It’s funny @toowonerful, I was just thinking about that old thread too. I think I actually started it. I have my suspicions about whether or not the size of the competitive pool has grown with the increase in the applicant pool. Though somebody in another thread said something that made me think. They talked about the number of incredibly talented students that do not pursue this field of study in college for whatever reason. Is it possible that a show like Glee (for example), made it seem so easy that now more of these same people DO try to chase the major? I have no idea but all I can say is if Rachel and Kurt can afford to live in an exposed brick apartment even if it is a subway ride to midtown, with each having their own bedroom, huge living room and room for all of the guests that seem to come and go (and get their own rooms too), plus fly home to Ohio whenever they want to AND get singing wait staff jobs with no experience can I just say YES PLEASE on behalf of my daughter. And then I wake up.
@Dusing2, thanks for taking the time to add your thoughts to my question. There is merit to your points. I pondered your second paragraph for a bit though. I’d venture a guess that the majority of students that apply to these theatre programs did not then, and do not now, attend things like Stagedoor Manor, French Woods never mind the pre-college programs like Cherubs, MPulse etc. They can’t afford to, or they can but their parents just don’t want to pay for it or are mean parents like me that make them get old fashioned summer jobs.
I do have the impression that you are right about the increased presence of professional coaching but I don’t know how much my impression is really skewed by reading CC. There certainly seems to be an trend towards heavier use of coaching in this CC population for sure. Either that or it just so happens that the people participating recently coincidentally are also using coaches and they talk about it a lot. But if you add up the number of active participants in the forum in any give audition/application year (the people actually at bat, not the old folks like me), it’s hardly even close to a majority of the people/students engaged in the process in any given cycle. So it is really hard to tell. I did a quick count from the beautiful smiling faces on MTCA and Moo’s websites. (Gosh those kids are all gorgeous.) I don’t know if Dave Clemmons posts the results like these coaches do and to be honest, I don’t know who he is but I have heard about the others. It looks like MTCA coached 76 students last year (acting and MT combined) and Moo had about 97. SWAG those numbers to assume 2/3 are MTs vs. just straight actor advisees and yeah, that’s 114 well coached students. But of course Tisch and BoCo combined can take them all so that pretty much leaves all of those other MT schools we talk about here for everyone else. Things don’t seem quite so bad when you look at it like that 
I think it is easier to prove that there are more people hanging shingles offering coaching services as a business. Could be a response to demand. Could also be a case of “if you build it, they will come.” I know that people read CC and get the pants scared off of themselves thinking they can’t do this without a coach and that worries me sometimes. Well now that I’m no longer +4 years out, and I’m actually only +3, which makes me current and cool again instead of a dinosaur (sorry @evilqueen, just having fun with you), can I still be current and cool if I raise my hand and say that my kid went through this process without one of those newfangled coaches. Even my use of the word “newfangled” should be a red flag that puts me in my place with the dinosaurs.
To get back to the OP’s question…there are plenty of MT programs with higher odds of getting accepted. You are right that the schools that pull more regionally than nationally have better odds. They have fewer kids auditioning, so the numbers alone make it a better chance. I will not name specific schools in this forum, with the exception of the school my daughter attends: The University of Utah. They have a fairly new BFA MT program (4th or 5th year). They attend Unifieds so they do audition many students, but their acceptance rate has been very high. I mean VERY high, like upwards of 75%. It’s just not a well-known program yet so there are many unknown factors that keep kids from attending. Their yield has varied. My daughter is a Sophomore and her class was the first one auditioned by the new head of the department. The Sophomore class originally yielded about 18, but this year’s Freshman class yielded about 32. I have no idea if they are going to adjust their acceptance rate to start reducing the yield. Previous classes were much more regional.
A year ago I would have hesitated to publicly state that their acceptance rate is so high because I equated a high acceptance rate with a less desirable program. And I thought it would imply my daughter was somehow less talented. But, you know what? My daughter is thriving there. She dances 1.5-2.5 hours/day, has private voice, acting classes, theater history, music theory, crew requirements, something called Dem Lab when all the MTs come together once/week. They have juries, work on their book, etc. Is it a perfect program? No, but they continue to make improvements to it all the time. And it provided an opportunity for my daughter to do what she loves and grow as an artist. I do sometimes wonder if she would be having a better experience at one of the “dream” schools she auditioned for, but we will never know so it’s just a moot point.
We are from NY so the idea of going to Utah was completely foreign to us. The school is big, has a top-25 ranked football team and a top-10 (?) basketball team. Salt Lake City (and the campus) is surrounded by mountains. Park City is less than a half hour away - home to Sundance Film Festival, great skiing, and a quaint town. SLC has a very strong arts community - BalletWest, lots of community theater, Shakespeare Festival, etc. And the U has inexpensive out-of-state tuition that gets much cheaper after the first year because it is very easy to get residency. My guess is it will catch on and when it does, they will have to lower their acceptance rate to keep the program from getting out of hand. But for now, there is no doubt it is easy to get in to. Surely there are other school out there with similar acceptance rates even if nobody mentions them by name.
