<p>I am blessed or cursed with two theatre kids, and having successfully sent my son off to study MT at Ithaca, I am wondering if it would be worthwhile to do things differently for my 13-year-old daughter.</p>
<p>Our local high school drama department is dreadful, so my son did a lot of community theatre and semiprofessional stuff and had an outside acting teacher. Our county does not have an arts magnet program. HOWEVER we are just a few miles from the District of Columbia, which has the Duke Ellington School for the Arts. Apparently kids from Virginia can apply and, if accepted, attend Ellington, though they would have to pay tuition because it is only free to DC residents. I have an acquaintance whose daughter is there and loves it.</p>
<p>Does anyone here know about Ellington? It sounds great, but overall the DC Public Schools don’t have a great reputation, so I am worried about what it is really like. The school is being renovated and classes are temporarily being held elsewhere, which means that visiting will be less helpful than I would like.</p>
<p>Do kids from Ellington actually have good training and get into good college theatre programs and have careers in acting?</p>
<p>The only kid my son knows who got into Carnegie Mellon this year, is from Ellington.</p>
<p>I used to live in the DC area, and I’ve heard nothing but wonderful things about Duke Ellington! Now, I will say that it is in DC and therefore they have metal detectors at the entrances which might freak one out, but otherwise I believe it to be a great school. If I still lived up there, I would’ve considered putting my D there.</p>
<p>I don’t know anything about Ellington but I looked over the curriculum at the Philly arts magnet high school and I was very surprised at the academics. It was no where near as academically rigorous as our high school. I didn’t expect it to be on par, because obviously the focus of an arts school is the arts, but clearly you would be sacrificing academic rigor for the artistic training.
My point being, take a look at the traditional academics of Ellington as well. We quickly decided to keep out daughter in the free, and excellent public school, for academics, and find the artistic training she needed elsewhere. Good luck!</p>
<p>One of my kids spent 2.5 years in the Philly arts magnet. The academics were abysmal.</p>
<p>If I’m remembering correctly, when my D was auditioning at Rutgers, one of the admitted Freshmen was from this school.</p>
<p>Here are some ways to gauge quality of student body and the environment of the school. This is in no particular order and mixes academics and theatre. All this is public info available with a web search. If you have trouble getting the info, ask the school for it.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Average SAT scores.</p></li>
<li><p>Graduation rate. </p></li>
<li><p>Percent matriculation each year. (To gauge happiness, satisfaction, and drop out/transfer rate)</p></li>
<li><p>Colleges admitted to. Percent going to college. </p></li>
<li><p>Notable alumni.</p></li>
<li><p>AP/honors courses offered and scores (scores are important to know; otherwise, they can offer a zillion crappy courses). </p></li>
<li><p>Finally, visit the school and ask if it’s possible for your D to sit in on classes. If not, go see shows and speak to parents and students. This is probably the best way to get your information.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I don’t know anything about this particular school but not all arts schools have abysmal academics. Even if they’re operating out of another space this year, it would still be a good idea to visit and have your D sit in on classes. The arts school that my Ds attended had specific opportunities for prospective students, and parents, to visit. I don’t know how it works at this DC school but the open house and information visits were in October and the application deadline was early December for us. Auditions took place in January. So, if it’s similar in DC, and your D is in 8th grade, this fall would be the time for her. I’d be happy to send you a link via PM to the school my Ds attended just to give you an idea of what an excellent arts school offers both artistically and academically.</p>
<p>Also, it appears that Ellington has a fairly active Facebook page. You might be able to connect with some people there who can give you the information you’re seeking. Good luck!</p>
<p>I live in the NOVA area too and actually don’t know much about Duke Ellington besides the fact that the students routinely get published for Cappies. Besides that, nothing really. I don’t know where you are in NOVA (as it’s a big area) but the buzz with all of my friends right now is the opening this fall Metropolitan School of the Arts in Lorton. A friend of mine actually goes to a school with a terrible drama department too and is transferring there this year. The tuition is more than Duke Ellington, but it’s always another option to consider!</p>
<p>We are in Vienna so Ellington is closer, but I will look into the Lorton one, thanks for the tip.</p>
<p>I was intrigued about the possible lack of challenging academic curriculum at performing arts schools. </p>
<p>I took a look at ours. Sure enough my local performing arts magnet is missing AP classes from their curriculum. </p>
<p>I wondered if this was the case at some of the top arts boarding schools. Walnut Hill has some sort of advanced classes but it does not look like outright AP classes while Interlochen and the SC Governors School do offer that AP’ track.</p>
<p>prodesse, Where you are not from the state would your D need to board there? If not,You should also explore the challenges and environment for the boarders vs commuters and how the school includes the commuters into the environment of a boarding school. If you are not from the state and your D would need to board, then perhaps you should not be limited to the on close to your home, and you could explore other boarding arts schools. Hopefully others whose kids have attended can chime in as to these details. Congrats to your son MT at Ithaca, he obviously has done well for himself despite the challenges in your public school.</p>
<p>mom2gals, I was thinking the same thing.I’m sure prodesse knows, but there are several very highly regarded boarding schools such as Interlochen, etc. I know my S said wistfully at one point that he wished he’d gone to one of these. Well, hindsight’s fifty/fifty! This wouldn’t be for everyone but if the student is on board, you can get an excellent overall education. They do have need based scholarships.</p>
<p>How lucky Prodesse’s D is to be planning for this now, my D would have killed to be in a arts school never mind an arts boarding school. This is really a very beneficial thread.</p>
<p>We’re not looking at boarding schools, just wondering about alternatives to the local high school. My daughter is a very strong student and would not want to sacrifice academic rigor for a better drama department, if that turns out to be the tradeoff.</p>
<p>Others here may be interested in the boarding programs, and to tell the truth I am interested in an abstract way, just not planning to send my daughter to one. Yet, anyway.</p>
<p>One of my son’s friends is doing a year 13 at Interlochen in their film program. I haven’t heard much about it, except he seems really happy, judging from his Facebook. (He’s been there about a week so far.) He’s got some serious talent at filmmaking and seems quite bright, though I’m not sure about his grades/test scores etc. Also reaching back a few decades, we used to go to Interlochen during summer vacation sometimes for concerts. It was always amazing and I, too, would have killed to go there, but it was expensive then and more so now.</p>
<p>Interlochen was definitely worth it for my S. He attended IAA for grades 10-12. He and his classmates were well prepared for auditions and are currently in top BFA programs thru out the country. Academics in the math and sciences were average, but were extremely demanding in the Humanities, such as English and History.</p>