Unifieds -- on-the-spot admits?

College Majors Musical Theater Major
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<p>My nephew has received two acceptances as a result of his audition this past summer at the National ITS conference. He also met with program directors from many schools and has maintained email contact with them. </p>

<p>Several schools told him on the spot that they’d really like to have him attend, but only one followed it up immediately with a written acceptance. A second just arrived out of the blue this week. Neither acceptance letter has mentioned scholarship $$, however! He also was “highly encouraged” to audition at many other schools–at least 2 of which are ones talked about a lot here at CC. </p>

<p>My nephew watched my two kids go through the BFA application/audition process, so he knows how competitive it is. He is not reading too much into the positive comments he received from the well-known programs–mostly, those were along the lines of “you should really come audition for us.” The experience of auditioning at a national level was very helpful for him and the contacts he made have been useful when he’s had questions. </p>

<p>Because I read about ITS here on CC, I suggested (4 years ago) to my kids’ theater director that she get the club more involved in ITS–of course, volunteering to be chaperone and driver whenever needed! It has been a positive experience, connecting the kids to other theater kids in the state and giving them the opportunity to compete nationally. </p>

<p>I think a student can participate in ITS as an individual even if his/her school does not, so that’s something parents might want to investigate. Over the time my kids were in high school I got the theater club involved in a couple of new things–the director was always happy to do it, as long as I was promising to do a lot of the work! And now I have passed the torch and there is an active group of enthusiastic parents.</p>

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<p>These events sound worthwhile, though I must admit I had never heard of them until I joined CC ten years ago. These are not events that people from my region know of or participate in. I live in Vermont. </p>

<p>Also, I am not sure which colleges attend these events and am thinking that many of the schools my kid applied to may not attend (someone who knows could answer…she applied to NYU/Tisch, UMich, CMU, Boston Conservatory, Syracuse, Ithaca, Penn State, Emerson).</p>

<p>I get the feeling that these events are more popular for certain regions of the country like the MidWest, Texas, Florida, etc. (correct me if I am wrong). </p>

<p>I just want to assure others that they are not at any sort of disadvantage by not attending these other events described above. My daughter only auditioned for colleges on campus and the schools had never seen her before. I could say this of every friend of hers, who came from many states, who also applied to BFA in MT programs, as well as most students whom I have advised. My D, as well as her numerous friends who applied to BFA programs, had successful admissions outcomes nonetheless. As well, none got on the spot acceptances at Unifieds.</p>

<p>PS, I just visited International Thespians’ site and NONE of my D’s colleges on her list attended.</p>

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<p>I just wanted to echo the previous couple of posts regarding Thespian events. They are really worth checking out! If nothing else, they provide an opportunity to practice what your student will be doing at Unifieds or at on-campus auditions.</p>

<p>The one held at our school is a function of Washington State Thespians, but is open to students from the entire region. I think that region includes Oregon, Washington, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana and British Columbia, though i am not certain. Ours is a small event, but here are some of the schools that have attended for the last couple of years (from memory):</p>

<p>CAP21, Central Washington University, College of Santa Fe, Cornish College of the Arts, Otterbein, Roosevelt University, Savannah College of Art and Design, Seattle Pacific, University of the Arts , University of Evansville , University of Northern Colorado , University of Oklahoma, Webster University ,Western Washington University,Willamette University</p>

<p>The national event in Nebraska features many, many more including USC, CCM, University of Minnesota: Guthrie program…and tons more. The website usually lists all who attended the previous year.</p>

<p>From our experience, these events had value in that they provided practice. The feedback generated or not generated gives some good information about your materials. They provided some great “back-ups” early on, so that D knew she was “going to college”, even if those early acceptances were not her first choices. They also provided lots of scholarship(merit) options. That is true for many of the kids we know. Lastly and probably most importantly, these events provide for multiple opportunities for schools to see your student, especially for those schools that don’t make 0n-the-spot offers. My kid is at Webster, which was always in her top 3 choices. By the time she got to Unifieds to audition for them, she had auditioned for 3 of the faculty already. One in Nebraska in the summer prior to senior year, 2 at our Washington state auditions and then 3 more at Unifieds. I don’t know if that really makes a difference or not. There is no control on this kind of experiment. But i suspect multiple meetings that are positive are a good thing.</p>

