Final Decisions, BACKGROUND, class of 2018

College Majors Theater/Drama Majors
161

<p>@ctl987 She did the Tisch Summer Program, so she/we have gotten to spend quite a bit of time on the campus, and I have been very pleased with the school’s commitment to security etc. I would be thinking about the tracker no matter where she was going, D is an only, and the struggle is to imagine my baby living somewhere I am not! (I know, time for the big girl pants!) It’s funny to look back- she KNEW she wanted NYU after the summer program wanted to do ED, but I said we should wait and see… could have saved myself a whole lot of stress!! On the other hand, going through the full process makes ME so much more comfortable - we looked and evaluated what programs offered and what D wants, and found a list of schools where she and I could both imagine her thriving. She liked the schools where she auditioned/applied, and while some didn’t feel the same way about her- in the end she ended up where she was always meant to be!</p>

<p>@connections - Ithaca wasn’t a problem. They were not rude or disrespectful, they just clearly had other things on their mind. What funny is that 2 of D’s friends also auditioned for Ithaca at Unifieds, but a day or so earlier, and commented on how engaged the auditors seemed. Just an illustration of how something totally out of our control can throw a wrench in the works!</p>

162

<p>Applied to: WVU, BU, NYU, Pace (BA/BFA), Fordham, Marymount Manhattan, U of Minnesota, Northwestern, Rutgers</p>

<p>Prescreens: Pace BA (invited to audition in person), Pace BFA (not invited to audition in person.)</p>

<p>Accepted to: WVU, NYU, Marymount Manhattan</p>

<p>Rejected from: BU, Northwestern, Pace BFA, Fordham, U of Minnesota, Rutgers</p>

<p>Wait-listed at: Pace BA (eventually accepted.)</p>

<p>Final Decision: NYU (Playwrights Horizons Studio)</p>

<p>Coach: None formally, worked with my director on monologues starting about a month or two before auditions.</p>

<p>Summer Programs: None.</p>

<p>I’ve been formally acting for about 2.5 years and am from WV, so I did not have an advantage at all and was nervous to go up against kids who’ve been acting their whole lives and who had a lot more resources to use. I received many many "no"s in a row and was getting really discouraged, and then I got my wait list from Pace BA and from my 2 auditioned acceptances. Surprisingly, my cheapest option, other than staying in state and going to WVU was NYU - which was (for me) the obvious choice. It only takes one yes to change the game entirely, so don’t count yourself out. I never expected to get into NYU. I seriously considered not even applying because I felt I didn’t have any shot at all, but I encourage everyone to just go for it. You never know what may happen.</p>

163

<p>Yay to @hermomma as well! Your daughters will all be just fine in NYC. In general, mischief and mayhem will be of their own making but they can do that anywhere and what you don’t know, won’t hurt you! </p>

164

<p>@halflokum - if they step out of line…the leather jackets are waiting in the wings to whip them back in to shape!</p>

165

<p>@halfokum - Glad to hear he made a decision! Boston is a great city. Hope he loves it.</p>

166

<p>Wow. Lots of NYU folks this year! Congratulations to all!</p>

167

<p>@romancepants fantastic story and a great word to anyone that thinks certain schools won’t happen and even if they do, cannot be afforded. Great lesson for future applicants. YAY!!!</p>

168

<p>Congrats from a fellow Mountain State native! :)</p>

169

<p>Thank you, @halflokum and @Times3!! :)</p>

170

<p>Love it @RomancePants‌ ! My S always says with a shrug " Someone has to get selected, why not me?"<br>
Congrats! :)</p>

171

<p>Congratulations!!</p>

172

<p>@RomancePants, really great story. Congratulations!
@toowonderful, yes, I didn’t say that Ithaca was rude, only that sometimes you can get grouchy or distracted auditors from any program. Auditors are human; it is only natural that occasionally they will be distracted.
@hermomma, so glad for you and your daughter!
These stories are really wonderful.</p>

173

<p>This is such a fun time of year when you see everyone’s decisions as to where they’ll be in September. And for those moms who want to put a tracker on their kids, you would very likely worry more if you knew where they were every minute. Trust me. :)</p>

174

<p>Great school, romancepanys. And love the studio!</p>

175

<p>

</p>

<p>This is not my D’s year, but I can relate to the above quote and had a similar experience, though not exactly the same. My D did not attend the Tisch summer program. But from age 12, she wanted to go to NYU/Tisch. She considered applying ED, but she was applying to college in 11th grade (decided to graduate a year early) and I had thought we’d have junior year to visit colleges, etc. (assuming she’d apply to college in senior year) and we had only visited a couple of colleges at that point and I thought she should explore the options fully before committing. I recall that on Dec. 15 (or thereabouts), and we were in a dressing room in a store, D was getting calls from some friends from other states who she knew from summer camp who applied to Tisch ED and got in and she was like, “I should have done that! Maybe I could have known by now too!” but that’s not what she did and so she still had the audition season to go and would have to wait several months to hear from schools. But she did all her auditions, visited every school on her list and considered them all worthy of interest. D got into a number of schools and had options. However, the day in late March when she got her acceptance to Tisch (albeit, in poor condition in a hospital), there was a scream of joy (nurses running in asking what was wrong and I had to tell them that her dream just came true and there was much to look forward to, given the condition she was in at the time!) and there was NEVER a discussion of which acceptances to weigh, etc. and we all just KNEW where she was going to go and did. But like you, I am really glad that she came full circle and when she got into Tisch, it was after fully exploring every option on her plate and we could say that this was the right fit and not just a childhood “dream.” She has since graduated Tisch and I can say that it really was a perfect fit for MY kid. </p>

