Hi again. Great follow-up questions. Apologies for any lack of clarity previously. In response
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Yes, 50% off COA merit (and I have a weird feeling it may have been 55% or 60%, it was too long ago) was as you described. And yes, that one conversation was anecdotal, but there were multiple other parents/students posting their New School scholarship offers that year, and those data points were consistent with that one parent’s anecdote
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I was too vague and broad in my statement of New School v Peabody. Let me be more precise: the assignment of studios and private lessons was more rigid at New School. I think your statement and your own experience at New School is accurate regarding the program overall.
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Very happy your son made that connection with Brian Marcella. Now that he’s been admitted, I’d suggest that your son reconnect with Brian and ask very directly what the chances are to get him as your son’s private teacher as a freshman, and if it’s low or zero, then dig deeper. Hopefully Brian will be as candid as Allison was with my son, and you’ll learn something along the lines of “Freshmen usually study with X or Y, and Sophomores with Ms. Purple or Mr. Yellow, etc.” New School’s faculty is consistently good to excellent, so it may or may not matter, but the personal connections are non-trivial IMHO, so do your best to go into any situation eyes wide open in that regard.
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My son considered Berklee for a brief moment, but moved them out of his consideration set relatively quickly because he decided he only wanted to apply to music schools at prominent (preferably, dare I say, “highly ranked” or “prestigious”) universities. Even though he’d be getting a BM in performance, the non-musical academic opportunities were extremely important to him. So places like with awesome jazz programs like Berklee, MSM, SF Conservatory, Juilliard, among others, were nixed.
Hope this helps.