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<p>As another example, here is the list of schools attending the Greater Houston Area Auditions (so far):</p>

<p>Columbia College Chicago
CalArts – California Institute of the Arts
CAP21 Musical Theatre Conservatory NYC
KD College, Conservatory for Film and Dramatic Arts
Oklahoma University Helmerich School of Drama
Oklahoma University Weitzenhoffer School of Musical Theatre
Penn State University
Roosevelt University Chicago College of Performing Arts
Sante Fe University of Art and Design
SMU – Southern Methodist University Meadows School of the Arts
Stephen F. Austin State University School of Theatre
University of Evansville
University of Houston
University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theatre
University of Texas at Austin
Webster University</p>

<p>Penn State, Oklahoma, Webster, Sante Fe, and Roosevelt are all listed at the top of the CC MT forum. CalArts, SMU, and Minnesota/Guthrie have national reputations for their acting programs. Houston and Texas have notable MFA programs and Houston is really putting a lot into their BFA acting program now.</p>

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<p>My D attended SoutheasternTheatre Conference as a high school junior and it was a very good experience for her. Not only was she able to go through the audition process as a junior and get feedback (via the schools that called her back), she was also able to get more information from the college reps there about their programs. She did receive acceptances and scholarship offers from several schools through this process. They were not the “big name” schools that are usually talked about on this forum. But they were nice “hey I can go to college and study musical theatre!” offers. So in case anyone is interested, here’s the link. If you would like more info about our expereince at SETC feel free to PM me.
[Undergraduate</a> School](<a href=“http://www.setc.org/undergrad-school]Undergraduate”>http://www.setc.org/undergrad-school)</p>

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<p>What are the profile of these kids getting these offers and scholarships from conferences and does this also go for stand a lone acting kids.</p>

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<p>This is an interesting discussion but I guess the thing I’d personally take away from this is that such (rare) offers seem to indicate much more about the personality of the school and the program than the ‘talent’ of the student. </p>

<p>For instance, for the story of the director who told the kid he was accepted right in front of all the other kids who had auditioned–that would be a deal breaker for me. It’s just yuck–even a reasonably thoughtful 12 year old would know better than to do that. I would not support my kid going to that school.</p>

<p>As for the comparisons to athletes and the implication that 18 year old theatre kids can also be ‘no doubters’–I disagree. First, at 18, many athletes in many sports are fully matured and ready to play competitively, some at the professional level. More importantly, they will hit their <em>peaks</em> not long after 18 in most cases. Secondly, sports are FAR more easily quantified. Do you run really fast? Do you score tons of baskets? What are your stats? Unlike athletes, actors are most certainly NOT quantifiable with stats, the judgement is FAR more subjective and FAR more complex, actors have a great deal of maturing to do and may be unformed when recruited, and finally, as opposed to colleges recruiting athletes, colleges ‘recruiting’ actors vary very differently in what they want and what their artistic vision is. A college sports team ‘vision’ is to win. Whereas a college theatre ‘team’s’ vision is to…what? Each college has a different answer. </p>

<p>In my view, aggressive on the spot offers tell you far more about the school’s vision, approach, values and environment, than anything else.</p>

<p>Finally, I disagree that there is this thing called 'talent" and it is IT and everyone can see the same thing. That is simply not true. I mean, sure, some kids have far far more potential than others. Others will most likely never succeed. But there’s not this package of ‘talent’ that is on some sort of American Idol scorecard that everyone can see and agree on. If that WERE true, ‘talented’ actors wouldn’t have to work for 10 years in obscurity or never make it or whatever. And untalented actors - of which there are MANY - would not get jobs. Different people look for different things and people’s gifts are not always obvious, or you think they’re obviously talented but really they can just be coached in a narrow range really well. You just don’t know for sure. This is true of other art complex forms as well, like art, writing, poetry.</p>

