Grad School search continues...

Last week I was lucky enough to be able to tour two graduate colleges - those at OU and OSU. Unfortunately, I didn't truly understand how to handle a college visit until after the first one, so my experience was better prepared for at OSU than OU, and I had more questions answered. But now I'm in what I would like to refer to as a "cesspool": a nice, large, foul-smelling dilemma.

Upon visiting OSU's campus, and getting to know several of their students (which I was not lucky enough to do at OU, aside from the fabulous Kristina... whom I of course already knew), I had the opportunity to pay a visit to the theatre department. This was not something I was lucky enough to do at OU, since I was distracted by the IMPRESSIONIST PAINTINGS in the ART MUSEUM ON CAMPUS (words capitalized for emphasis and ecstasy). When I walked into the theatre office, completely impromptu, they told me they were re-printing promotional materials for the grad program, and didn't have any new ones - but lo and behold, a grad advisor walks in at that very moment!

Only a few minutes later, and I find out that, coincidentally, this grad advisor is also the head theoretician of the department (my main interest in theatre studies) and that (insert drum roll here), she and I went to the same high school... in Richmond, Virginia. That was probably the craziest moment of this semester, if not the year. Talk about a coincidence.

Needless to say, after talking to her and about bridging the gap between the theatre and English programs, I'm much more interested in making sure the school I apply to offers an M.A. in Theatre, with classes I'll be able to take to supplement my graduate studies in Literature (the school also needs to have a strong program in critical theory). This ruled out more schools, and now I'm having to format a completely new list.

Some potential schools I may add to my list:

University of Wisconsin in Madison
University of Minnesota in Twin Cities
University of Missouri in Columbia
OSU (why not?)

Schools that (I think) remain on my list:

Rice University in Houston (though it's a terminal PhD program)
OU
Washington University in St. Louis, MO
Abilene Christian

Of course, if I didn't care where I went, I'd be applying to Cornell, and to Berkeley, or Duke, or Notre-Dame... but I'd like to stay within the midwest (and I certainly don't know if I'd be accepted into those prestigious schools with any sort of Assistantship or Fellowship).

Bah.