{"id":10751,"date":"2018-05-31T10:23:55","date_gmt":"2018-05-31T14:23:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/takenote\/?p=10751"},"modified":"2026-01-20T18:05:49","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T23:05:49","slug":"rock-on-berklee-online-class-of-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/rock-on-berklee-online-class-of-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Rock On, Berklee Online Class of 2018!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-berklee-online-helped-students-overcome-challenges-and-launch-successful-music-careers\">How Berklee Online Helped Students Overcome Challenges and Launch Successful Music Careers<\/h2>\n\n\n<p><strong>Above, Jean-Carlos Casely of Berklee Online&#8217;s Class of 2018 is ready to rock.\u00a0(PHOTO BY MARK TEIWES)<\/strong><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Less than a year ago, Jessica Saltz wouldn\u2019t have imagined she would be marching across the stage in a cap and gown at Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA. That\u2019s because up until December, she was certain she would receive her degree from McNally Smith College of Music in St. Paul, Minnesota. Then the unthinkable happened: On December 14, McNally Smith administrators sent out an email saying the college would \u201cdiscontinue all course offerings at the end of this fall semester, 2017.\u201d<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Within two weeks of her school closing, Jessica was taking classes with Berklee Online.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI was like, \u2018you know what? Let&#8217;s get it done!\u2019\u201d she says.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10754\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10754\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10754\" src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0845-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0845-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0845-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0845-1024x683.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10754\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>&#8220;I just want to go out there, and I want to get going. I want to do what I want to do, which I still can, but I think that this degree is what really makes me distinguished from everybody else.&#8221;<\/strong><br \/><strong>\u2014Jessica Saltz, Berklee Online Class of 2018<\/strong><br \/><strong>(PHOTO BY MARK TEIWES)<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And getting it done is exactly what she did. She was able to walk in Commencement earlier this month, and she will complete the 30 credits she needs for her degree in Composition this summer.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Berklee Online\u2019s Class of 2018 is full of inspirational students like Jessica, many of whom also took unlikely paths to get here.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mindy Wilson was a senior airman in the Air Force, who was medically discharged in 2001, after four years of service. She began DJing in Florida and started her own company, which she enjoyed for a number of years but was never able to make it into a full-time gig.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI thought to myself, \u2018Why in the world can&#8217;t I go to school for what I love?\u2019\u201d she remembers.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And when her mother passed away in 2015, she had an epiphany.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI just found this motivation that I had never experienced before,\u201d she says. \u201cCome hell or high water, I was going to go to music school.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10753\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10753\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10753\" src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0854-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0854-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0854-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0854-1024x683.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10753\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>&#8220;I wanted to do music because that was my passion and I knew that I had something to offer, no matter where it was, no matter what I was doing. I just knew that I needed that education; that structured instruction, if you will.&#8221;<\/strong><br \/><strong>Mindy Wilson, Berklee Online Class of 2018<\/strong><br \/><strong>(PHOTO BY MARK TEIWES)<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As a veteran, Mindy found out she was eligible for Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment benefits (also known as Chapter 31) and applied for assistance. \u00a0She says that graduating from Berklee Online has righted her course.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIt&#8217;s been the biggest blessing of my life, other than my child,\u201d she says. \u201cIt was something that I needed for myself, not just for a sense of completion\u2014getting your degree is one thing; it&#8217;s amazing\u2014but the experience and the amounts of things that I&#8217;ve learned over the past two years is just incredible. It&#8217;s changed me so much as a musician, as an artist, as a producer. . . . I&#8217;m at the point now where I finally feel like I&#8217;m doing something right with my life and I&#8217;m on the right path.\u201d<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Will Jay is a member of the Class of 2018 who has been on the right path for a while, but he says his Berklee Online education is helping him blaze new trails he hadn\u2019t considered before. In the music industry since he was 14, he was one-fifth of the group <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/im5band?lang=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">IM5<\/a>, put together by Simon Fuller\u2014the same Simon Fuller who put together the Spice Girls and created <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">American Idol<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014and he felt he could better round out his performing and writing career by focusing on music business, and earning his Interdisciplinary Studies degree.