@afterp89 Congrats! Kent State is definitely intriguing. May have to add it to the list!
Congratulation @afterp89 to you and your daughter! So glad that she’s found her home for the next 4 years. Go Kent State MT Class of 2023!! 
Congrats to your son @Kristiern1 and your daughter @afterp89 ! Glad they found their perfect fit and happy for you that the decision is done and you can all enjoy the remainder of the school year! Thanks for sharing your stories!
Congratulations @Kristiern1 and @afterp89 on your wonderful decisions and being done with this roller coaster ride! Wishing you lots of continued good health as well, @afterp89.
Congratulations @Kristiern1 and @afterp89 !! So happy to hear your kiddos have found their path! Thank you for sharing your journeys with us! ?
@afterp89, CONGRATS!! have loved " getting to know you" through this thread- as you know my non-MT daughter is starting at KSU in the fall as well- GO FLASHES!!
What a journey, @afterp89 ! Congratulations!!
@ Kristiern1 Congratulations!!! So lucky your S choose a great school where he can grow and still be close to home!
@afterp89 so excited for you and your family. I love how you took a gap year to help your daughter through her journey. Sounds like she found a great match for her 
Congratulations @afterp89! My kids have a number of friends in the program at Kent State and they are enjoying it. My nephew is also accepted but waiting on some financial information from other schools to make a final decision!
Congratuations to all!
@Kristiern1 Chirp, chirp from another BSU mom. He will love the program!
Okay - here goes - #1 of 2- DD (one of a set of fraternal boy/girl twins)
Programs applied to: BSU, CCM, Coastal, Elon, Hartt, Ithaca, UM, Montclair State, Oklahoma (OU), Syracuse, Texas State, UCLA, UNCSA, Webster and Wright State
Prescreens: Coastal, Elon, Ithaca, UM, Oklahoma, Syracuse, Texas State - She passed them all
Academically accepted to: BSU, Coastal, Elon, Hartt, Ithaca, Montclair State, Oklahoma, Texas State, UCLA, Webster and Wright State
Artistically accepted to: BSU, Hartt, Ithaca, Oklahoma and UCLA
Waitlists: Texas State (priority hold, then WL, then a “no”), Elon (removed herself from WL), Wright State (removed herself from WL)
Rejections: CCM, Coastal, UM, Montclair State, Syracuse, UNCSA
Withdrawal: Webster (call from director to see if she was still interested and she withdrew her interest)
Coach: No college coach - local voice teacher, dance classes and Sacramento Theatre Company Young Professionals Conservatory program (extracurricular conservatory training)
Summer Programs: Interlochen (3 week MT Workshop - summer 2017 and 2018)(Maddy Summer Artist winner both summers)
Auditions: Wright State (on-campus), Texas State (on-campus), Elon (on-campus), UCLA (on-campus) + Chicago Unifieds and LA Unifieds
Background:
My DD spent a lot of time selecting her list of 15 schools. Each week throughout the spring, we would do research on one or two schools. She felt like she had a good mix of reach and fit schools, though she decided to go without a safety school. SAT and ACT done last spring, headshots and prescreens done over the summer. Got a good head start on applications with the goal of completing all before September 15th, but DD and DS decided to do In the Heights at a local theatre in August and that put us a bit behind schedule. My DD had toured several schools when her older sister when through this process in 2015, so had a bit of an idea of which schools she liked and didn’t like.
One strategy that both of my kids used was no walk-ins and no more than two auditions a day at Unifieds. Our theory was if a school wasn’t on their list of their top 15, it was unlikely to become a contender during a walk-in. The two audition a day limit was to preserve energy and focus. Seemed to work for both of my kids.
My DD is a wonderful storyteller - whether she is dancing, singing or acting. She is also a bit different from many of the girls we saw at auditions - she is mixed race (white/japanese American) and wears her hair very short. I think that this just made her a bit more memorable, perhaps.
She was incredibly lucky to receive so many wonderful offers. Oklahoma came in first, then BSU, Ithaca, Hartt and UCLA in that order. She was a bit disappointed to have been in the mix with a priority hold and WL at TXST and ultimately rejected - she really enjoyed that audition experience and could see herself in that program. That was probably her biggest let down of the process, but she took it in stride. I think she would have loved UM, but knew that it was basically buying a lottery ticket.
She narrowed her list down to Ithaca College and Oklahoma and we visited both over her spring break - spending two days at each. Though she was honored to receive an offer at UCLA, the BA program wasn’t a good fit for her, although she loved the campus and would have liked to stay in California. She loves the BSU program, but that is where her sister went and her brother was very interested in the program and I think she just wanted to find her own place. She had visited Hartt in 2015 and it didn’t make her short list.