<p>Some programs value subtlety and consideration as well as making decisions after discussion with others–and so an on the spot offer would be extremely rare for them. I guess these would be the programs I’d prefer for my son.</p>

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<p>Connections, you make some good points, and I certainly respect and agree with what you said. However, some things to think about:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Depending on the school, you won’t get significantly more audition time at Unifieds than at a regional audition. You may even get a really short audition if you travel to the school (read the summaries of the auditions at Northern Colorado, for example). So, some, and possibly many, schools are going to evaluate most if not all of their candidates based on a really limited audition. They can’t possibly weigh a whole bunch of intangible factors in making their decisions. </p></li>
<li><p>Depending on the school, only one auditor may be present for the audition at Unifieds and sometimes even on campus (read the summaries of auditions at UCLA and NYU, for example). No way one auditor will be able to generate enough information from a short audition to enable a meaningful discussion of a bunch of intangible factors among those who were not present.</p></li>
<li><p>Sports recruitment is more subtle and complex than you may think, its not just about stats, because, obviously, gaining 2,000 yards playing A ball is a lot different than gaining 2,000 yards playing AAAAA ball. Coaches have to assess many of the same sort of intangibles than you point out, and they probably do more of it than many college theatre departments. However, there are some kids that obviously have superior skills and athleticism than the vast majority of their peers, and college coaches can spot this relatively quickly. I imagine so can college theatre department heads. And both college atheltic coaches and theatre departments have the same fundamental goal in recruiting - get the best kids that they can into their program.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>I wouldn’t draw a conclusion that schools that make rapid assessments for musical theatre admission are necessarily worse (or better) than other programs, although it is certainly food for thought.</p>

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<p>Well, I know one of those “no doubters” and he really is, and got into nearly every school on his list. However, he is a tall, very good-looking, romantic lead type boy with tons of talent. That’s a category that’s pretty rare even in this crowded field. But I do agree with connections about the subjectivity and room for growth at 18. The on-the-spot offer came from a school in anybody’s top 10 and probably plenty of top 1,2, or 3’s. Don’t know any girl’s though although some did get strong signals but those were from schools that have to work a little harder to attract the kids they want.</p>

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<p>I would feel better about this process if schools would put up on their websites that they are doing all these other auditions so that everyone can have “a fair shot.” I have never seen a school list these conferences on their audition dates. Because people apparently can audition at both these conferences and then come back and audition for a second time on campus and/or unifieds, it doesn’t quite seem right that the schools are not sharing this information with everybody. I can see that this can be quite an advantage. We heard quite by accident from the father of a “drama” sister of a dance friend that there was such a conference in our neighborhood. There was no dance call so final decisions could not be made, but my D did get an on the spot and great offer from one of the attending schools when she showed up for the campus auditions. It was quite obvious that they were sending everyone out to make her aquaintance having heard her earlier at the conference auditions. Schools need to share this information better - don’t leave it up to the conferences, as it’s clear they are not sharing the information in any useful way. It sure would have been nice to have had two auditions in one season for some of those big name schools listed above.</p>

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<p>I love your points, Connections. As a parent, I want my D to be passionately studying an art that will always be a part of her life, among people who encourage and challenge her. As you say, every program has a vision-- and I’d sure love to see the different visions made clearer to applicants. We did get a sense from the introductions given before the audition sessions, but it felt like we were left to our own hunches. D had friends who had graduated from some great programs-- some said yes, they got good training during four years of miserable competition. Some said yes they got good training and made friendships that have sustained them for years-- we tried for the latter type of program. </p>

