<p>I would like to get your advice on organising a New England college trip next October. We will be flying over from London on 10/19 and flying back on 10/31, so we will have between Monday 10/21 and Wednesday 10/30 to see colleges. We were thinking of the following draft itinerary:</p>
<p>First week:</p>
<p>2 Days in Boston
3 Days to visit Amherst, Williams, Middlebury and Dartmouth
Weekend free (is it possible to do college tours on a Saturday</p>
<p>Second week:</p>
<p>3 days to visit Yale, Wesleyan and Brown
Is this above schedule realistic and feasible? Also, since we will probably end up spending some of the weekend in VT or NH, are there any really nice hotels or country inns where you would recommend staying?</p>
<p>It’s certainly possible to visit Yale and Wesleyan on the same day as they’re only about 35 minutes apart. It might also be possible to squeeze Amherst and Williams into a single day; they’re about an hour and a half apart. Williams and Middlebury would be more of a stretch; that’s about 2.5 hours.</p>
<p>Some of this will be contingent on the tour and information session schedules offered by the colleges, which they haven’t yet scheduled this far in advance. We’ve sometimes had good luck combining visits to two schools in a single day; other times scheduling has been a challenge. I think on the whole your plan is probably workable, but ambitious, and after a while all the tours and information sessions start to blur together. For that reason we found ourselves jettisoning the information session at many schools–do a few of of these to get the general flavor, but after that there’s surprisingly little useful school-specific information at most of them, and they become pretty predictable, right down to the same lame jokes. Taking the tour is helpful to get a sense of the physical facilities and an opportunity to interact with your student tour guide, but bear in mind it’s a sample of one, so good or bad you shouldn’t read too much into it. Sitting in on a class here or there is also helpful, but given the range of schools you’re looking at there’s going to be very little difference from one school to the next, so it’s certainly not necessary to visit a class at each school (and again, you’ll be seeing a tiny sample of the curriculum at any particular school, so it’s probably not wise to draw sweeping conclusions from such a small N). It’s also worthwhile to spend some time on your own poking around the campus bookstore, perhaps having a meal on campus or at some nearby eatery frequented by students, and browsing the organizational and event postings on campus, just to capture some of the flavor of campus life–or even taking in a campus sporting event or theatrical or musical performance. That takes some time but it can be fun and in its own way just as informative, if not more so than the official dog-and-pony show organized by the college.</p>
<p>As for Saturday visits, some schools offer Saturday tours and info sessions in October, others don’t. Few if any would have Saturday classes for you to sit in on.</p>
<p>Dartmouth to Middlebury is about 1 hour and 45 mins, Middlebury to Williams is 2 hours and 15 minutes, and Williams to Amherst is 1 hour and 35 minutes. You’re looking at about 5.5 hours in a car traveling between these three schools. Doable in 3 days.</p>
<p>Three years ago we did the first group on your list in 3-4 days. We drove from Boston to Amherst and stayed the first night there. The second day we toured both Amherst and Williams, then drove to Middlebury and spent the night there (at the Middlebury Inn, highly recommended). The next day we toured Middlebury and then drove on to Hanover and spent the night there (at the Hanover Inn, very conveniently located but overpriced). From there we returned to the airport in Boston.</p>
<p>Amherst, Williams, and Middlebury seemed very much alike. My wife and daughter liked all three and didn’t like Dartmouth at all, which was a surprise to me. </p>
<p>New England colleges don’t look their best in March but in late summer and autumn they are just as you probably have imagined them.</p>
<p>By the way, my daughter chose Middlebury. I don’t think it was entirely due to quidditch.</p>
<p>How many schools do you intend to see in the Boston area in two days?
Some school’s websites do give you an idea of whether they offer Saturday tours/info sessions in the fall, I would think most would.</p>
<p>Two schools a day is easily done assuming reasonable proximity. Depending on your child you may be able to add a third school; my sons became very adept at dismissing schools that they had no feeling toward. No much point in wasting time at schools they don’t care for.</p>
<p>As a travel tip, I’d make Inn reservations sooner rather than later. October is prime ‘leaf-peeper’ season so demand may be high for the better Inns (though it may be easing by late October).</p>
<p>You schedule seems doable but top heavy and I might suggest you throw in a few “lower” schools. It’s easy to go visit a bunch of top schools with sub15 acceptance rates; they’re all easy to love.</p>
<p>I see that I mistakenly thought your visit was in March. October is the perfect time to visit New England colleges, but I agree with the recommendation that you make your room reservations early. This month would not be too soon.</p>
<p>london, my son is a Williams grad. He looked at many of the colleges on your daughter’s list plus a few more. </p>
<p>Because we live overseas like you we knew he was not likely to return after acceptances were in, so we tried to lengthen our stay so that he could devote a full day to each college. He did the info session, the tour, interviewed if offered, visited the academic departments that were not on the tour, ate at the dining hall, wandered around the town and surrounding area. We visited in the summer, so no class sit-ins.</p>
<p>Many – but not all – offer on campus interviews, often with students or with members of the admissions committee. My son found this experience invaluable.</p>
<p>I think you’ll find that Saturday appointments are fairly common, especially “in season.” Some will have Fall Breaks so you’ll want to check the schedule. Driving distances are fairly manageable, so I wouldn’t worry so much about the ideal sequence; there are lots of ways to go about it. </p>
<p>Try to spend the night at your daughter’s top picks. We stayed in Boston, Providence, Amherst and Old Saybrook, CT. We wished we had stayed in Williamstown. The countryside is glorious – especially in October – and there are three worldclass museums on or near campus. October’s leaf viewing time in New England, which is glorious, but reservations are essential.</p>
<p>There were surprises. My son’s top choice fell off the list post-visit, and Williams was a last minute add on. Be flexible.</p>
<p>Your daughter might want to add a safety or two. I don’t know her personal situation, but those are all mighty selective. I’d suggest Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Conn College in the same geographic region.</p>
<p>Thanks everybody for the tips. We are probably going to see 3 schools in the Boston area (will definitely see BC and Wellesley and not sure whether to see harvard and/or MIT. We will also look for other very good, but less competitive schools (maybe Conn. College?). My son is doing his GSCE’s (my daughter is one year behind him) so we will have a better idea of whether these schools maybe out of his league by then, so we may have to change the list a bit depending on his end-of-year grades. I will also book some of the hotels asap.</p>
<p>I also recommend looking at Smith since you’ll be near it (Amherst); it has a different vibe than Wellesley. Keep in mind that many schools have parents weekend in October and hotel rooms may be extra tight.</p>
<p>Don’t forget about leaf peeping – hotels/motels/bb fill up with vacationers too. Especially in VT, NH area. Should be a pretty sight though if you happen to be there at peak time.</p>
<p>If he starts in Boston with the dates he posted, he may be a week or two past the prime leaf-peeping for NH and VT and Western Mass. The following resource will help predict that -
<a href=“http://www.yankeefoliage.com/peak-foliage-forecast-map/[/url]”>http://www.yankeefoliage.com/peak-foliage-forecast-map/</a>
As for the Boston area, he could stay just outside of Boston along Rt. 95/128 where there are TONS of chain hotels. Not as quaint as a B+B or country inn, but much cheaper than staying in downtown Boston. Unless staying in the city was part of the objective of course.
You can post in the college-specific forums to get specific inn/B+B recommendations…</p>
<p>We find staying in the Waltham area easy when we’re in Boston - it was an easy jumping-off point to see Brandeis and Tufts, but also convenient to Wellesley and easy to jump on the turnpike to get out to western MA.</p>