<p>My daughter's in her junior year and there's mounting pressure about college and admissions and financial aid and everything else. I'm worried I'm late to the game, but I'm trying to catch up by joining this community and reading extensively the forums these past few days.</p>
<p>One of the things I haven't seen addressed much is: how could we look beneath the surface when we do college visits? </p>
<p>I'm planning a college tour this summer for my family, possibly 5 - 10 colleges. How do I look beneath the surface and get beyond the info sessions where there're like 100 parents, and the campus tours where we're just criss-crossing campus in a hurry? How much time should I spent on each campus? </p>
<p>Narrow down the list. You can’t know 10 schools inside out and turn over every rock at all of them.
-read campus newspapers regularly-crimes, complaints and criticisms get published as well as all the good stuff.
let your child do an overnight. Visit area at night on a weekend. See what you see.
-Talk to alumni, let your child speak with alumni.
-Talk to your tour guide-What’s their major, about advising and career services and dorm life and partying. They are coached but sometimes they reveal some unpublished truths and don’t be creepy with a million questions, just slip a few in casual conversation.
-Attend a game or play or lecture. Talk to students in that casual setting.
-Ask guidance counselor about any H.S. alumni that attended a target college that may speak to your child.</p>
<p>My D did a lot of advocating for herself and these are all things she did. She knew her top few schools very well and from many angles. It was better that she did it vs me acting on her behalf.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, simply talking to other parents about what they wish they knew ahead of time and how they would do things differently or regret not asking is an excellent way to improve your research and questions.</p>
<p>Perhaps first figure out the “hard” criteria:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Talk to the student about cost limitations and run net price calculators on colleges of interest. Check for merit scholarships at schools where the need-based aid is insufficient. If not affordable even with the biggest merit scholarships, don’t bother visiting – no sense in having the student fall in love with an unaffordable college.</p></li>
<li><p>Check for basic academic criteria, like majors that the student is likely to consider. An undecided student who does not have obvious strengths and weaknesses may need a college with good degree programs in all kinds of subjects.</p></li>
<li><p>For each college to visit, consider what questions to ask beforehand. After visiting web sites, you may have questions not answered by the web sites, for example.</p></li>
<li><p>If you visit when class is in session, check the class schedules for courses of interest. Big lectures are easy to sit in on; smaller classes may have to be observed through the window of the door to avoid distracting the instructor and students.</p></li>
<li><p>If the student is a picky eater or has food restrictions, consider the dining hall as a restaurant for a meal.</p></li>
<li><p>Stop by the career center and get a list of what companies come recruiting. Find out if there are post-graduation survey results.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>If your student is interested in a full residential college experience, its important to find a college where most of the students stay on the weekends. We made the mistake of visiting during holidays when there weren’t any students on campus. It was hard to gauge what it would be like.
For example, the cafeteria might be shut closed during certain parts of the summer.</p>
<p>You can either eliminate or include for further investigation a lot of schools with the superficial info sessions and tours. Before summer, however, I would spend a lot of time trying to solidify a list and getting some basic criteria together. If there are any schools within 1-2 hours of your location, I would suggest visiting them before the summer. </p>
<p>Even if they are not where you think you want the D to go, they can often represent a particular genre of school. For example, D attended a 3-day conference at a small school in a very rural area. She learned that she does not want to attend that type of place, irregardless of any other factors.</p>
<p>That’s a great list of advice. Thanks @Madaboutx, @ucbalumnus, @coralbrook and @sylvan8798. @Madaboutx, sounds like your daughter really has her act together. Not sure if mine is as organized / disciplined / proactive about this whole college thing. I’m worried, but she doesn’t seem to be!</p>
<p>The students themselves obviously have a wealth of information inside them. Apart from chatting with the tour guide, any tips on how to get to the actual students while on campus? </p>
<p>I’m guessing it’s not that hard to find a random student to chat for a few minutes, but any tips on how to engage into a longer, more in-depth conversation? </p>
<p>I can reach out to my friends and network to find their kids in some schools, but some of the more famous schools I wouldn’t be able to get a contact. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>Much thanks. Further questions along this topic welcomed since I’m pretty sure I haven’t covered much. Thanks for all your help!</p>
<p>Here’s another tip used by a mother on one of our tours. She would randomly stop students as we passed them on the tour and ask how they liked the school. That way she got the unvarnished truth,not something said by a student affiliated with the tour…</p>
<p>Pick up and read the school newspaper while you are there.</p>
<p>You can stop students and just simply ask for directions (you are bound to get lost at least once.). </p>
<p>Visit inside the library! I think this tells a lot about the value a school places on academics. Do they invest in new technology? Do the students seem to be studying in there? Are the staff friendly? Many librarians will be more than happy to speak with you. I visited one school where the library was outdated 30 years. I think that speaks volumes (ha ha :-)</p>
