BFA Theatrical Directng....Advice? colleges?

glassharmonica
Tue, 18 Sep 2012 10:15:26 +0000

CADirectorMom, to answer your question about how people pay for it: some families do qualify for significant financial aid, but even so the proportionate burden on their finances is usually quite demanding on family resources. Most families (that we know, and like us) end up with a combination of debt spread between the student and parents. But, some families are able to pay in cash, thanks to significant savings, inheritances, gifts from relatives, or simply very high incomes. Some families send their kids to less expensive schools. Two years in a community college and a transfer into an state university is a great strategy for graduating with as little debt as possible. There are a lot of days when I ponder how different our lives would be if we had taken that fiscally prudent road!

More helpful, perhaps, would be to point out that merit aid is available at many colleges and universities. It’s hard to predict what financial offers your student will receive in advance of early April, so one strategy is to apply to many schools. I have been a little astonished by the unpredictability and large variation in the financial aid offers my kids have received. If you have significant merit aid from a school that is considered equally or more competitive, you may have success (or not-- it’s gone both ways with us) in appealing to the FA committee. Merit aid is guaranteed for four years, generally contingent upon student performance (e.g., maintaining a minimum GPA.) Merit aid is not usually so large that a family will not have to make sacrifices, but it can provide relief from many tens of thousands of dollars of potential debt.

Of course, there are other factors in the mix: NYU Tisch does give merit aid, but their COA (cost of attendance) is quite high (I think it was $67K/year last year), so, to use round numbers, a $17K merit scholarship will bring NYU into the same debt ball-park as another school with a $50K COA that offers no financial aid. And, COA is not always straightforward. After freshman year, if one moves out of the dorms, COA can drop quite a bit, depending on location.