Creating the List of Colleges

GoForth
Thu, 14 Jan 2016 23:57:33 +0000

Thanks for the great outpouring of thoughts.

Keep in mind, if S gets a $25K scholarship on a $40K tuition, that would still be quite a stretch for us (where stretch = financial risk). I think some of the suggestions are of this kind.

@ScreenName48105 - I envision the way gigging could start to de-luster. I think S will reach that point this year.

@musicprnt - In my bringing this thread back to life and mentioning only of wanting a great peer group, a lot of typical preferences were not specified - such a big/small, urban,rural because they do not really matter compared to playing skills and networking - being able to graduate and get down to business. Eventhough his academics are good, he is not looking specifically for academic challenge, having given his schoolwork a fair shake during high school at the expense of playing time. Dual majors and the like are not sought after as well. It would be nice to limit the auditions a bit - none of us really know for sure which ones will be offers.

The large presence of grad students hogging up the top spots at UNT is understood, but viewed as a realistic view of who you might run into in the real world. And those spots are something to shoot for anyway. And there will still be spots for undergrads in other ensembles and such. Reminiscent of ScreenName48105’s note about the luster of gigging, I wonder if there is also the luster of being in a particular performance group - I mean, as long as you are learning and playing in situations at your level, maybe that is fine. You might not be seen at the big jazz gala, but what loss does that cause for you?

As far as Temple, yes we have been thinking of that - a full tuition within 1 ACT point - well that is doable. And I could probably see a chain of schools between Chicago and New York as a nice cluster (Michigan, Oberlin, Hartt, Patterson, Berklee, SUNY, or some such) where they are chosen for financial safety or for having a fair chance at a great final offer from a great place.