Final Decision: ITHACA COLLEGE BFA MT CLASS OF 2023
I think the tours were the tiebreaker - going into the tours Oklahoma and Ithaca were literally at a dead heat or OU was slightly ahead. The smaller liberal arts vibe at Ithaca really resonated with her as well as the rigor of the program and the talent of the students that we saw perform. Oklahoma as a campus just felt too big for her, although she really enjoyed her visit and liked the students and faculty very much. She just couldn’t see herself there. Ithaca came through with a nice financial aid package which brought it within reach (thank goodness!) Now we just have to figure out how to get there from California!
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Okay - here goes - #2 of 2- DS (one of a set of fraternal boy/girl twins)
Programs applied to: BSU, CMU, Coastal, Elon, Hartt, Ithaca, UM, Montclair State, Oklahoma (OU), Pace, Penn State, RCS, Texas State, Webster and Wright State
Prescreens: Passed - Coastal, Ithaca, UM, Oklahoma, Did not pass - CMU, Elon, Pace, Penn State, TXST
Academically accepted to: BSU, Coastal, Elon, Hartt, Montclair State, Oklahoma, Pace, Texas State, Webster and Wright State
Artistically accepted to: BSU, Hartt and Wright State
Waitlists: Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
Rejections: Coastal, Ithaca, UM, Montclair State, Oklahoma, Webster
Coach: No college coach - local voice teacher, dance classes and Sacramento Theatre Company Young Professionals Conservatory program (extracurricular conservatory training)
Summer Programs: Interlochen (3 week MT Workshop - summer 2017), NEXUS (TXST) summer 2018
Auditions: Wright State (on-campus), Ball State (on-campus) + Chicago Unifieds and LA Unifieds
Background:
Like his twin sister, my DS spent a lot of time selecting his list of 15 schools. Each week throughout the spring, we would do research on one or two schools. He felt like he had a good mix of reach and fit schools, though he decided to go without a safety school. SAT and ACT done last spring, headshots and prescreens done over the summer. Got a good head start on applications with the goal of completing all before September 15th, but DD and DS decided to do In the Heights at a local theatre in August and that put us a bit behind schedule. My son had visited Ball State to visit his older sister several times over her four years. He did the Nexus program at TXST last summer and had visited Wright State on one of our trips to Muncie.
One strategy that both of my kids used was no walk-ins and no more than two auditions a day at Unifieds. Our theory was if a school wasn’t on their list of their top 15, it was unlikely to become a contender during a walk-in. The two audition a day limit was to preserve energy and focus. Seemed to work for both of my kids.
My DS has a lovely baritone voice, is an intermediate dancer and a talented actor. He feels like he will not really fit his type until he is about 35 because of his low voice - definitely not a rock tenor! My DS had a rougher road than his sister and it sometimes created some tension at home - as you can imagine. It was very hard on the whole family when my DD passed the TXST prescreen and her brother was rejected after doing the summer program there. That was a heartbreaker. I have to say I respect Kaitlin Hopkins a great deal for pulling the bandaid off quickly since she decided early on that she did not think my DS was a fit for the TXST program. Not sure what we did wrong on the prescreens, but he got a lot of “no’s” right off the bat and that shook his confidence. Though he passed prescreens for UM, Ithaca and Oklahoma - so, who knows? But, we stayed the course and went into January with 10 schools left on his list.
He received a reserve conditional from RCS first and then was accepted to BSU, Wright State and Hartt in that order.
He narrowed his list down to Ball State and Hartt and my husband and he flew back to Harrt to tour and for my DS to sit in on classes. While he enjoyed his experience and really liked the faculty at Hartt, the campus itself felt too small for him.
Final Decision: BALL STATE UNIVERSITY BFA MT CLASS OF 2023
BSU was the bar by which he judged all of the other programs. He visited his older sister five times over her time there and sat in on MT classes and saw her shows each visit. He got to know the students and faculty over the last four years and felt like it was a perfect fit. He was extremely honored to have received an offer – that was a very happy day in our house when both twins got a phone call from Bill Jenkins. He is very excited to be a part of the Honors College and Mom and Dad are excited to have another 4 years with the BSU family! Also, he received the Presidential Scholarship and a department scholarship which makes it almost equivalent to in-state tuition. #chirpchirp #fourmoreyears
So, in August, my DD and DS will go their separate ways, which is a bit bittersweet. They are very close and this will be a hard transition for them - they have always been part of a set - one of the twins; but, I am excited to watch them thrive as individuals and find their own paths.
@Divamamacita wow!! Amazing stories. So happy for your family.
@Divamamacita Congratulations to both on finding their fit!!
So much respect for your family going through this x2 at the same time. Happy they both ended up in excellent programs and the tension is (hopefully) long gone. Yay!
Congratulations @Divamamacita on both decisions!! Sounds like they both landed in amazing programs! My D is WL for UCLA MT - we are trying to figure out when the WL may start to move. May I ask when your D declined her offer there?
Just today. Hang in there!
@Divamamacita thank you!
Congratulations to both of your kiddos @Divamamacita !!! So happy they each found their path! Thank you for sharing your story!