HS Jr Costume Design/Tech search questions

momof2lefties
Fri, 31 Mar 2017 18:54:23 +0000

Hello. My daughter and I started narrowing her list of possibilities over spring break this week and visited a few campuses. We are scheduling more through the spring and summer when we can fit them in. The initial list was about 20, with most of them in the MidAtlantic, Midwest and a few in the South. She is looking for a small to medium size campus, not NYC. She loved the visit to UNCSA. We have DePaul on the visit list in a few weeks–we just found out that their open house happens to coincide with our Hamilton tix weekend. That’s handy. Webster and CMU are also on her top tier (at least right now, she hasn’t visited yet). Second tier for her are likely Shenandoah, Coastal Carolina, maybe Otterbein. There are several more that we just added to the list and need to research to see if they have the depth of field and resources that she is looking for.

She has a 3.6 weighted GPA through fall semester, waiting for SAT scores to come back but probably around 1300. A few AP classes, 2 years of honors art portfolio and expected AP portfolio next year. Student Costume and Wardrobe Designer for 2 productions a year (though they don’t really get to make much new stuff and mostly have to work with altering what’s available). One tech class, which is all that’s available. She knows sewing basics and is working on improving her skills and has years and years worth of costume and cosplay sketches. No great related experience outside of school other than working with kids on drama stuff at camp as a counselor.

Our question is, how many schools must you apply to for a reasonable chance at getting into a Costume program?

She is undecided as to design or construction, but there aren’t a ton of separate programs out there anyway. We think she is a talented artist–but she’s never had a portfolio review by anyone outside of school, so it is hard to know what anyone in the business would think. (Obviously I am biased.) She’s fairly shy and the idea of interviews scare her to death, so we’ll have to do a lot of practicing.

While her school is well-known for it’s rigor and excellence in college counseling (it’s a Country Day school), this choice of majors is a first for them and they aren’t as experienced with conservatory-type BFAs as they are with, say, journalism and business degrees. Any thoughts you have on this are much appreciated. I’ve been doing searches of the old forums and looking at numbers like 5 applicants per field accepted is a bit daunting. Anyone have an idea of how many applicants each school is turning away?

Thanks!