BassTheatreMom I’ll be on-campus next weekend as my daughter has the lead in a student production. I’ll see you here next year!
So lucky! S has been in the pit twice for theatre productions, plus he’s had two orchestra concert we’ve missed. UGH! What show is your D in ?
I’m glad your S has been able to play for theatre productions. I’ve always been impressed with the pit orchestras for the main stage and student opera productions that I’ve seen. She’s in a student theatre production.
So I need the wisdom of all you wonderful parents. We are halfway in the live auditions (4 down, 4 to go) and my daughter wants to cancel the FSU audition. She says she doesn’t want to go there but it is one of our 2 in state “safeties”. She said she would prefer the other safety even though it is closer to home and “ranked” lower than FSU. I’m torn. While I would be happy with a weekend off, and it would be nice not to do the 12 hour round trip in 24 hours, I keep thinking “what if…”. I mean, rationally speaking, she must get in somewhere that we can afford, right??? But what if she doesn’t and we regret canceling it???
@NYsaxmom has your daughter visited FSU already?
@NYsaxmom Last night I reached out to a couple of mom friends I made here last year when we were going through this process together with our three kids. My second is going through it this year, and was ready to drop a potentially good program because it was requiring additional application work and she thought she was all through with that. Their advice was to see it through, and I pretty much made her do just that. You’ve already done the hard work, another audition isn’t going to add too much burden. I say go for it. It would be horrible if for some reason her other financial safety didn’t pan out.
@NYsaxmom I would want at least one decision in hand that works better than FSU before I canceled that audition. Especially, if this is an academic and financial safety.
@drummergirl yes she has visited FSU. She was there for several days last year in the Tristate bad they have. She was the principal clarinet and heaps the while campus tour etc. The reason I am inclined to let her (other than not having to drive 12 hours in 24 hours!!) is her other safety is where she already takes lessons from the prof, so he knows her and it’s pretty much a certainty she’ll get in with both academic and music money puis we have “bright futures” in FL which kicks in money too. And FSU is a giant music school and all her others are small
Oh I hate the autocorrect on my iPad!!! That should be Tristate Band, and “had the whole campus tour”
Ugh!!!
Just a thought, @NYsaxmom , might it be possible to delay the FSU audition rather than canceling it? To give you more time to receive some offers before making a decision to cancel? Is there a later audition date?
@dramasopranomom sadly no. This is the last one.
This process Is hard enough without the added drama. LOL!!!
It sounds like it might be a healthy decision to cancel. If she is pretty sure she is in at the other in-state safety and likes it. I think it might be healthy for mom too!
We are in the middle of a three week break before the next audition. The time to rest has been good for D and for me. Plus, I think she is starting to get a little sick of her songs. If your daughter has already seen FSU ad she is reasonably confident about the other choices, a rest may be valuable. I just tend to be super cautious about “safety schools” as this process seems unpredicitable and I wonder if there is such a thing as a music safety.
I’m loving this thread - previews of next year I’m sure.
Related to FSU, I have a question about “safeties” and also financial aid. I hope you don’t mind if I insert it here for you wise music parents. (btw, not that I’m an expert, but re: FSU, I know if I force my kids to do stuff, it ends up biting me in the butt - for instance, I ended up taking our son up and down the East Coast looking at ballet schools - the poor kid kept telling me tat he only wanted a Balanchine school - and I kept ignoring him (like I knew better) - so the only thing that I got out of it was a big travel bill and maybe info for a book about ballet schools).
I assume that “safeties” are typically in-state schools that maybe aren’t as popular and thus selective? Does anyone know what that might be for us? (we live in CA and our daughter is a jazz bassist). I would think that USC Thornton would not be a “safety” for jazz since it is a popular music program? What about for financial aid? How does that work in the music world? Do any music school meet financial need? (we’ll have 3 - possibly 4 kids in college at the same time and my husband is disabled - so our need will be great). Just want to get some “safetieis” on our daughter’s list - as I don’t think that she has any on her list right now (she’s fairly ambitious re: music (academics is another story :-? ). I’ve heard that with state schools (In CA does that include UC’s - or just the States?) - that you have to be admitted for both music and academics - true?
BTW - I’m sure that several of us on here will carry the torch forward next year - but only if you pop in to get us over the finish line =D>
@tripletmama, l am no expert either, but yes most universities with music programs will need to admit your child academically and musically, though music talent can give her some leeway on the academic side. For safeties, we chose schools we knew we could likely afford that had good but not uber competitive music admissions. But music admissions can still be so subjective!
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We are in the middle of our Miami-Fla visit. Everything is going great so far. We came in a few days early for a mini vacation. We rented a VRBO condo only about 15 minutes from the school, in the area of many walkable restaurants. Highly recommend Bulla Gastrobar and Cerviche 105! S18 had a sample lesson with the voice chair yesterday that was extremely positive and sent his confidence soaring. I hung out at the Rat and had a beer, soaking in the warm weather and resort-like campus around the lake. Afterwards we drove to Key Biscane beach, had lunch at a beach bar at the Ritz Carlton, and used their beach for a few hours. Today brings scholarship interviews and the audition for S18, with more scholarship activities tomorrow.
