Scoir is Special Music School's application portal, and it's where your whole college process lives: your school research, your college list, your documents, and your counselor's support. Use it well and everything else gets easier.
Scoir is the platform SMS uses to manage college applications. Think of it as home base: if it matters to your application, it either lives in Scoir or connects to it.
Research schools, build and organize your college list, track deadlines, and see everything your counselor has prepared for you, all in one place.
Your teachers upload their recommendation letters in Scoir. You invite them there, never through the Common App.
Your counselor manages your transcript, School Report, counselor letter, and mid-year reports through Scoir, and uses your list to track where you're applying and what each school needs.
Scoir matches with your Common App account, so documents flow from school to colleges automatically. No paper, no chasing, as long as your lists are accurate.
Your counselor can only support what they can see. When your Scoir account is complete and current, every transcript, letter, and form goes where it needs to go, on time. When it isn't, things fall through the cracks. Using Scoir efficiently is not busywork; it is the application process at SMS.
Scoir is also your research tool. Your college list grows up in three stages, and keeping it current is what makes everything downstream work.
Search schools in Scoir and read their profiles: majors, size, cost, admission stats, and more. When one catches your eye, heart it to save it. Following a school keeps it on your radar and keeps you updated.
Revisit your saved schools as you learn more about what you want. Compare them side by side, discuss the list with your counselor and family, and let it evolve. Junior year is for this stage.
When you commit to applying somewhere, move that school from your saved list to your applying list in Scoir. This is the official signal your counselor uses to prepare and send your documents.
Heart generously in the beginning; you can always unfollow later. But once senior year starts, keep the applying list exact: every school you're truly applying to, and nothing you've dropped. Your counselor works from this list daily.
You focus on essays and auditions. These documents are prepared and sent through Scoir, and your counselor tracks all of them there.
Your official record, sent by the school through Scoir to every college on your applying list, with a mid-year update after first semester.
The form that gives colleges context about SMS and its dual curriculum. Prepared by your counselor, sent through Scoir.
Your counselor's recommendation. Meet early in senior year so it can tell your story well.
Uploaded by your teachers in Scoir after you invite them there. Never invite SMS teachers through the Common App; that blocks the senders.
Keep your Activities & Achievements section current and upload your résumé to your Documents folder, so your letter writers see your full picture.
This is the single most important Scoir habit for SMS students, so here it is in bold:
Conservatories and many music programs don't use the Common App, so Scoir is the only place your counselor can see your complete picture. Add every school: conservatories with their own portals, schools using their own applications, CUNY, SUNY, everything. If a school isn't in your Scoir list, your counselor doesn't know to send documents there or to track it for you.
Mark it in Scoir the moment you decide to apply, even before you've started that school's own application. Your counselor tracks deadlines, transcripts, and letters for those schools from Scoir alone, and conservatory deadlines (like the December 1 standard) come fast.
At the beginning of senior year, you'll connect your two accounts. This is the moment the whole system starts rolling.
The Common App opens August 1. Set up your account with the same name and email you use in Scoir, so matching goes smoothly.
In Scoir, connect your Common App account when prompted (and sign the FERPA waiver in the Common App first). Your counselor will walk the whole class through this at the start of senior year.
The Common App colleges and your Scoir applying list should mirror each other, with your non-Common App schools listed in Scoir as well. When they match, documents flow automatically.
Students who do these consistently have the smoothest application seasons. Tap each one you've got covered.
Next up: the application itself, your materials, and the deadlines that matter.