@shaun0203 what an absolutely lovely read. Thank you! =D>
^^^ Agree and thanks for getting this thread back to where it belongs. Post #62 is now among my hall of CC fame favorites.
Great advice, but of course remember that not all non-audition schools fit the OP’s criteria of being “less difficult to get in to”. In fact, some are among the most difficult admits, sometimes including a resume-based artistic evaluation.
I don’t know the answer, but would programs like CAP21 be easier to get in to?
shaun0203, what a wonderful and helpful post! THAT’S exactly what we need. It honestly drives me crazy that on the one hand, we are constantly told to make a balanced list - NOT all Top Tier “lottery schools” with miniscule odds of getting in - and yet, when anyone asks the logical next question of “Okay, so which are the schools that have statistically somewhat better odds?” in order to create a balanced list, people get defensive and say “NO audition programs are easy to get in!” which wasn’t the question! It’s NOT an insult to say that a school has excellent training and is selective, but isn’t AS insanely hard to get into as CMU etc.
In that spirit, I’ll add Marymount Manhattan. I seem to remember reading a FAQ on their site that said they accept something like 25% of theater applicants (which includes the smaller category of musical theater, I forget the exact number for MT). So clearly, one has a better chance of getting in there than a school that only accepts 3%. But the curriculum is exactly what my daughter is looking for, and it’s in Manhattan, and its alumni include Tony winner Annaleigh Ashford, Tony-nominated Andrew Rannells, “Glee” regulars Jenna Ushkowitz (Tina) and Melissa Benoist (Marley Rose), Alexander Skaarsgard of “True Blood,” Laverne Cox of “Orange is the New Black,” and a lot of Broadway, tour, and TV actors who aren’t household names. That tells me that even though this school is statistically easier than some others to get in, it still offers great training and gets talented students. So that’s a school that’s definitely going on our list when the time comes (my dd is only a high school freshman right now, but we’re thinking ahead!)
So, I think it would be helpful to have more schools like that mentioned, without the defensiveness of thinking that “easier odds = bad school.”
actorparent, GREAT post. I think people are hesitant to add names of the “easier odds” (though NOT easy by any means) BFA programs for fear of offending someone. Just as you say, “easier odds” doesn’t equate with “not a good program!” While I think all the BFA programs are very tough odds and one can get into a top program and rejected at a so-called “easier odds” program, there are some very rough estimates of which school are more competitive generally to get into than some others. With my clients, I do provide rough artistic estimates so they can create a college list that is balanced artistically. It is not nearly as accurate as the academic odds I give them for each of their schools. But one must develop a balanced list, both artistically and academically, and so a general idea of which BFA programs are the hardest to get into and some that are not quite as hard, generally speaking (but not nearly foolproof predictions!!) can be helpful to know. I occasionally have given some names of schools on the forum on this topic and I think I have even in this thread, but I get worried that someone is going to get offended and so I don’t post school names on this topic as much as I would privately to clients.
@shaun0203 I would caution to say the acceptance rate is anywhere near 75%. The reason why we ended up with 34 freshmen this year is because we didn’t have a full understanding of the use of the waitlist, if that makes any sense. out of the close to 200 (or over, cant remember) students who auditioned last year, I know 25 Girls were accepted, and then another 20 or so put on a waitlist and after the initial tally came in of students who accepted their offer, they re offered too many waitlist spots and it just became a mess. So I would say the overall acceptance rate is closer to 30 percent or lower for girls. Guys is a different story. Ask me questions about the U if you have any! It’s the Best!
@stageman181 - I definitely did not hear the numbers directly from the department, so I may certainly be wrong (I caution everyone on this board to take what everyone says with a modicum of caution, myself included). If you heard this directly from the department, then I stand corrected! Still, if 30-55 girls were accepted and perhaps 20-40 boys (just guessing - no idea), then that’s still 25%-50%. Nowhere near 75% but still much higher than most schools talked about in this forum. At least we both agree on one thing: the U is great! Go Utes!
I would add Coastal Carolina University to the mix. Great school with top notch training, but a somewhat smaller applicant pool. Ken Martin posted this on the CCU page recently so this is coming from the chair of the theatre department:
Another thing to consider at CCU. Fewer kids audition for Acting and PT than for MT. Acting (and PT) majors can take voice and dance, and they are cast in musicals. So it may be worth it to delve into the curriculum for both majors and consider applying to both MT and Acting if you are really interested in attending CCU. I would not suggest applying to the PT major unless PT is what you really want to pursue in your training.
I think in terms of numbers Roosevelt CCPA must also be considered as they take up to 75 kids per class, 25 each in Acting, MT-Singing, and MT-Dance. They do not always have classes this big but they will go that big according to the admissions director we talked too last year.
Will college department admissions tell you their stats if you ask?
