Help with school list! (what to do when kid has no preferences...)

junior72
Sun, 09 Sep 2018 13:48:45 +0000

Right now list of possible schools to apply to is too long (maybe 50 or so…).

When I talk to my son I can’t get from him any criteria to use to narrow the list. He is passionate about doing MT and wants to go the BFA route. But when I try to narrow it down by school size, location, weather, city vs. rural, conservatory or not, etc. he simply does not care about any of these factors. He just wants something that would give him a great MT education. (Are there any other criteria people use to try to figure out “fit” in addition to the above that I can try asking him about?)

We haven’t really visited any schools, planning to do that after getting acceptances (which will help us later, but doesn’t help now!). He did summer programs at Penn State, OCU and Webster, and based on those summer experiences he really enjoyed Penn State a lot, both for the interaction with the faculty and the location, but not sure how much we can transfer thoughts from a summer program to the school as a whole.

So with no input from him to narrow the list, I am left with just the various general “top school” lists, etc., with nothing to go on to figure out which is best for him…

If I impose my own opinion of what I know about him, criteria I think make sense to consider (if possible):

While he is passionate about musical theater, he sometimes procrastinates. So I think he might benefit from a school that pushes students and ensures they move forward vs. a school that leaves it up to the student to drive themselves. Are there any schools that would move up or down based on this? Are there schools that are known to require kids to be more of a "self starter" than others?

He gets good grades, so I think he might fit in better with a school that has higher academic requirements over one with lower requirements. Maybe this is most important when trying to pick the right "middle tier" schools - which of those are more known for stronger academics?

He is rather picky with his friends. He gets really turned off by kids who are arrogant, spoiled, showy, entitled, rude, etc. Would get along best with kids who are on the quieter side, respectful, focused on working hard. Any chance that helps to move some schools up or down? Are there any schools that are known for having student body that is, well...nicer? Or the opposite? Absent such knowledge, perhaps better to be in a school where more likely to have connections to wider net of kids than a school where stuck with the same 15 kids in every single class?

Right now I took my own shot at narrowing the list down to 20, listed below - but any suggestions to add or remove?

Most difficult to get into - UMich, CMU, CCM, Penn State, NYU, Elon, Ithica, FSU, BoCo, BW, Syracuse, Pace, Emerson
Middle difficulty - Hartt, Rider, Ball State, Montclair, Ohio Northern, Temple
“Safety” - Muhlenberg

Thanks!