College Deciding on engineering or just technical theatre for college

[derekleffew]

Story time (gather round ye children)...
(I won't name names as I heard this story second or third hand, but believe it to be a reasonably accurate account.)

A long, long time ago, in a place called Atlantic City, a young engineering student applied for a part-time followspot operator position in a casino showroom. Since he had a little community theatre or HS experience, he got the job. After a few months, he fell in love with the technical aspects of live entertainment and told his boss he wanted to either quit engineering or change his major to theatre since he'd decided that's what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. "Do either of those things and I'll fire you," his boss stated. "You've come this far; stay in school and complete the degree."

A short time later, a new show was opening in Las Vegas, where the boss had moved, and needed an automation operator. The boss remembered the student; he got the job and moved to Las Vegas. After a few years of doing the same show twelve times a week, he grew bored and started his own automation company. We've spoken often (almost always favorably) of the company here on CB, and the company was recently sold/merged/absorbed by a larger firm.

Moral of the story--one can get an engineering degree and do theatre on the side, but one can't get a theatre degree and do engineering on the side. Just about any degree is more valuable than a degree in theatre, it goes back to "If you can find ANYTHING you enjoy doing as much as theatre, do that instead."

Just my 2¢, FWIW.
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[hobbsies]

Rental houses, rep theatres, road houses, and the like won't really care what your degree is. I don't pay my employees with MFA's any more then I pay my employees who just got out of prison. Just because you have an engineering degree will not mean you get paid more. If you go work in a scene/automation type house where your engineering skills will get used more then yes you could make more money. Of course if you want to go do R&D for one of the many manufactures out there you might make good money, but those jobs are pretty far removed from the production world. If you talk to anyone who has worked for Tait, they will tell you they their ideal employee is a mechanical engineer who has spent years on the road putting together stages. Unfortunately, you don't get paid as an engineer when you are swinging a sledge hammer building a stage everyday.

And if I had a dollar for every person I know who is going to college to become an engineer so they can go work for ETC one day I would probably have a new car in my driveway...

Sorry this is an old thread, just seeing some of the new features of this site, like the alerts when someone quotes me. I only said an engi degree would help because I think getting an engi degree would focus more on how things work, like electricity where in a tech theatre degree you're just taught that it works, not necessarily how or why. I wish more people at my school and in my field had better understandings of electricity.

 

[museav]

Most would tell you go get that engineering degree, work for 30 years in a real job, retire at 55 with a nice house and a real retirement while laughing at all the people in the production world who work till they are 70.

It used to be that way, but with the rising costs of insurance, healthcare, etc. and the elimination of pension plans, 401k matching and so on most Engineers I know that are retiring in their 50's are able to do so because they made money investing in some other ventures (real estate, stock market, franchises, etc.). I've worked 30+ years and am not that much closer to financially being able to retire than I was 20 years ago.

 

[Focus]

That statement right there pretty much throws a wrench in the whole thing (as others have said). No college teaches what you need to know to run a day in the concert world. No college teaches what you need to know to work for Cirque. Some colleges teach what you need to know to run a stage on a cruise ship.
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Very true, but maybe not even enough for the ship. I love the look on a kids face, fresh out of college, when it changes from "I went to a conservatory, I know it all" to "holy s**t, I am in way over my head"

I think than anyone that has the opportunity and the desire to go to college should do so, study whatever you want, it is an experience and it teaches us how to learn things and how to deal with many types of people, however, a degree in theater is not particularly helpful in rock and roll and touring, but the fundamentals should be learned somewhere though. Keep in mind that theater lighting people and rock and roll people approach things from very different angles.

Internships, community theater, working for the local labor broker as a casual hand(and being observant and not a moron), and hanging out a punk rock bars can all have their roles in, non-formal education.

Do whatever you can do to make contacts, learn things from experienced people, and take everything you learn from anyone, in school , or in the industry with a grain of salt, do research, get experience, mash all of the above into powder, snort it in one big line, and repeat. (the last part is the Full Sail method, but meh..I't works)

Also I hear working for at Disney sucks, maybe on the road is better, but that is from potentially unreliable resources.