<p>Hi guys, I will be visiting Notre Dame this Saturday. I am signed up for the tour and info session at 10:15. What are some good questions I should ask? We will be in town all day Saturday so what are some things I should do after the tour around the town? Good places to eat? Also does a campus visit help my admissions chances by showing interest?</p>
<p>For what it is worth, I was told by an Admissions person, quite recently, that a campus visit does not help admissions chances. As far as questions to ask, figure out what is important to you when looking at colleges, and let that guide your questions. Not all things are of equal importance to all people. As far as places to eat, etc., I seem to remember that we received tickets to eat at one of the dining halls on campus. Otherwise, head over to Eddy Commons, just south of campus. Plenty of places to eat there.</p>
<p>I recently visited and they say that the visit does not help chances. But do you really believe meeting with an admissions officer in South Bend and getting to know them personally won’t help you? ;)</p>
<p>My son was an admissions tour guide. He was amazed at the number of very basic questions he got that could have been answered by looking at the website. So don’t waste everyone’s time by being that guy, or girl.</p>
<p>When we went on our tour, I was surprised by how few buildings we actually entered. It was June and the campus was pretty quiet but our guide simply said that many places were closed. There were only four people in our group, so the size couldn’t have been the issue.</p>
<p>We ate in the dining hall also - we were given discount tickets, not freebies. This might have been the most valuable part of the tour. It was a chance to see someplace that kiddos visit every day and we were able to get candid opinions from a wide range of people there (students, faculty and employees).</p>
<p>I definitely agree with clairemarie - don’t be the person who asks questions that are easily found on the web site (How many undergraduate are here? Is Mechanical Engineering available as a major? etc.).</p>
<p>The fact that you are visiting during the academic year is good, as you will get more of a feeling for what the campus is like than you would during the summer. Be forewarned, though, ND is getting towards the end of their term, so students might seem a bit stressed. One thing we have found out from numerous college tours is that if you ask your tour guide questions about his or her specific experiences, they are generally more than willing to give you the unvarnished truth, something you might not necessarily get at an info session. There were a few tours we went on that we felt, for both better and worse, really gave us insight into things Admissions might not necessarily want to focus on.</p>
<p>Good places to eat: Fiddler’s Hearth, on Main street. Go early or be prepared to wait. Eddy St commons has some good stuff too. My daughter always asks why the tour guide chose the school. Can’t look that up on the website! Ask about other experiences too, about getting classes, professors, dorm life etc. How’s the tour guide’s social life with the gender specific dorms? Notre Dame was one of the tours where the visitors could choose the tour guide, so my daughter chose one that was majoring in her interest area. Then after the tour, my daughter asked about the research the tour guide was doing. The tour guide’s face lit up, and she spent another 20 -30 minutes talking about her field to us. My daughter just ate that up. </p>
<p>If you do your homework, you may have questions that really interest you to ask. I think you will have a great time on your visit. ND is a very welcoming place.</p>