@CanaDad congrats, incredible outcome!
@CanaDad As someone who works with a natural history collection I would find the connection to Ohio interesting if you find out lol! Congrats to your D and happy for you that you have landed! Here’s to an amazing four years!
@CanaDad congratulations (and more Ohio talent)! She’ll definitely get the full U.S. college experience at Cincinnati.
Great story @CanaDad
So glad your D persevered and found her place! Congrats!
Congratulations @CanadaDad!
@CanaDad I’m so happy to have been even a tiny part of your D’s journey! She had such great options on both sides of the border, but I’m glad that she’s going to get to have a US college experience like I had. I hope to continue to pass on what I know to more Canadian families with theatre school dreams! From one weird mascot to another (I was a V-Hawk…), go Bearcats!
Congrats @CanaDad - and welcome to Cincinnati! It’s neither a bear, nor a cat, but named after a 1914 football hero named Leonard Baehr. It’s kinda cute (and ugly at the same time) and handlers actually bring on out on the field now and again. May your D get an excellent education in this next phase of CCM’s evolution!
Congratulations to your daughter @ CanaDad… and thanks for the levity which only humor can bring to this wild ride! May we all get off it intact 
@mom4bwayboy Thanks for the info, very interesting! A little weird, but who am I to judge a school’s mascot. I saw the photo of the Malaysian bearcat from the zoo that comes to visit home games, he’s a homely thing. Probably either the high or low point of his year.
Thanks to all for the kindness and good wishes.
Where else but on the MT final decision thread can you find a great final decision story, a dose of humor, and an education on rodents and obscure mascots?! Great story @CanaDad and congratulations!
@CanaDad love the story and your humor! Congratulations!
@CanaDad - Congratulations!!! Thanks for sharing your story (and humor)!!! So glad your D found her path! 
@CanaDad - GREAT choice and Congratulations! If you need any dining recommendations on visits to Cincinnati, reach out as we are just across the river in Northern KY.
@CanaDad Congratulations to your D!
Oh my gosh, what the HECK did we all just go through?!!??? That was an insane process! I wasn’t going to write here as it somehow felt indulgent, but then the other day I was on a plane, me in my hippie beads and chronically messy hair, seated next to a teen and mom who were dressed in cosmo perfection when I overheard the word “audition” and struck up a conversation with them. The teen is going into dance and her college process is just like the MT process - there was this moment when the other mom and I just both expressed so much relief to talk to someone who KNOWS - us, seemingly different people, so happy at our common ground. Our friends and family watching from a distance kind of sort of get it? But they don’t KNOW. And so, here I am, coming to all of you, who also KNOW what this was all about, and just how intense it was. I’m so amazed by all of our kids and all that we have all done to get to this point. So much congratulations to everyone, and also gratitude; you have been good community.
Programs Applied to: ummmmm, Point Park, Ithaca, Molloy/Cap21, Manhattan School of Music, NYU Tisch, Long Island U, Roosevelt, Northern Colorado, Michigan, University of Southern Oregon (safety school - straight theatre), Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
Prescreens: Ithaca, RCS, and I forget what the other was.
Accepted to: Roosevelt, Manhattan School of Music, Long Island University, Southern Oregon, Molloy/Cap21
Rejected from: Ithaca (didn’t make it past pre-screens), NYU, Northern Colorado, Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Point Park (schools that did academic acceptances first all accepted him academically, but some we never found out about the academic acceptance as he wasn’t interested if he didn’t get into the MT program).
Wait-listed at: none
Coach: local voice teacher - just the last 1.5 years
Summer Programs: none
Background - Always loved the stage, but wasn’t one of the kids who was raised on stage. Took a little local acting day camp type thing from time to time, but no real training until high school where he immediately fell in love with the theatre classes/scene. His public high school happens to have an outstanding performing arts program. He soon became passionate about musical theatre, but couldn’t sing on key to save his life and had never taken dance classes. Signed up for high school dance and choir and found a local voice teacher who could work with our budget. He did his vocal exercises/homework religiously and was singing pretty quickly. Joined local non-profit theatre company with an excellent program for teens. Participated in all the high school productions, got first professional work senior year (just completing second professional show). We had NO IDEA what we were heading into with the whole college thing. Thank goodness we got some good advising toward the end of his junior year so that we weren’t completely blind sided by the process, but it was still quite a steep and fast learning curve. Did an east coast/midwest road trip last summer looking at schools (there are almost no MT programs on the west coast where we live and he didn’t want to be someplace too hot, so the south was out). Didn’t see Molloy when we were on the east coast. It was on his list, but then we we were running out of NYC time and someone had told us it wasn’t such a great school, and besides it was closed so we wouldn’t get to see any staff, so we skipped it. Then last fall attended an arts college fair that Molloy had a desk at. My S met the admissions person from Molloy and something just clicked. Without having seen the college, it was suddenly top of his list but we didn’t know much about it. Then we started haunting the College Confidential boards and found the Molloy/Cap21 thread, where people were more warm and welcoming and enthusiastic than any other thread we’d seen. After he was accepted we flew back to the east coast to see it and were not impressed with the campus, but were blown away by the heart. Oh, I skipped Unifieds, but you all know all about that most likely. Exciting, scary, lots of self doubt knowing he was auditioning with kids who had been being training since they were 2, all of that, but overall an incredible experience.
Final Decision - Molloy/Cap21 Honestly we all knew in our hearts from the moment he met their admissions person at that arts fair. The rest was just doing due diligence. Okay, next chapter!
I know I already said it, but congratulations again @tatteredandfriendly !! Thanks for sharing your story! I love reading everyone’s journeys! And again, welcome to the family!
@tatteredandfriendly Congratulations to your son!
Congratulations @tatteredandfriendly !
Wonderful story @tatteredandfriendly - and now I have an image to go with your user name. I once said my personal style was “amiably rumpled”. So happy that your son is so confident in his “fit”, it’s wonderful that you can head into next year without any qualms. I am sure he will love the Molloy CAP21 program - it certainly does seem to have happy students and parents! CONGRATULATIONS!