My kid has been accepted (engineering, CS) and will be seeing the campus for the first time soon. Are the accepted student tours that different from the regular tours? The accepted student day tours are limited. Are there other admitted student days? I only see the April 1 date. Thanks so much!
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I think because of the different audience - and their mindset - the tours will have a different feel. Especially, the questions raised and the depth of the answers will reflect that many students have since seen a few other colleges, and are much more informed about student life at various colleges and what specifics they need to find out.
When we took a few accepted student tours (none of them at UMN), we both realized that there were certain departments that were over-represented - in facility and in student guides’ majors, while others felt like after-thoughts compared to what we had seen elsewhere.
More importantly, those were accepted-student DAYS, where there were several presentations for parents and/or students going on in parallel - in case people were interested in particular areas of study, interested in semesters abroad, the mechanics/rules of choosing/changing majors, etc. At LEAST at one college, there was also a “department fair” in one of the large halls, where the different departments had set up “booths”. At another college, they invited all the honor students to a posh luncheon where they suddenly threw out progressively even more merit dollars, trying to rope the high-stats acceptances in.
Yes, in general the accepted student days were infinitely more informative and very much helped filtering out the choices for daughter.
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Are you referring to UMN’s admitted student days? Or to admitted student days for other universities?
I have the same question as the OP, specifically for UMN. We are trying to figure out how important it is to attend an admitted student event, or if we should just visit at a more convenient time and try to arrange a department tour. We are OOS (CA) so it takes significant advance planning to attend anything in the Midwest.
UMN CSE offers admitted student tours on various days, but only two hours long, and I am not sure how much depth they can get into. Here is how the web site describes the CSE admitted student visit:
These collegiate visits include a college-specific information session specifically tailored toward students admitted to the College of Science and Engineering and a Minneapolis campus tour. Please note: Our campus tours are general in nature, and do not showcase college-specific facilities, such as labs or studios. These visits are open ONLY to admitted students in the College of Science and Engineering.
UMN’s web site also mentions “Future Gopher Admitted Day” on April 1, but there aren’t any details yet about what this day includes.
I would love to get some advice from other CSE admit families who have visited UMN!
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My apologies - I didn’t notice the question being tagged to a particular college.
Please disregard, I am unfamiliar with UMN.
We are planning to attend April 1st. From what I can infer, the general admitted student “collegiate” tour is basically the same tour we took before he applied, plus a 1/2 hour of a more targeted tour of your major (which is not available to those that haven’t been accepted yet). April 1st is called Future Gopher Day and I assume it will be more like other schools’ admitted students days where there are many activities highlighting student life and an opportunity to meet people in your major.
I’m a little annoyed that they only offer 1 day (most have a choice of 3 or 4) and that they still have only sent out a date and no other information. They make it sound like it’s the first time they have ever done an admitted students day which I find puzzling.
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I think like most colleges it’s about convincing you to go there. Usually the acceptances ones are more specific to your major ie :engineering. Hopefully you find your peeps and push the button to go there. Many people never go to these. If you want to check out the campus then it’s a good time to do so. Ya might get a free t-shirt also. But you could also check out campus on days that work for you better also. We walked campuses outside of the scheduled times just to check them out. All the tours etc are basically the same and rah - rah this school. Only so many chemistry building’s you can see…
But if your really on the fence then maybe a visit will help you push the button of acceptance. Congrats and good luck.
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Son was also accepted for CS/Eng. I was really hoping there was going to be one in Jan/Feb. Honestly wanted to experience the weather and see if the boy is tough enough! Unfortunately April 1 is right in the middle of HS baseball season and we’d be coming from the east coast.
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We’re in the same boat, but my son is down to his top two and feels he really needs to see them again before making the choice. Luckily, the other school has a choice of days and we are able to see it in a few weeks (which is during wrestling season, but at least it’s just one weekend from baseball and one from wrestling).
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We happened to live close enough to the two final contenders, so my daughter was able to audit two sessions in two different classes one day - which helped her experience that college “in operation”.
In one sense it reassured her that she would be able to follow, on the other hand, it was a wake-up call how drastically different classes are being held in college vs. high school.