Hello everyone!
Right now I’m having a very hard time deciding where to go to college. Amazingly I got into every college I applied (how did that happen??) and it’s making it very hard to make a decision. I’m planning on majoring in Illustration and I’m interested in taking non-art classes at colleges through the various college partnership programs that are at these colleges because I would like to continue studying Japanese (a great art program is definitely the priority though).
I was accepted into…
SMFA @ Tufts
RISD
MICA (25.5k/yr),
SAIC(19k/yr),
Massart (13k/yr)
MCAD (19k/yr)
and also… (but I’m leaning away from liberal colleges as of now)
Oberlin (24k/yr - i’m a legacy), Sarah Lawrence (24k/yr), Mt. Holyoke (15k/yr), Temple (9k/yr), Smith (10k/yr), University of Washington
As of now I’m leaning towards RISD, MICA and possibly MCAD. My parents keep telling me not to worry about the money and go to the most selective/prestigious school I got into (which I assume means RISD or a liberal arts college) because I would have more opportunities/better chance getting a job after college but the price of RISD scares me a bit. As for MICA, I’m still not exactly sold on the idea of going to college in Baltimore and I wish they were as diverse as RISD…so I’m very confused as of now.
If anyone has any information/experiences with any of the colleges I listed, please share! Thank you!
My DD is a sophomore at RISD in the Illustration department and LOVES it. She did NOT love her foundation year, but in a lot of good ways it forced her to try things out of her comfort zone and helped solidify what she does love.
I’ve already been very impressed with the opportunities and references her profs have shared with her and fingers crossed this will pay off in the end. The price IS scary though - our family was very lucky in that she received alot of merit aid $ so that actually made RISD either cheaper or not much more than other schools & their FA packages.
Feel free to DM me if you have any questions. There’s also few parents on this forum with children at RISD. @BrooklynRye has a child who’s a sophomore there now too (sorry forget their major).
But all of your list are great schools with different strengths…we just visited MICA with my son who’s a junior and it’s in his Top 3 now and honestly a much better fit for him than RISD. There seems to be much more flexibility and cross-pollination of majors and interests that’s highly encouraged there.
My DD went to MCAD, majoring in illustration, graduating in 2015. I was not aware MCAD had a sister program where you could study Japanese as well.
@ArtAngst Thank you so much for this information! I actually visited both MICA and Temple today and am going to visit most of the schools I got into this week. I really liked MICA, and I thought the facilities and dorms were very nice. Temple on the other hand was not for me, although the Tyler building was also very nice. I’m visiting RISD tomorrow so I can’t wait to compare it with MICA and see which I like better.
@redbug119 Hello! MCAD does not have a sister program actually, at least not anymore (?), sorry to be confusing. I think at one point they might have had a program with Macalester because it is on both Macalester and MCAD’s website, but when I asked about it at a college fair they had no idea what I was talking about lol. Most of the other schools on my list have those kinds of partnerships though.
Also, what did your daughter think of MCAD? Did she like the illustration program?