<p>I want to take my kid on a number of campus tours of the college where he's been accepted so that he can make his binding decision. It seems like most tours are offered during weekdays. He has 3 AP classes and it is really hard to take the time off to miss anything then so we'd like to go on a weekend. I've checked and most that offer weekend tours require registration and are already full. Have any of you just walked the campuses on your own and gotten the information you think will be important without being part of an official tour group?</p>
<p>I think it’s harder especially if there is no information session. However we ended up on at least one tour that was full. We arrived as it was starting off and the tour guide assumed we were signed up. We didn’t bother to tell her it was already full when we tried to sign up. You may not be able to get into some of the buildings that a tour guide will be able to get in.</p>
<p>Yes. If you are stealthy and sneak on while the security guards arent’ looking. If they catch you you are not allowed to apply to that school though so be careful.</p>
<p>Tour guides have scan cards that allow them to get into places that the general public cannot just walk into these days. For example…you can see the public areas of the dorms with a tour guide. There are even some buildings that are off limits to the general public. For example, if you wanted to see the practice rooms at some universities, or see the athletic facilities or fitness centers except through the glass. </p>
<p>There are, however, some schools that even have “self guided” tour information. We did this at UNC-Greensboro and I know they had this at Peabody Conservatory for a while too. </p>
<p>Does your child have a school break in March or April? Colleges do their tours during the week during these times as well.</p>
<p>Contact the individual colleges your S is considering. There are usually programs for accepted students.</p>
<p>i must have toured a couple dozen campuses with two sons and half we did not sign up for the official tours. it was quite easy to just join along with a group. the boys really did not want to go through all the info sessions for many of the schools so it became easier to get info (maps, departments we wanted to visit, etc.) on our own and then follow one of the many tours going on, if we so desired. the boys were always bored with official tours, anyway, and preferred to explore the campus by themselves. self guided tours are always (often) allowed and, for us, all places were friendly and folks were willing to let us in buildings. even at NYU, with it’s tight security, we were able to get into buildings. in other words, i wouldn’t panic. true, the official tours are nice for the parents, and staffs are there to provide answers, but i think your kid can get a lot of information and feel for a school with a little research and just asking questions of students or administrators.</p>
<p>Wow! I am amazed that there are college campuses that restrict access other than to dorms. Maybe I’m so behind the times.</p>
<p>We’ve visited Washington & Lee University, Brown University, University of Virginia, Virginia Military Institute, Colorado College, University of Florida, Liberty University, Southern Polytechnic Institute and State University, Edison State College, Point Loma University, University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, New College of Florida, Salve Regina University, Florida Gulf Coast University, and others without being a part of an organized campus tour and without ever being challenged in the least.</p>
<p>DS did his via internet and without a guide.</p>
<p>I discover that no matter the school:
Blue jeans.
Flipflops or sandals of some sort. Really fancy shoes are runners in various condition of falling apart.
Girls are generally better kept than boys.
Class rooms have chairs, whiteboards, overhead projectors, some have tables, some are lecture halls.
At least one building is ivy covered.
There is a quad, circle, where some sort of frisbee is happening.
Between the hours of 9-3 there is a bunch of visible activity. Before 9 and after 3pm, things are visibly quieter.
