<p>There is a discussion on another long thread about whether campus tours or info sessions are really helpful. I was wondering if anybody had the experience of finding out that a college was not really as it was advertised in its ads, tours, etc. I have generally felt that at most of the colleges we visited, the general vibe that was portrayed was pretty much what is the common understanding of the school, and has also been confirmed by what I've heard from kids who go to those schools.</p>
<p>But does anybody have any examples of disconnects between how the school is portrayed and what a student found upon attending?</p>
<p>Colleges don’t typically lie - but they omit the negatives. They don’t tell you many freshmen are living in triples, that their dorms have mold, that there is a really bad neighborhood on the opposite side of the campus that you weren’t supposed to see, that you can’t get into the classes you want, etc.</p>
<p>They will show you the best dorm, not the worst. They will show you the nicest classroom building, not the worst.</p>
<p>That is where sites like this come in handy - so you learn things that were not prepared by a public relations firm.</p>
<p>I also think the problem is wanting to hear what you want to hear. </p>
<p>Our oldest son started at URochester. We knew it was a school that attracted lots of smart kids, but we also thought they were attracting kids who “went by a different drummer” as they say. I recall one brochure focused on all sorts of unique interests and skills the kids had, and we thought, “That’s our kid too”. He’s smart, yet has his own style. They also seemed to promise lots of help in their sp ed center. Well, let’s just say things didn’t work out as planned. They tried to help later (Nov), but he had already fallen into a major depression. </p>
<p>Best example: math class. He was taking a calc class where just before the midterm the class learned about some short form to calculate a problem. He already knew this form, so used it in the midterm. But his grade went from a 94 to 62 because he “didn’t show his work”. He came home Dec. 19 for December break and on Dec 21 got an email from the professor asking who his TA was. Son didn’t know about TAs, because when the prof said everyone should go to their “sections” each week, son thought he was doing that by going to the sp ed center. Only the TAs were handing out quizzes that represented at least 33% of the grade. For every one missed, that was another zero.</p>
<p>I blame some of this on URochester, some on the professor, some on us, and some on our son. We never should have chosen this school that was too far away that wasn’t prepared to handle kids with this type of special needs. He never should have gone to this ultra-conservative university that was just too far away. I just hope they made their school to be an easier transition for freshmen.</p>
<p>I forced D#1 to go on one canned presentation and tour (not a school she was seriously considering). Afterward we pulled up information from the Web and compared that to what she’d heard. It was an eye-opener. After that we did campus visits just walking around, talking with students and staff.</p>
<p>I realize many CC parents rely on information provided by the college. And I can understand (from my own experiences) why some feel let down when reality doesn’t match.</p>
<p>[Aside: The university D#1 eventually chose had a national tour for prospective students … ninety minutes of dreary presentation. It was partially staffed by alumni from the local area. DD signed in, and spent the entire time talking with an alumnus just outside the room. Great stuff, lots of insight from a student’s point of view. About 45 minutes in, a parent came out and said “Could you two keep it down? We’re trying to hear what the presenter is saying.”]</p>
<p>Visiting and reading a college’s literature is important, but you have to take everything with a grain of salt (and exercise that critical thinking that everyone says arbitrarily is so useful).</p>
<p>One piece of Vassar’s literature pictured five students. Three were male; two were female. The male-to-female ratio is about 40-to-60 percent. I would guess most of them were non-white, as well.</p>
<p>A handful of tours guides I’ve had recently have made a point of saying that the dorm room displayed is average, not the best one on campus (this was very surprising at Amherst since the dorm room they showed was enormous and extremely nice… not sure if I believed them). Or they at least admit what differences there might be. But I’ve been visiting LACs mostly, which tend to have housing available all four years and often don’t divide dorms by class.</p>
<p>Think of the tour, info session and marketing materials as a first date situation. When you go on that first date, you wear your most flattering outfit and try to be a scintillating conversationalist. You don’t reveal that you have an incipient cold sore or ***** about your crappy boss all night.</p>
<p>D had that experience - she visited a school that on the internet and in brochures looked much bigger than in person. After she came back I looked and looked on their website, and it took me a very long time to find clues to their actual size (both acres and # of students).</p>
<p>That said, due to timing of admission (from a waitlist) and lack of $, she moved to her campus sight unseen and it exceeded her expectations from the literature and website. It was everything it had been represented to be and more.</p>
<p>I’m not so much thinking about covering up some minor problems (i.e., that the food in the dining hall isn’t good), but more whether the general campus tone is not as represented. So, for example, is the campus much more “preppy” or “hippie” than you were led to believe?</p>
