able to access all its offerings as a music minor. However, it’s a big school, there are lots of great performing groups and opportunities outside of the school of music for non music majors such as the campus philharmonic, symphonic and pops orchestras. What is your instrument?
Im a sax player and probably looking to further myself in jazz, I think Ill look through the music majors section, thank you!
Carnegie Mellon and Case Western would both be good choices!
Other possibilities:
Boston University
University of MD - College Park
Syracuse
NYU might be good but their FA is notoriously bad.