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10760\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10760\" class=\"wp-image-10760 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0828-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0828-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0828-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0828-1024x683.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10760\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t get a high school graduation. Because I was in my band, I took the GED to get out early. It was a really cool experience to have my parents, my grandparents, and my brother there to see me graduate.&#8221; \u2014Will Jay, Berklee Online Class of 2018 (PHOTO BY MARK TEIWES)<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cFor me, it was important to learn about the business side of things, because you know you have to be a business person as an independent artist, which I am,\u201d he says. \u201cI learned a lot about the legal side of things, which will definitely help me moving forward. . . . To be honest, signing a contract at 14, I definitely didn&#8217;t really read it. I kind of relied on my parents as well as the lawyer we hired, who&#8217;s great. We didn\u2019t get screwed over, thankfully, but a lot of people do.\u201d<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Music Business has traditionally been one of Berklee Online\u2019s most popular areas of study, and in the Los Angeles apartment of Desanka Ilic and David Pinder, it\u2019s also the most popular area of study. So much so that both members of the household\u2014 who also walked in the Berklee\u2019s Commencement ceremony in Boston earlier this month\u2014will be part of Berklee Online\u2019s inaugural master\u2019s cohort, hoping to earn their <a href=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/music-degrees\/graduate\/music-business?pid=8023&amp;utm_source=takenote&amp;utm_medium=blog&amp;utm_campaign=bol-gen-takenote-article-promotion\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Master of Arts in Music Business<\/a> in 2019.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10755\" style=\"width: 1034px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10755\" class=\"wp-image-10755 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0837-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" srcset=\"https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0837-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0837-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/online.berklee.edu\/takenote\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/2i6a0837-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10755\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>&#8220;It was really cool that we were able to kind of congregate in one place and everyone kind of had the same end goal but with different journeys.&#8221;<\/strong><br \/><strong>\u2014 Berklee Online Class of 2018 grad Desanka Ilic, pictured here with her boyfriend and classmate David Pinder<\/strong><br \/><strong>(PHOTO BY MARK TEIWES)<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWe are so academically focused right now,\u201d says Desanka. \u201cWe&#8217;re like, \u2018might as well just keep the ball rolling and continue with the 12-month program.\u2019 It&#8217;ll do nothing but good for us and give our business more credibility.&#8221;<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The business is a PR and marketing firm called <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coldcoffeerecords.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Cold Coffee Records<\/a>, which she and David began right as they started at Berklee Online. She had previously been enrolled at Pepperdine University as a music major, but it wasn\u2019t the right fit for her.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI just felt that Berklee Online&#8217;s classes were so much more relevant to actual life than just doing classes to do classes,\u201d she says. \u201cThey were so helpful in developing our business, and I felt that each homework assignment had meaning and had a greater purpose than just busywork.\u201d<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In addition to her own business, Desanka also has a singing and acting career, and has accomplished all of this at a young age.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI&#8217;ll have my masters right when I turn 22,\u201d she says, proudly.<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Berklee Online\u2019s Class of 2018 is full of inspirational students, many of whom took unlikely paths to get here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":10752,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,9560,32],"tags":[93,172,175,332,337,398,416,599,667,720,725,896,927,1288,1331,1536,1605],"class_list":["post-10751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","category-spotlight","category-student-stories","tag-american-idol","tag-berklee-online","tag-berklee-online-commencement","tag-cold-coffee-records","tag-commencement","tag-david-pinder","tag-desanka-ilic","tag-graduation","tag-im5","tag-jean-carlos-casely","tag-jessica-saltz","tag-mcnally-smith","tag-mindy-wilson","tag-simon-fuller","tag-spice-girls","tag-united-states-air-force","tag-will-jay"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.8 (Yoast SEO v25.8) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Rock On, Berklee Online Class of 2018! 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