<p>My son started at a small *Colleges That Change Lives *LAC. I believed their pitch about personal attention. I thought that with so few students, they were probably telling the truth. It turned out to be a highly impersonal environment…extraordinarily impersonal environment…I am out of words, but you get my drift.</p>
<p>Well I went to the info session at my kids’ school for the university I have worked at for the past 12 years. I was aghast at how misleading the info session was! The photos in the powerpoint portrayed an entirely different demographic than the one I see everyday, and the physical campus looked quite different as well. And the statements made were not just misleading but at times entirely untrue (I’m not even sure if current students would know they are untrue, but anyone in the inside of administration would know). And it was shocking how poorly they answered questions pertaining to my particular school in the university!</p>
<p>I think my university is pretty fabulous, but like all large ones, there is way too much diversity across programs, majors, schools to draw one conclusive opinion about the whole place (not to mention it is probably too much to ask one person to be able to answer questions about so many different facets of such a large place). The culture of one part of the college is quite different than the culture of another part. </p>
<p>I have to say I laughed a bit too loud (to the point where people turned around) when the presenter actually said, “our faculty love to meet with students. In fact, they are mostly just sitting in their offices waiting for students to come by to talk to them!” I know they are trying to get students and families to see this big university as touchy-feely and personal. And personally have an open door sort of policy and love talking to students. But it’s not as if our faculty are sitting there, with nothing else to do, no labs to run, no meetings, no preps, no classes to teach…just waiting to be relieved of boredom by a knock on the door!</p>
<p>As noted above, admissions officers are often given a directive to attract more diverse applicants. When dealing with a private school full of rich white students, they may tend to exaggerate the existing diversity of students. If they don’t, minority students won’t attend, and they never will become more diverse. </p>
<p>The self-segregation of students is another matter. Sometimes it is most common when the minority students don’t feel welcome.</p>
<p>Starbright:
We will be attending Junior Visit Day with our S this year at the U where W and I have worked for the past 10+ years. I can’t wait to hear what they say. I suspect that multiple snort or chuckle sounds may come from me also.</p>
<p>In response to the OP - no. When we visited prospective schools that were high up on the list, we also tried to drill down a bit and schedule face time with a faculty member or someone unrelated to admissions, or even sitting in on a class. That provided the opportunity to interact with a random sample of folks and definitely paid off. And I second walking around campus on your own and striking up conversations with students, such as those who staff art gallery desks and the like.</p>
<p>*
The self-segregation of students is another matter. Sometimes it is most common when the minority students don’t feel welcome. *</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s a matter of not feeling welcome. I think it’s often a feeling that “people like me” will have more in common with me…like similar foods, music,politics…and perhaps better dating partners.</p>
<p>We visited one very conservative very religious Christian school. I could tell that the student guide was told to downplay the religious aspect of the school (to attract a more diverse population, I guess) but you don’t have to be a genius to pick up on “mandatory daily chapel.” After the tour there was a Q and A and a girl from way out of state said she was looking at the school *because *of its religious aspects. Seeing, or at least thinking, that she was in a religious crowd, the student started telling her own story, how she had converted to the school’s denomination, had been rebaptized, etc. Very enlightening.</p>
<p>I have a 2 children at UVA and have found their admissions tour, student tour guides and printed materials to be very representative of the university as a whole. While the tour guides might be a little chirpy in their praises of UVA, all questions seemed to be answered honestly. UVA does have a reputation as a preppy school but all tour guides (and random students) questioned were honest about being able to find a group in which to belong. My vegetarian, atheist, intensely liberal but jock daughter has a great group of friends. The only complaint I might have is that the dining hall food was definitely better when parents were there!</p>
<p>I felt it my job on the walking tours to ask questions such as “what do you feel is the biggest challenge for you at this school?” “where else did you apply and why did you choose here?” “what did you do differently in your sophomore year from your freshman year?” When you get the students off script, they can unintentionally reveal a lot more. We also asked three or four random students at each school what they thought. Worked pretty well!!</p>
<p>I liked to ask tour guides unusual questions at the end, where they likely didn’t have a canned answer. </p>
<p>For example, at Case I asked if there was anything that was a pleasant surprise… a perk that had not been part of the original decision making. One of the tour guides tipped her head and pondered it, then smiled as she explained how much she liked being on a campus where everybody was smart and enthusiastic about learning (which had not been the case at her high school).</p>