The Sophomore Gate is taken during the MUED 211 (Introduction to Music Education; only offered in spring semesters) final during finals week. The Music Education Coordinator will send out an email that will detail the requirements a few weeks prior to finals week, and students will sign up for appointment times. The gate consists of four components:
Dispositional review
Interview
Sight singing
Error detection
Prior to finals week:
Dispositional review: Music Theory, Music History, and Ensemble faculty are sent a survey (see below). Faculty fill out the survey, which are collected and organized by the Music Education Coordinator. All applied faculty of the student are interviewed one-on-one by the Music Education Coordinator. The information collected helps the Coordinator to determine strengths and growth points for each student, which is synthesized and given to the student as part of the gate process. Students are expected to have primarily 3s and 4s in the dispositional process.
The day of the final:
Interview: Each student will be asked 2 questions by the music education faculty. These questions will be known so that responses can be prepared, but responses should not be read during the interview. The student will deliver their response and be scored by 2 – 3 Music Education faculty. The rubric is provided in the email sent by the Music Education Coordinator prior to the gate. A passing score is 70% of the total on the rubric. The most recent version of the interview rubric can be found below.
Sight singing: Each student will sight sing an exercise in major and an exercise in minor. The exercise can be sung on solfege or neutral syllables. The first pitch may be played on the piano. A passing score is 51% or higher on each exercise.
Error Detection: Students will go into a separate room from the interview and sight singing to take the error detection component. Students will receive the score for the error detection a week in advance to allow for score study. Students can listen to the exercise as many times as desired, but the piano in the room MAY NOT be used. Students will circle the errors and mark them as either Pitch or Rhythm errors. A passing score is 50% or higher in both pitch and rhythm errors.
If a student does not pass a portion of the gate, the student will be expected to take the portion failed during finals week at the end of fall semester. If a student does not pass the interview portion of the gate, the student will not be permitted to register for courses having field experience components until the interview portion is passed.