Parents - What were the best/most insightful questions asked on your prospective college tours? And/Or what do you wish you had asked, but didn’t?
We are embarking on some college tours in the next month, and I would love to know your answers to the above questions!
Honestly these are so scripted… with older kids I got a lot of mileage asking “what schools were you deciding between and how did you choose to come here? Looking back, did that make sense?” But this time around I am mostly getting “we aren’t allowed to talk about other schools”. Also will your kid even let you ask questions? Most of us parents are kept on a pretty tight leash on these tours lol. I think you just listen to their spiel and look around and do the best you can with that…
I never asked questions–it wasn’t my tour. It was my kid’s tour. Pre tour, we’d discussed what they might want to know and if they didn’t ask it wasn’t important to their process.
Part of these tours include 1on1 meetings with students, professors, AO’s or financial aid offices including lunch, etc. So I won’t be mute the whole time! I get that this is for the student, not the parent, but can’t there be questions you wanted your kid or someone else’s to ask? Particularly about financial aid or something similar? My kid would not be embarrassed to ask or be embarrassed if I asked (situationally appropriate) questions. The whole point of being there is to find out if this is the school for you! Am I wrong? Is this a waste of time? Does no one ask questions on tours? I can read a spiel on the internet! Yikes!
D20 always asked what was one aspect of their time on campus would they change if they could. Sometimes she got answers about how difficult registration was, or how they wish the food was better, or how they wished the campus felt more inclusive. Things that seemed like dealbreakers to her really impacted how she felt about the school.
The important thing to really understand is tour guides and student reps on panels are chosen by the school because they can stick to the school’s messaging and bullet points. Everything about student visits are a sales pitch. Not to sound like a cynic, but anytime you can get a question in that deviates from the “script”, the more realistic the answer is.
I would ask why they chose that college or their favorite and least favorite things about the college. Some tour guides would only answer the first part and not the “least favorite” part so I think some colleges have told them not to say anything negative.
Are these admitted student visits then? Most things you describe don’t happen on normal college visits. For admitted student days you can definitely ask more and more practical questions, such as pros and cons of different dorms for example.
The point is was the school correct for my kid, not for me.
For the 1v1s with professors-- that was definitely kid time and not mine (including the one which was with one of my mentors. In that cases we did not more than “Hi-- good to see you” before she started chatting with my d).
Several of the schools we looked at had half day events as described for general prospective student visits. Usually, they were on days like Columbus Day or Presidents Day (or occasional Saturdays) when lots of high school kids had the day off.
Guess you missed the “situationally appropriate” comment. I get this is not about me, and you want to enforce that. Move on. It should be obvious I’m not the one attending college.
Just prospective tours actually. We were able to sign up for specific things at some colleges, like lunch with a student or department meeting, and others we know a student attending and feel like we can ask them more in depth, experience specific questions.
Thank you!
Excellent question! Thank you!
I remember my daughter asking about the ease to switch majors, what the most popular majors might be and why, their feelings about any mandated curriculum, how (ir-)relevant Greek life was, where people might go off-campus on weekends, etc.
We mostly went on the scripted tours, which my daughter disliked because they all seemed to have the same script. For those, you (or your kid) can ask about campus safety (can they get an escort back to the dorm if they’re at the library late?) What is there to do in the surrounding town? If the college has football or basketball, you can ask about student tickets. How do the dining dollars work?
For one-on-one visits with a student you actually know (we had the opportunity to do this at one college with a student who went to my daughter’s high school), you can ask more personal questions, like are they happy there? What are things they like and dislike? Did they get along with their roommate freshman year? What do they do socially on the weekends? is there a party scene? Are they happy with their choice of this college? What were some of the other colleges they considered and what was it about this college that made them put down a deposit? What happens if they don’t like an advisor or want to change majors? What are the keys for success in college classes (especially large lecture hall classes that may be taught by grad student TA’s)?
For meetings with department heads, I would have your kid prepare some major-specific questions, info about specific courses, research opportunities, internships, etc., enough to get a good feeling for the program while being respectful of the person’s time.
Thank you so much! Great insight!
Thank you!
The two questions I always tried to ask are whether they had trouble getting the classes they wanted and if financial aid followed the student if they chose to study abroad. The latter question I wouldn’t have thought of had I not heard somewhere that at some schools need-based aid only follows you if you do one of the programs run specifically by the school (i.e., your choices would be seriously limited compared to classmates). Only an issue if you have significant need-based aid, but as my D definitely wants to study abroad it was an important question for us (and we got a variety of answers). The registration question also got a variety of answers and they were usually unscripted answers as the kids talked about their and their friends’ experience.
I heard a good one from another parent on my most recent tour… ‘what’s your favorite class this semester?’ It’s not part of the scripted spiel and you might hear a tip of something for your kid to consider taking (eg, at Lewis and Clark the answer from a couple of students was an intro bio class for nonmajors that fulfills a general ed requirement and I guess they really liked how the material was presented. If my son ends up going there I’ll suggest he at least consider that one for his required science lab course).
As far as whether parents ‘should’ be asking questions… I usually leave space for the kids to ask first but if no one is asking anything (or if I really do have a question I want to know the answer to) I’ll start asking.
I believe there is value in questions that others have asked.
What were the best/most insightful questions asked on your prospective college tours?
My kids and I learned a lot from questions asked by others.
My kids also weren’t going to ask about financial aid, scholarships, and other topics. I’m the one writing the check, I have no issues asking. My kids aren’t omniscient.