@tripletmama safety to us (this time) were 2 in state schools that have well regarded music programs, that my daughter knows she can get into (and she has been accepted academically) but ar affordable. There are other schools she prefers but may not be accepted, or we may not be able to afford.
And after being the travel planner, chauffeur and cheerleader for four kids getting into music schools, I will have a void to fill so will be happy to pass on anything I can
@vistajay we love Frost. One of my sons graduated from there last year and I would love my daughter to go there too. It has the right balance of a great college with a small well run music school. Plus you can’t beat the location
@tripletmama I don’t know anything about jazz or about California schools, but I think your D’s private teacher would be a great resource for creating a school list and picking musical “safeties.” If her teacher has sent a good number of students on to jazz programs in the past, he or she will probably have a good idea where students like your D are competitive and which ones are pretty “safe,” at least as far as the music side is concerned. My S’s teacher was able to say things like “in 25 years, only my three ‘best of career’ students have gotten into that program, but you have a shot” or “any halfway decent player I’ve ever had was accepted musically at (in state safety).” He also knew where previous students had gotten big scholarships. Keep in mind that which schools are popular or selective for music might vary by instrument and program, too. If a school happens to have a high profile bass prof, it might be more competitive than you expect. USC Thornton is a top jazz school so no, it is not likely to be a safety for anyone.
We found that as great as my son’s private teacher was at helping us select music targets, he really couldn’t help advise on the academic side of admissions. From what I’ve read around CC, California schools have formulas, their own UC GPA calculation, and “impacted” programs and stats can be most important at many schools and I don’t know anything about those or how the music part fits into that equation. There are a LOT of in state schools in CA! Start by looking at which UCs and CSUs have BM programs in jazz if that’s what your D is looking for, and look at their jazz offerings and their bass profs. Don’t expect your school’s guidance counselors to know much about music admissions or whether the music department has influence over admissions, though they probably can tell you the likelihood of academic admission at CA schools without considering the music side. If your D probably wouldn’t be admitted academically for general admission, it can’t be considered a safety even if music admission is very likely. Sometimes the music admissions people will tell you straight out that they will fight for those they want and are usually successful if someone is on the border academically OR that they have absolutely no sway over admissions decisions. I got both those answers when I was doing my homework on academically competitive schools of interest to my son.
On the money side, a “safety” also has to be affordable. I think California has programs to help those with need, is that right? Find out about those first and what level of financial support you might expect having 3 (or 4) in school at a time and figure out your budget for each of your triplets. I don’t know about CA schools, but many public universities (Michigan and Indiana excepted) don’t have a lot of music merit to give, and 2K might be their most generous music merit award. Private schools have much bigger awards, but their initial price tag is much higher. There are some good music schools that claim to meet full need, but those are often harder to get into academically (e.g. Northwestern, Rice, Vanderbilt), even if music admissions aren’t quite as competitive as general admissions. Other parents might know a few more that meet need…Oberlin, I think? Look at the scholarships pages on both the main admissions site and music admissions site of every school to get a sense of what music or academic merit awards your D might potentially qualify for. Call if you have questions and they may give you more specifics. Try to talk to someone on the admissions staff rather than the student who answers the phone. For example, they might be willing to tell you the range of merit awards and how many of each are given. If there are full tuition awards available but only 3 are awarded each year across the entire music school on all instruments then you know those are very competitive. If they tell you the top music merit award amount and you know even that top award will not make the school affordable, then you can strike it from the list.
Depending on how much you can afford, you might look at U of North Texas, which is a top jazz school and any student who gets at least a $1000 scholarship qualifies for in state tuition, which is lower than in many states, though CA need based aid couldn’t be used there, obviously. @GoForth has a bass player there now so he would be a good resource. Once you have a budget you might also run Net Price Calculators on schools like U of Miami, Northwestern, USC, Oberlin to see what type of need based aid might be expected at a variety of private schools. They don’t usually include music merit, but getting a sense of your EFC at colleges that use the CSS profile is important in order to know if they are likely to be affordable. That EFC may be higher than your FAFSA EFC depending on your individual financial situation. I think many parents here have found the net price at privates came in around the Net Price Calculator result, even with music merit added, since music merit awards reduced their “need” as far as the school was concerned.
@tripletmama some of the safety jazz schools in California might be a few of the CSU’s - although some are very competitive, like Northridge. You could look at Humboldt, Chico, East Bay for instance. And not many of the UC’s are audition based for freshmen - in fact only a few (UCLA is the one you’re thinking of which if you don’t get into the school of music you’re denied admission to the university.) There aren’t that many BM programs in the UC’s actually. Some of the CSU’s don’t audition into the music major until junior year - such as SF State. Also, for privates look at University of Redlands and University of the Pacific. I wouldn’t call them safeties, but they may be matches.