She's talking about a gap year

MichaelNKat
Fri, 11 Feb 2011 03:23:16 +0000

Have to agree with NMR and onstage. My daughter, who is a graduating senior in a BFA program, was an all honors/AP student at a rigorous college prep high school, with all of the dance classes, voice lessons, school and community shows, extracurricular activities, etc that she (and we) thought could be physically packed into a 16-18 hour day. Throughout college, she has often commented that the work load and time demands have exceeded her high school experience. In addition to all of the performance aspects of her program, there is more reading, paper writing and analytical “academic” work than I ever thought would be involved in a “performance” based program. On top of that, the physical and emotional demands of her BFA program have been unlike anything she dealt with in high school. Her days are still 16-18 hour days but she feels even more gets packed into that time frame than what occurred during her high school life and is of a far more demanding nature. Over the past 4 years, her class which started out at 26 has whittled down to 21 as students concluded a BFA program was not for them due to the demands and intensity.

So I agree; don’t for a minute think that a student burned out from high school will find a BFA program to be “refreshing” simply because the student is doing something he or she loves and has a passion for. I would keep my finger on her “pulse” and seriously consider a gap year if she and you conclude that she is not physically, emotionally and mentally ready to dive into the demands of a BFA program. Many schools will permit deferring admissions for a year and there is nothing wrong with taking advantage of that if it seems appropriate to do so. For some students it is a very beneficial and mature choice after which they go on to very gratifying and successful college experiences. And in your daughter’s case, it sounds as if she has some very constructive and worthwhile ideas about how she would spend the time.