The Student Room Group

ACM London or ACM Guildford??

Hi, I've recently attended both acm open days (London and Guildford) and was wondering if anybody had any advice on which to pick? I'm a keyboard player if that helps anything. Both looked amazing and whilst the London one was smaller, something clicked a tiny bit more with it but I do not want to be biased in my decision at all.

Reply 1

They are opening a new, bigger campus in brixton september 2022 i believe

Reply 2

Don't go to any ACM anywhere, I went to the G ford one after less than 6 months and left, it's a terrible place you can make it in music without these places

Reply 3

I've just done 2 years of diploma at guildford and am gonna stay for degree. It's not that good to be real though. Most of the lessons are pointless and ACM have a real problem with students skipping lectures but they can't do much because we all do it. Facilities are great but ACM seem to take literally anybody so whilst you will find a few amazing musicians but I've also made friends with quite a few people that can't actually play their instrument/ sing/ well at all and as lovely as they are they can be an utter waste of space. ACM seem to be okay with the lowest of standard...

Reply 4

Original post
by hitchhiker242
Don't go to any ACM anywhere, I went to the G ford one after less than 6 months and left, it's a terrible place you can make it in music without these places

hi mate, im looking at ACM at the moment, what was wrong about it when you left?

Reply 5

Unfortunately I stuck with ACM and went to the Guildford campus and it is an absolute joke of a university.

Reply 6

Original post
by jabowla
hi mate, im looking at ACM at the moment, what was wrong about it when you left?

The facilities are horrible, lesson content is pathetic and the majority of your studies are independently led because tutors don't actually teach. There has been times where tutors just haven't showed up for lessons, we were told we could book and use rehearsal spaces 7 days a week which is not true, the syllabus is outdated, half of the facilities and resources are broken and haven't been fixed for the entire time I was at university, the promise of "state of the art facilities" is complete false advertising, the industry link and supposed opportunities and jobs is lacking entirely and the partnership with metropolis that they always talk about is very overstated and chances to do anything there are extremely rare. We also had ZERO one to one lessons on our instrument which is ridiculous at a music uni. I was better at music before I went to ACM and through a lack of real teaching, lessons on my instrument and facilities, I would've been better off staying at home - ACM has actually made me a worse musician than before I started. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.
(edited 12 months ago)

Reply 7

Original post
by keyzo
The facilities are horrible, lesson content is pathetic and the majority of your studies are independently led because tutors don't actually teach. There has been times where tutors just haven't showed up for lessons, we were told we could book and use rehearsal spaces 7 days a week which is not true, the syllabus is outdated, half of the facilities and resources are broken and haven't been fixed for the entire time I was at university, the promise of "state of the art facilities" is complete false advertising, the industry link and supposed opportunities and jobs is lacking entirely and the partnership with metropolis that they always talk about is very overstated and chances to do anything there are extremely rare. We also had ZERO one to one lessons on our instrument which is ridiculous at a music uni. I was better at music before I went to ACM and through a lack of real teaching, lessons on my instrument and facilities, I would've been better off staying at home - ACM has actually made me a worse musician than before I started. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

Thanks Keyzo, do you mind sharing which course you did at ACM, my son is 16 and wants to go to ACM to do a Level 3 extended diploma. He can do the same course at Richmond but we are favouring ACM because it's a specialist music school, where as Richmond is a 6th form college with a music dept.

Reply 8

I’ve posted this on another thread, but ACM is now under new ownership and has transformed. It is buzzing again and lots of investment has gone into equipment and the buildings.

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