In a change from the past - students can now apply to both Yale College and Yale School of Music in senior year of high school (rather than applying Junior year of college.)
"High-school students can now apply to the Yale School of Music’s bachelor of arts/master of music program. Previously open only to Yale College students making plans for graduate school, the revamped degree path allows high-school students to plan simultaneously for college and graduate school. The program is designed for outstanding instrumentalists who are also interested in pursuing a liberal-arts education.
The program, in its expanded form, offers undergraduates the opportunity to spread master’s-degree course requirements and study with YSM faculty over the course of five years. Similarly, Yale College students who begin the program in their senior years can complete some requirements toward their master’s degrees before graduating and enrolling at the School of Music.
The revamped B.A./M.M. program, which comes with no costs beyond Yale College tuition (the School of Music is tuition-free) should be particularly appealing to pre-college students who might otherwise have trouble deciding whether to go the conservatory or university route. As the only music school in the Ivy League, YSM’s B.A./M.M. degree offers students the opportunity to do both at the highest levels of education."
How is this program structured? I mean, do they do mainly Yale College for 3 years and then mainly SOM for the 4th and 5th? Can students enter the program in sophomore or junior years too, or just as freshmen or seniors?
Yale has more gen eds than some Ivies, and the normal course load is a little higher too. Is this a difficult path? Do these students do all their performance at SOM or both the College and SOM?
Do students in the double degree program get to study with the excellent teachers at the SOM? Prior to this many studied with grad students.
This would seem to emulate the Harvard program with NEC (and with Berklee). Tufts and others have double degrees that are BA/BM.
I think it’s great that there is no price increase for Yale College students while doing this. That means the double degree program is accessible to financial aid students.
One thing for students to think about is whether they want to commit to a specific grad school for music at age 18. Needs can change over the undergrad years. And can a student go deeper with academics and with music by spending 6 years instead of 5? (But these apply to all double degree programs.)
This is a great new opportunity for some committed musicians, and I think it will draw more talent to Yale College as well. Exciting, and great that there is no extra cost, including a tuition free 5th year.
Watching with interest. Makes throwing an application into the ring at Yale much more appealing. I’d also love more info on the program if anyone has that info.
So only high schoolers and juniors can apply. Yhe BA part cannot be accelerated. And students can major in music for the BA or major in something else entirely.
The difference with Harvard/NEC is that for the Harvard/NEC program, I believe students can apply in any of the 4 years. Cost is less at Yale, and no bus!
I can’t figure out if this new program will include voice students and I’m hoping that it will not. The press notice clearly says “oustanding instrumentalists” which seems to define it but Yale’s MM in Opera program is well known and respected;
It would be extremely difficult to judge the voice of a 17-18 year old for suitablity for admission to a graduate program 4 years hence. Voices develop with time, they can and do change fach and this is why the majority of VP students take at least one year off between undergrad and grad school and some of those that don’t will find themselves waiting for the growth spurt after those two years.
Students will often benefit from a change of teacher after the four years of undergradate study so this Yale program seems like a “safety-net” that might not be terribly valuable to all students.
I’m wondering if this is going to “dilute” the quality of the students in the MM program…The kids who have been applying for Yale’s grad program are the cream of the crop from undergrad conservatories like Juilliard, CIM, NEC, etc, practicing 8 hours/day, playing in multiple orchestral rotations, chamber groups, premiering new works and such. It would be difficult to design a program where a student is going to get those opportunities plus cramming in all the required gen eds, necessary music courses and the early grad classes. Unless they supply each new student with a Time Turner from Hogwarts!
Yale students were already applying as juniors to enter the program in senior year, I believe, so this should actually improve the chops of Yale College students applying to the SOM, since they will be in the degree program longer. Or, at least, it would seem. That is one reason I am curious about the structure of the program and if this means the entering freshmen will get the top teachers, not grad students.
I wonder if the Harvard program put pressure on Yale to do this. It started in 2007 or 2008 and is quite popular, if selective.
I would doubt that many applicants will make it into the program as freshmen, only the “cream of the crop.” We found that Yale, with its relatively large course load and gen ed requirements, might be a tough place for a musician though I have no idea what the reality is.
Would love more info. The website doesn’t have much right now.
I wonder if @Hunt knows anything more about this. All I know is what I stumbled on, on the website. I’m guessing, too, that it will be super selective as one will need to be accepted to each individual school with prescreening and auditions for The School of Music.
Not sure how it would work for composers since Yale College has its own composition separate program.
I don’t know anything about the new elements of the program, but I do know that very few students were accepted into the dual degree program as juniors. (I do know that at least one of them was a composer, though). I suspect that only a tiny handful of people will be in this program, but I don’t really know.