My son is a standout vocalist (jazz, contemporary, classical) who has performed at an elite level with lots of rigorous training at New England Conservatory of Music since ten years old (his choice!) He discovered as a high school freshman he also has a passion for football! He played varsity as a junior at a very competitive high school rated best for sports in our state.
His vocal coach has assured us he could get into several great prestigious music programs. But now he wants to play football. None of those programs allow that.
So we’re now pivoting to a LAC with a strong music program and a DIV III football team. He is being recruited by a few right now:
Oberlin, St. Lawrence, St. Olaf, Univ of Rochester
He is also targeting:
Lawrence, Ithaca, Muhlenberg, Hobart, Union
His cumulative GPA isn’t high enough likely to get into a NESCAC, but Trinity or Bates have shown interest in him (Junior day/camp invites)
Are there any other great music schools with DIV III football teams that should be on his radar?
It looks as if you’ve identified many of the schools where these criteria intersect, and it sounds as if his prospects are good at several of them. Do you think he has a preference between a true LAC (like St. Olaf, which could be an amazing fit and which is a bit larger than the typical “small LAC”) and a mid-sized DIII university like URochester?
It sounds as if academic (non-conservatory) admission to Hopkins would be too reachy, but if his music is really strong, he might still have a chance at Peabody. (According to PrepScholar, median stats at Peabody are 3.71 GPA, 1290 SAT, so not as daunting as JHU outside the conservatory.) Peabody students are theoretically eligible to play on JHU teams, but it’s noted that scheduling conflicts may pose difficulty w/ varsity sports, so football might not work well… could be worth inquiring though.
Some additional LAC’s with DIII football and music conservatories include Gettysburg, Shenandoah, Baldwin-Wallace, Trinity TX (I think your Trinity reference was to the Hartford NESCAC one, but Trinity in San Antonio is a great school too, with DIII football and both BA and BM music tracks), and College of Wooster.
My daughter is at Oberlin for vocal performance. The music conservatory is great, and she loves it there, but if he wants to join a football team that wins occasionally, Oberlin is NOT the place, lol! They are the worst team in the country and have been for awhile, I think. It’s actually kind of comical how bad they are.
My oldest daughter was at TCU a few years ago when they were in the D1 championship, so that was a really exciting season of football. Then my current college kid goes to this school whose team won 0 games all season
I know a student that just attended double reed day at Lawrence. She confirmed there were kids in the music program that were also on sports teams.
Be sure to ask the vocal professors and coaches if there would be a conflict. My daughter played a D3 sport and asked each coach and captain if there were any majors that were off-limits. Her coach said musical theater would be problematic because the practice and performance schedule would overlap with the practice and competition schedule for her sport.
You might look at DePauw University in Indiana—yes, DePauw with a “W” often confused with DePaul. It’s a super strong liberal arts college with a reputable D3 football team. Their music program went through a restructuring process recently, so you would want to do your due diligence, but in the past it has produced well-trained vocalists who have gone on to well-known voice grad programs. The school was high up on both of my daughters’ lists when they were applying. The program has a cozy personal vibe and their music building is beautiful. My daughters really vibed with the faculty as well. The school in general is known to cater to student athletes as a decent percentage of the students are involved in athletics. Might be worth looking into.
I knew someone would mention this! There’s even a podcast (nominated as a finalist in NPR’s annual College Podcast Challenge) called “The Best Player on the Worst Team” on SoundCloud.
I agree with others, even though DIII football is light years removed from playing at a div 1 school like Alabama, LSU, ETC, they still demand a lot of practice time, and if your S is interested in pursuing football at schools talk to the music program and to the football coach to see what typically happens in a given day and try and see if there are conflicts. I know very little about how vocal music works, with time demands, with something like strings because of ensemble playing and coachings and rehearsal time with a group and personal practice, it would be very stretched time. On the other hand I think having football if he really loves it as a balance to the rigors of the musical training might be great. My S loves sports but would never think as a violinist to play the sports after in 6th grade playing football he ended up with a 90% fracture in his upper arm, couldn’t play for like 5 weeks.
The biggest difference at the level of D3 football you are looking at is that all of those schools play in small conferences that are fairly local. The good thing is that time spent traveling won’t be as much of an issue. Schools like Oberlin and St. Olaf look for kids that are “more than just a (musician) (athlete) (bio major)” so I’m assuming coaches buy into this as well. I’d definitely have the conversation with both the music department and the coach, but he is on the right track with schools.
Also, don’t forget the broken leg test. If he should have to stop playing due to injury, or decides he doesn’t want to continue, would he still want to go to that school?
Oberlin made him a verbal offer of admission! St. Lawrence asked him to an “official visit” We are visiting both schools in April. Lots of football Junior Day invites:
University of Rochester
Muhlenberg
St.Olaf
Gettysburg
Trinity College
Tufts University
Union College
This is progress I think!
Hoping University of Rochester shows an interest after camps/ visits
Just to be crystal clear, the coach is recruiting your S and offered him a full-coach-support thru admissions slot (note coaches can’t offer admission)? Or???
Admissions did a pre-read and then gave the coach the greenlight to make an offer so I think admissions is already on board with him being accepted there.
This is how athletic recruiting works…positive pre-read and then coach offer. Offer will be open for some period of time, typically several weeks, maybe a month, likely not several months (son should ask the coach). If your student verbally accepts the coach’s offer, that usually requires an ED application and he is done talking with other coaches and schools. He can continue talks with other schools if they know he accepted an offer from Oberlin.
Did the coach address if he ‘allows’ music majors? Does Oberlin require an audition?
Where does he stand with the other schools? It can be difficult to get athletic offers to align timing wise. For example, if he did progress with Trinity and Bates, the earliest they can do a pre-read is July 1 and then offer shortly thereafter.
The biggest benefit to attending Oberlin is they are very accommodating to students who have extracurriculars - the coach stressed this in his talk with us. And they support dual majors for students who want to explore options other than music. Most of the other elite music programs weren’t receptive to him playing football.
The other schools(besides St. Lawrence) are in pre read stage and sent Junior Day/ prospect camp invites. We travel to Oberlin April 9 for a visit.
I am an Oberlin Conservatory parent (soon to be alumni parent) and I love this so much! I hope it works out. I know there was a voice major a few years ago who was on the baseball team.
