Can Playing an Instrument Help Your College Admissions?

Does playing an instrument help with college?

From the time children are young, their parents and teachers often emphasize the importance of getting into a good college. As a result, many young people are thinking about where they want to go to school and how to increase their odds of getting in. If you're a musician who has college coming up on the horizon, you may want to know if playing an instrument can help with your college admissions.

Identifying Your Goals

While you are thinking about the connection between your musical talents and your admission into colleges, you should also start to really consider your goals. For example, determining your involvement and passion can help you to gauge whether you are pursuing playing an instrument as a hobby or whether you want to potentially explore this path as a career. Sitting down with your parents and guidance counselor to talk about these issues can help you to have a better sense of whether your skills will help you get into college.

Establishing Extracurricular Activities

Many colleges are looking to enroll students who are interested in becoming active members of the community. Of course, attending class and completing coursework are two significant parts of the college experience, but they are not everything. If you are involved in extracurricular activities, you are showing that your passions and interests extend beyond the classroom. Colleges may see your involvement with instruments as evidence that you will become an active participant in the campus's environment.

Researching the School

You also have to take into account the type of music program at the school in comparison to your skills. For example, imagine that you are planning to apply to some of the top music programs in the country, and you are hoping for your instrumental experience to get you in. This situation likely requires a high level of dedication to your talent. The school may very well want to see that you've participated in concerts regularly and that you are working on improving your craft. On the other hand, you may only want to show that you have extracurricular interests to a college that is not known for its music program.

Declaring Your Major

During the first couple of years of college, many students decide to dabble in different classes to figure out what major they want to pursue. Other students, however, go in with a strong focus on a specific discipline. If you are planning to pursue music as a major or a minor, you may find that the fact that you play an instrument plays a stronger role in the admission decision than it would if you were going in with a science-based major. If you are planning to enroll as an undecided major, you may then want to note in your application materials that you are considering music as a major or minor.

As you can see, whether or not playing an instrument can help with your college admissions depends. It depends upon what the school is looking for, what your goals are and what your level of commitment is to the craft. For more information on how music could affect your studying abilities in high school and beyond, check out our other articles!

References:

Check Out Niche.com, The Yelp For Researching Colleges | Forbes

The Best Questions to Ask on College Visits | College Wise

Guide to Choosing College Majors | Princeton Review

The Ultimate Guide to College Preparation | International Connections Academy