<p>I met a man who had been an auditor for a great school for years-- asked how he could tell talent in the short span of an audition. He said “You can’t. You can tell training.” MT is more like a sport than some other arts. There is the simple question of how high you can kick and how high you can belt. But if it were only that it would be far less compelling than it is-- how well can you embody a feeling, how much can you express with a few notes and a twist of your hips? That’s an art-- and it might come through in an audition when you’re 18 and might not.</p>

<p>Classicalbk that must have been a great experience for your D!! Even if she didn’t go to that school in the end it would be a real confidence builder, and confidence is such a big part of it all.</p>

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<p>Another opportunity for making connections are the Performing and Visual Arts College Fairs held around the country (in the Fall, so look now) sponsored by National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACACnet.org). </p>

<p>A classmate of one of my kids met a department chair there and they exchanged several emails. This student did not have very good grades, but I think the initiative shown in the email exchanges may have made an impression, because–despite a lot of talent–this was the only BFA acceptance for that student.</p>

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<p>[Performing</a> and Visual Arts College Fair Schedule](<a href=“http://www.nacacnet.org/college-fairs/PVA-College-Fairs/Pages/default.aspx]Performing”>http://www.nacacnet.org/college-fairs/PVA-College-Fairs/Pages/default.aspx)
Here’s the list of locations for the Performing and Visual Arts College Fairs. I took a look at the schools that would be in Chicago and there are many that are on my daughter’s preliminary list. However, the location of the Fair is not so great for us, so not sure if we will go this year.</p>

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<p>We are going to a Performing and Visual Arts Fair this week. I’m not sure we will learn anything we don’t know but maybe just putting a face with a name is good. Should we take resumes?</p>

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<p>I enjoyed the energy at the Performing and Visual Arts Fairs that we attended over the years. No resumes were given. Filled out a lot of “requests for info” forms. It’s more useful if you can go in with specific questions whose answers you can’t find on the internet. Oft times the person at a school’s table teaches an instrument and can’t really help with MT questions. If it’s convenient to go, I’d go, but I wouldn’t put a lot of effort into attending otherwise.</p>

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<p>Make labels with your S or D’s name, address, intended major, email. People told us to do this and I thought they were crazy…but we did anyway. Every school you talk to wants to get this info and you either stand in line waiting for a chance to scribble it out…or you apply a label and get back to your conversation with the rep. </p>

<p>Merlehay I don’t think it’s a make or break-- there are tons of schools, tons of students. There’s a chance of making a real connection but it’s only a chance. I was glad we went-- it helped D get a sense of things and she had some conversations that helped her think things out. But it wasn’t essential.</p>

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<p>To my knowledge, from the lists I’ve seen all the schools your D was interested in attend at least one regional (esp. the TX ones, some of which are very well attended, better variety than Intl Thespians) except BOCO. I believe BOCO only attends Unifieds, plus they do audition days in Boston. Hope that helps. And yes, some audition programs do on the spot acceptances at regionals with an immediate written follow-up. Now–scholarship money offers–sometimes that has to wait until you are accepted academically too. I don’t know about on the spot acceptances at Unifieds bc we haven’t been yet. When I talked to BOCO specifically, I got the idea that they thought Regionals are not a big deal in the NE, and Northeasterners on CC seem to share that view, but I can tell you they are a very big deal in the south and southwest. More and more Big Name schools are coming every year. I think it’s because they realize, quite rightly, that these southern and southwestern kids may be very talented but hesitant about coming out to the NE to visit bc of the travel costs, the negative perceptions of the NE, traveling to Unifieds, etc., etc.</p>

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<p>On my prior post I was replying specifically to Post # 22 by SoozieVT. Sorry–I think my post makes less sense withoout that context.</p>

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<p>haspotential, what are the negative perceptions of the NE? I’m having one of those “wo, what does THAT mean” moments, since I live in the NE :)</p>

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<p>Calliene… I thought the exact same thing! WOW!</p>