I think Roosevelt is not as difficult as an admit as the tippy top most selective programs, but not due to how many they accept. Size of class is not what determines selectivity.
We found it very difficult to compare statistics from school to school because they all come up with their numbers differently. Just as @austinmtmom said of Coastal Carolina - some schools will count everyone they see at thespian fairs, SETC college fairs, performing arts college fairs, summer camps and workshops, prescreens, unifieds, etc… Are all of these students truly interested in their school? NO. But it could mean the number who “audition” for them is inflated if all of these kids are included in their numbers. Other schools don’t even attend any of those things and only have on campus auditions. So there total number auditioning may be much smaller, but the quality of their auditioners overall could possibly be higher. So it doesn’t mean necessarily you have a better chance of being admitted there just because they say they see fewer people. The quality of the applicants has to be taken into consideration as well. Additionally, they all have different ways of handling their yields. Some accept far more than they want because they know many will choose another school. Some will have a wait list. Some will have a “priority hold”. Some will only extend offers to the exact people they want. They are all different. So the number they say they accept does not necessarily mean the same thing at each school. All that to say, just be careful when comparing numbers from school to school because more likely than not, you won’t be comparing apples to apples as they each have their own formula for saying how many audition for them and how many are accepted each year.
I know I will get flamed for this but class size and cost do play a factor in selectivity. There is no way to exactly quantify what that is but you will never convince this business analyst that the numbers don’t mean anything.
evilqueen, I can’t see anyone flaming you for your opinion!
I happen to believe that it is not about class size. In terms of “numbers,” one has to examine the acceptance rate. You can have a bigger MT program that is more selective than a smaller MT program. Outside of MT, you can have a larger university that is far more selective than a smaller college, if their acceptance rate is lower. In terms of MT, numbers aside, there is the level of the applicant pool…which types of kids apply to the school in the first place and the depth of that applicant pool.
Cornell University is a whole lot bigger than Cornell College and accepts more freshmen too and has a bigger freshmen class, but it is a LOT more selective than Cornell College. Their applicant pools also are not alike. If I were hedging my bets and just basing it on NUMBERS, I would apply to Cornell College, the smaller school.
Back to MT, BOCO is a lot bigger of a MT program than Wagner or Viterbo, but I think it is harder to get into BOCO than Wagner or Viterbo.
I think the applicant pool is key but I think we would disagree as to how that shapes the outcome. I would argue that a school like BoCo is not necessarily harder to get into than a school like Viterbo (for example) anymore. The cost of BoCo automatically reduces the pool and there are considerably more slots than at Viterbo. As some schools become increasingly more expensive the decision not to apply to them is affecting the talent pool and where they apply. I really don’t think the “old rules” are terribly accurate anymore.
@evilqueen You are assuming that the cost of a school reduces it’s pool–but that is certainly not the case for many schools. Let’s talk about NYU whether it be MT or any major for that matter. An insane number of kids apply and many go into debt to attend.
We’ll just disagree. BOCO was very expensive even when my D applied. It still is. It draws a large talent pool from across the country. Likewise, NYU/Tisch is a larger program and has a low admit rate for MT and it too, has always been a very expensive school compared to many others (before financial aid is taken into account). I know lots and lots of talented kids who were successful in BFA in MT admissions who did not apply to schools such as Roosevelt and Viterbo (those schools also get very talented applicants, don’t get me wrong). But some of the talent pool is not even applying to those schools. Schools like Viterbo still attract more of a regional talent pool that I don’t think is as deep as to these two other schools. I have had two former clients from the East Coast go to Roosevelt, but that was the only BFA program they got into. I have had MT clients from around the country for 11 years, and none have applied to Viterbo and all got into other well known BFA programs. Size of program is not what makes it selective or not. You have to look at acceptance rates, and also strength and depth of the talent pool.
Also, I do not believe that NYU or BOCO, two larger BFA programs, have seen a drop in applicants or a dearth of applicants.
On a personal note, I consider NYU and BOCO two of the hardest schools my D applied to. While she did get into them, I don’t believe it was due to their being larger programs or two of the costliest ones. She also got into small programs such as Ithaca and Penn State for MT. When I advise MT applicants, I still consider NYU and BOCO (just using these as two examples of larger MT programs) as needing to be on the high end of their “artistic selectivity” spectrum when building a balanced list of schools. I consider Roosevelt and Viterbo (just two schools as examples, but not just these) at another point on the spectrum of artistic selectivity when they build a balanced list of schools. None are easy to get into by any means. I have a feeling that many would see NYU or BOCO as more difficult odds than Roosevelt or Viterbo.
I gave examples from the non-MT world where very large universities with larger freshmen classes are way more selective than some smaller colleges. In addition, some of these very large universities only offer need based aid and no merit scholarships and they have NO dearth of applicants. Their application totals are skyrocketing and their admit rates are dropping! The admit rate at some Ivy League (and similar schools) are now in the single digits!