| Very good points, NotMamaRose and MichaelNKAT.
AZMT, I think you're missing several points. First of all, if I may be blunt, the BA program at the University of Arizona is a joke that has nothing to offer anyone interested in performing. It offers two beginning level acting classes (that anyone in the BFA will have already taken), no musical classes and no opportunity to participate in mainstage productions or musicals of any kind. The classes offered amount to surveys of scenic, costume and lighting design plus theatre histories. So please do not tell someone who's cut that "all is not lost" because they have the opportunity to take courses towards a BA.
Secondly, the major problem as I see it is not the results of this years auditions. The faculty has established an ongoing pattern of admitting people whom they obviously do not think have the requisite talent to graduate from the program, all in order to fill ensemble roles in their productions. Not only is it irresponsible to toy with the lives of kids in this way, it's downright immoral. There is SUCH a lack of accountability on the part of the majority of the faculty that it boggles the mind. Do these professors really want to teach and help kids, or are they there because of a steady paycheck and a chance for power?
Perhaps some people who were dropped from the program deserve it, but when (every year) those same students who were cut move onto higher profile programs (Carnegie Mellon, BoCo and UArts being three recent examples) or even directly to professional jobs, doesn't that beg the question of what exactly they lacked in talent or motivation at the UA that they immediately regained upon being cut?
There are certainly fantastic graduates and students the University of Arizona, and many of them are my friends. And if you want to judge the program by those select results (most of whom don't credit the faculty with too much of their development, btw), then by all means do so. However, if you look at the overall picture of how the students are treated you get a much harsher picture of the program. |