First Impressions - College Visits (UNCSA)

College Majors Theater/Drama Majors
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<p>Well…this is my 2nd attempt at this…clicked the wrong button the first time & lost it all. Needless to say, this version will be much shorter! :)</p>

<p>Thought I would share my S & mine first impressions of University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA).</p>

<p>Went there for open house on Friday. First impressions…not immediately good. School was not visually pleasing & was shabby around the edges. Admissions presentation & information fair were not that impressive. </p>

<p>Learned:
–School is very small (by our standards)…total undergrads about 700, high school students about 300, graduate students about 150.
–Admissions based almost wholly on auditions & recommendations from School of Drama for the Acting program. Academics has very small play in this decision.
–About 30 students (out of 300 applicants) per year get accepted into Acting program.
–School mascot is the Fighting Pickles!<br>
–School initially appears to be in rural setting, but is actually relatively close to downtown Winstom-Salem.</p>

<p>Took a tour of 3 buildings. The theatre building was fairly impressive. I think there were 3 theatres in the one building, multiple blackboxes & multiple rehearsal rooms. The Design & Production building was extremely impressive. From the warehouse size costume shop with two levels of racks of costumes & floor to ceiling boxes of various items of clothing (one box was shirt collars) to rooms of sewing machines & students making/cutting/sewing patterns, to yards & yards of hundreds of different types/colors of material. And, the same impressive views of the scene shop & the prop shop, etc. Very nice.</p>

<p>The tour of the dorm brought us back into the dingier section of the school. The floor we looked at had 4 toilets and 2 showers for the entire floor. Now…I’m not 18 & heading off on a grand adventure…but, I wouldn’t want to stay in those dorms!</p>

<p>But, of course, the day was really all about the School of Drama; Acting Program. They “demo’ed” their school for us. As we watched, they ran 20 minutes each of three 2nd year acting classes with their 2nd year students. A voice class, stage fighting class, and a mask class (sorry, there are probably better names for those classes). Anyway, very very impressive. I don’t know what else to say. Clearly the professors were top notch and their group of students were top notch. </p>

<p>Between observations & Q/A, here are some tidbits we learned:</p>

<p>–Acting classes consume first 3 years; last year includes career-type classes/workshops.
–4th year winds up in front of agents, etc. in NYC
–Productions are for 3rd & 4th year students; no auditions…faculty makes selections.
–Transferee from Texas A&M, transferree from UC-Irvine, one student who had taken a year off…all had interesting stories re: their decision to go to UNCSA.
–Acting program seems all-consuming…but, students appear to love it.
–2nd year students were from all over USA; probably less than 5 (out of 30’ish) were from North Carolina.</p>

<p>Definitely impressive & some things for my S to ponder. </p>

<p>If we can coordinate in time, we’re (well, my H & S) are off to UCLA, USC, CALARTS, and USD next!</p>

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<p>I’ll bet the grungier parts of the school mattered more to your than your son!</p>

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<p>This is so helpful. I am visiting in a 2 weeks!</p>

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<p>Looks like someone watched me do a demo!</p>

<p>(P.S.- the dorms might initially look unpleasing but… they’re really not that bad I promise!)</p>

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<p>(Oh and also there’s about 8 people in Studio II from NC out of 28. :slight_smile: )</p>

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<p>The thing about the dorms is you’ll be so busy that you only use them to sleep in after a while.
So they may be unpleasing but the school is worth it!</p>

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<p>The dorms will get you prepared for the apartment that you will probably have to share with three other people when you make the big move to New York City and are scratching together a living from being a waiter while going to every audition you can. Might as well get in the practice now. :)</p>

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<p>I emailed Bill Poole a couple weeks back asking if all the letters had been mailed at that time. He just emailed me back saying he will research that and get back to me…</p>

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<p>Oh oops, wrong thread for that last post!</p>

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<p>Thanks to all for posting & to those UNCSA posters: congrats on being in the USCSA Acting Program & best of everything to you & your education & career.</p>

<p>Another point that stood out to me during the presentation was a student mentioning that the faculty teaches all classes…not graduate students. </p>

<p>As a newbie to this entire process…what is the “Senior Showcase” that I read about on various posts…how does it work at USCSA & what are the pros/cons to the various ways in which schools approach this?</p>

<p>Thanks.</p>

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<p>I’m not aware of any pros or cons to senior showcases but basically at UNCSA your fourth year you prepare a senior showcase and you then fly with your entire class to NYC and then L.A. (Your class raises the money the L.A. showcase- it’s actually a very fun process and no one has ever had any real trouble with it). At these showcases you are put in front of agents and then if they are interested you have meetings with them. For the most part, usually everyone gets at least one meeting with an agent.</p>

<p>I feel all showcases are pretty similar. However, some schools don’t have showcases, and some schools only have showcases in NY or L.A. and not both. Lastly, more established older programs with bigger names in the industry than some newer schools I would guess would have a larger and better selection of agents than maybe some up and coming programs. </p>

<p>Note: this is all based on my speculation, haha.</p>