<p>And finally, try to visit when school is in session. Summer visits won’t give you the same vibe as campuses tend to be so quiet then.</p>
<p>Agree with the suggestions about the libraries and cafeterias:</p>
<p>library - pay attention to hours - how intense is the place? observe the study vs. napping patterns. </p>
<p>cafeteria - not just for the food - but how many sitting together and relaxing? how many just laptops out and doing work alone? Best place for your kid to randomly start conversations about the school with those already attending for some unvarnished truths. </p>
<p>look in general at how everyone strolls about on campus - in groups? alone? Conversing? Listening to ipods or just obsessed with phones? Gives a vibe for how congenial the student body might be.</p>
<p>Forgot to add that you should check with admissions when you sign in - many offices will comp your visit to the dining hall - some for all in your party, others just for the prospie. And if you’re short on time and just don’t want to eat there, pop in one of the a la carte type eateries and just sit at a table for a bit to collect your thoughts and rest, but listen on the gabbing going on around you. Amazing what your kid picks up that lets them get a sense of whether they’d belong there or not!</p>
<p>Another thing we were told to watch for on campus is how many students are wearing school gear - t-shirts, hoodies, etc. It’s an indication of how happy or engaged the students are with the school itself, the level of school spirit.</p>
<p>
Lol, jandj, D would have stuffed me in a closet if I’d tried a trick like that. I was lucky if I could ask questions of the tour guide ;). Parents are so embarrassing.</p>
<p>One thing we used to do when visiting schools was to go to their student center or dining room to observe students. I always asked our kids if they could see themselves hanging out with any group of kids sitting at different tables. D1 noticed one school kids were very segregated by race by how they were seated. D2 noticed at one very highly regarded schools, boys and girls didn’t sit together as much. At one school D1 was very interested in, at our second visit she noticed kids were all studying at the student center and there wasn’t that much laughter or kidding around. Instead of going to a lot of planned tours, we spent most of our time just observing students. Both of kids took in how students were dressed to see if they would fit in socially. </p>
<p>Similar to what sahp2kids did. We knew most of schools our kids were looking should have academic, career things covered, but each school has its own vibes and attracts different kind of students. I don’t think summer is a good time to visit colleges because without students there a campus is just whole bunch buildings.</p>
<p>I checked out the bulletin boards around campus, how full where there and what types of activities. Some schools had nothing on them, indicating no one stayed around on weekends, others were 4 or 5 deep on the board with a wide range of things going on. I would also suggest NOT taking the family on the tour. Have one parent go if you have younger kids and no one to stay with them otherwise leave any siblings at home with grandma and grandpa and mom and dad take the junior. It’s not a family event and younger siblings can be distracting.</p>
<p>Also, just sign up for personal tours. The “info” sessions with 1000 people are BORING and you can find all the information they give on the website.</p>
<p>The other thing I paid attention to was how many times people greeted the tour guide. We were looking at smaller colleges so this probably won’t be helpful at larger schools but we wanted to know how well connected students were to each other.</p>
<p>Lots of good suggestions here…I agree with the others…I also asked the tour guides, kids sitting by us in the student center, kids working in the newspaper office (one of mine is a journalism student), kids ahead and behind me in cafeteria lines…you get the picture😊, what other schools they considered and why they landed where they are…the kids were very forthcoming and a lot of information was shared</p>
<p>/\ Sylvan,
We knew the woman as she was the mother of my son’s basketball teammates and that was her personality. What was funny was that ALL ten students that she stopped said they loved it there and two even admitted that when they are home, they can’t wait to get back to campus. My son is now one of those very happy freshman there and while her son went elsewhere, she had hoped he would choose that school. They chose to visit after being admitted… Both of the boys were smitten with the tour guide but that’s another story…</p>
<p>I would take a book and sit in the library while my kids sat in on classes. I spent time watching the kids there and listened in on their conversations. At one school there were several groups complaining about not getting into the courses they needed for the upcoming semester. At another, everyone was working and there was no conversation at all.</p>
<p>I think you COULD do 10 schools, but break it up into smaller trips. If you try to do them all at once they will all run together and you won’t get enough time at each one. We have done 7 schools in 2 trips and it was really so much fun and we felt like we got a good “feel” for each of them.</p>
<p>“Also, just sign up for personal tours. The “info” sessions with 1000 people are BORING and you can find all the information they give on the website.”</p>
<p>I heard this advice as well from an admissions counselor who came to speak at our high school. However, although I agree they are boring (and can be repetitive), I think they can also be revealing. I actually found them all to be quite different and also quite representative of the universities we visited. I learned stuff I might not have picked up on the website alone. (“Don’t worry – you can still apply in April. We only look at test scores anyway!” Yeah, same school with 30 year old library…)</p>
<p>Ds1 is at a school where we walked everywhere. We didn’t rent a car, taking buses and vans to/from the airport, etc. We felt like we really got to know the place. My advice: Get out of the car and engage others.</p>