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday before noon is absolutely dead.</p>
<p>^^^ hahaha i got a kick out of that one. Niceee.</p>
<p>One thing to remember is just that it will be a lot quieter on the weekends, so it might be a little harder to see what the true atmosphere is like. Best of luck in your decisions!</p>
<p>Depends on the kid, depends on the college. I forced D#1 to attend one informational session. One the way home we used that same college’s brochure to compare what was said in the session to what written. After that all touring was done by walking around and talking with students and faculty. D#2 successfully evaded all formal informational sessions. She’s a very social person and was REALLY interested in what happened outside of studying! YMMV.</p>
<p>At many schools, you sign up separately for the info sessions and tours. At some schools you sign up for both (although I will say that after a couple that all sounded the same…we started to skip the info sessions). At some schools the tour IS the info session (U of South Carolina, for example, has an outstanding tour during which the tour guide tells everything there is to know…and is able to answer just about any question you can think of). </p>
<p>Regarding getting into buildings…there is much more security these days in any building that. Especially if you are looking at urban schools, you will find very limited access to those who are not students or employees. As a parent of two students attending urban schools, I appreciate the security.</p>
<p>Some colleges hand out maps and self-guides. I wish we had done more of those, or had peeled off from the guided tours to do some of it ourselves. D hated information sessions. Both of us liked the freedom of just wandering around and talking with students. As others have said, in urban areas you are not going to have access to most if not all buildings, as they require ID card swipes. This is a good thing, because it means security is taken seriously. On self-guided tours you will not be able to enter dorms, but one guided tour at at high tier school we were not allowed into the dorms anyway, which was very weird, especially since all students on the tour were accepted students. My guess is that you will be able to connect with a tour even if you are not signed up. Either way, talk with as many students as you can! Maybe call the school and see if self-guided tours are possible?</p>
<p>I can’t imagine any school turning a walk-in, accepted student away from a full info session/tour. If that is the only time you can visit, just go. I think attending official info sessions and tours is important for the serious contenders. You pick up little tidbits of info you would not discover on your own. Good luck.</p>
<p>We have 4 states to visit and I’m trying to figure out how best to do this. Our criteria was that he wanted a big school and it couldn’t be too far from home (MD), so we ended up with UPitt, Penn State UP, UDel, UMD @ Coll Park, Va Tech and JMU. I know he would hate sitting through the multiple info sessions but would accept the foot tours. Trying to make sure this gets done before May 1 is keeping me awake at night!</p>
<p>(I should change my user name as now this #3 is last one to go. #2 just got accepted into a master’s program! #1 made it through CC in a transfer program but isn’t sure what he’s going to do next on account of the job market.)</p>
<p>If you’re not keen on going to the info sessions…just go on the tours.</p>
<p>Re: dorms…when we did tours initially with DS, we actually were able to see dorms, both the common areas and rooms (students volunteered to have their rooms viewed on these tours). BUT by the time DD toured 3 years later, most schools did not allow dorm ROOMS to be seen by prospective students (although several had “model rooms” for students to see…not a room actually used by a student, but one set up to look like one). On the tours with guides, we DID see the common areas of the dorms…bathrooms, hallways, lounge areas, etc. Most of these are now behind a security checkpoint in the dorms where either a card swipe is required or there is a person to check that you are authorized to enter. </p>
<p>In addition, even places like some of the libraries require a card swipe. Parts of these places are not open to the general public especially at private institutions and especially in the urban areas. Simply put…there are too many place for unauthorized folks to hang out and it would be a security nightmare for the campus security to go through these buildings each night to find folks before they closed.</p>
<p>In our experience ALL schools have virtual tours or at least a slideshow on their websites so you can SEE what a dorm looks like.</p>
<p>Another thing to think about…if you KNOW a student at a school, contact that student. DD has taken some friends and acquaintances on “private tours” of her school. Students ARE allowed to bring friends with them into the buildings.</p>
<p>I think the important thing here is that the OP’s son is already ACCEPTED, not just looking for schools. Info sessions would hardly be interesting to him at this point, anyway. On the other hand, I don’t think just walking around campus will really give him the info he needs either. What about setting up a meeting with a professor in his potential major? Of course, you are talking Saturdays – maybe at least sitting down with an admissions officer and your list of questions, eating at the cafeteria, walking through the library. Don’t expect to see kids before two pm or so.</p>
<p>Twice we have toured campuses on our own on a Saturday. I wouldn’t suggest it. On one campus we saw maybe 5 students all day (it was between semesters), and the ONLY building we could go in was the library, and it didn’t open until noon. We got no sense of the campus or life there, except for the architecture.</p>
<p>The other campus we had toured two days earlier, with school in session. Even then, it was never bustling. But going back on Saturday was almost eerie, with absolutely no one out and about (we saw one person) in the late morning.</p>
<p>OP, can you fit in some tours on Spring Break or teacher workdays?</p>
<p>Neighbors toured 2 big state u’s in the summer with no guide. It was a disaster. They didn’t know where to park, got lost trying to find admissions office for directions, didn’t even know where to look to buy a bottle of water, walked all over two big campuses in humid southern summer heat with no idea what they were looking at and were ready to strangle each other by time they got back to the car. Needless to say, the D did not attend either sch.</p>
<p>We toured S2’s sch. after acceptance. We did let him skip a day of sch (toured on a Fri.). It was great. S became very excited about attending in large part to a very enthusiastic (but still cool) tour guide. The info. session was short, mostly quick facts.
Tour was definitely worth the trip.</p>
<p>My kids also took AP classes when they were seniors. They spoke to the teachers and had no difficulty missing just a couple of days of classes for college visits. BUT we arranged the accepted student visits for the April vacation of their senior year.</p>