176

<p>Applied to: Northwestern, Emerson, CCPA, and CMU. Later at unifieds walked-in to then applied to Pace, UofArizona, and Hartt</p>

<p>Prescreens: none</p>

<p>Accepted to: UofArizona, Pace, CCPA, and Hartt</p>

<p>Rejected from: Northwestern</p>

<p>Wait-listed at: Emerson and CMU</p>

<p>Final Decision: Pace</p>

<p>Coach: They have coaches for this stuff? </p>

<p>Summer Programs: They have summer programs too? </p>

<p>We knew very little about this going in. My son did get some direction from his high school drama teacher/director who attended BFA and MFA programs. We knew to have a safety school, but really not much beyond that. </p>

<p>She suggested a few schools and my son did a little research and that’s how we developed the list. CMU got added because I suggested it based on other factors. We had no idea about the prestige of any of these schools. We showed up at unifeds LA and asked the people in line ahead of us ( Ithica staff) how the whole thing worked. That’s how we learned about walk-ins. </p>

<p>My son just walked in to places that had slots and looked fun. I know some of you are cringing as you read this. Now that I see how involved this is, I cringe a little too. </p>

<p>Our journey with this has been interesting, exciting, and fun. We subscribe to the belief that success in life is directly tied to investing in your “flow” or strengths. To that end, we have taught S to find those things and invest himself there. We use the phrase “those things you do where you become so engrossed you lose track of time” a lot in our house and support the kids wherever that takes them. That’s how we ended up here. :slight_smile: </p>

<p>We are grateful in the respect that he has been able to come into his own with his talent in a pretty happy-go-lucky way. I am confident that he will do great wherever he goes. He has lots of family and community support, and rightly so, he is a pretty talented kiddo. He is excited about going to New York and has already made friends and connections at pace. He’s doing a fundraiser now and two of the kids and one staff have even contributed! He’s very excited about the school ,the teachers, the curriculum and all the opportunities NY has to offer. All in all, I think it will be good experience for him. Hard for me to see my kid so far away, but that’s another post! </p>

<p>If I were to do this again, I would be more prepared. I don’t think we had a good list of school and we certainly didn’t research well. I’d pay a lot more attention to cost and schools able and known for offering financial aid. We also didn’t do a good job of applying to more than one school in a city. We totally missed the chance to explore other schools in NY and Chicago. </p>

<p>I honestly don’t know if I would have invested in coaching and summer programs. My son was himself in his auditions, a talented 18 yr old kid, raw, high school educated, and ready to be taken the next step by a university program. If that is not what a school is looking for then what are they looking for and why? Why would schools want kids who are already educated? Maybe I’m missing something. </p>

<p>I am glad to be done with this part of the journey and so is S. It feels great to only have one school with one website and one Admissions and one FA office to deal with. Onward! </p>

177

<p>Octaviar, does this mean CMU called today? Am I remembering correctly that they gave you a definitive date? Pace seems really exciting…we were there an ENTIRE day for auditions…and S was waitlisted. I know he liked the program.</p>

178

<p>I think the way they do it is they contacted the newly accepted yesterday and the rest of us got an email today. It also seems they have filled the acting program with a fair amount of MT students. I’m wondering if they are on their way to doing away with the acting concentration altogether and just doubling the MT program. Several of the originally accepted and WL accepted Acting students were MT applicants. </p>

179

<p>I noticed that, too…and when my S auditioned, they had a questionnaire asking how many years of voice and dance training…and I said, “Just put N/A”…LOL! He can sing and dance and has had some “training” in each, but not YEARS of it…and since they were also auditioning MT, I just assumed it was for them. LOL again! But OH, if we had it to do over again. I also asked how long they expected the auditions to take (at about 8 am) because we had a 6pm flight and I was hoping to get out of town sooner if possible (it was our 13th and final audition). Felt like asking the question didn’t sit too well, either. Live and learn. I’m just happy that some unsuspecting folks will come along next year (like I did this year) and possibly be more prepared to help their actor with the crazy audition process.</p>

180

<p>Hindsight is always 20/20… Octaviar, that would seem odd if CMU concentrates mostly on MT since their YouTube showcases of the past two years seem to emphasize their students’ film and commercial marketability. I wonder if CMU folks have any insight? My S didn’t apply; I’m simply curious. </p>