<p>So basically I scheduled this information session and tour at this local college which I'm interested in. Should I take notes at both occassions so I can write about them in my supplemental essay? I will talk to the tour guide and the admission officer after the tour, but what else should I do? Should I also drive around the campus a little bit and maybe dine around the college?</p>
<p>Enjoy it. Look for what you like and don’t like. Have some questions. Write about the visit,not so much for the essay, but so that you can use those notes as refreshers after you have a bunch of college visits under your belt.</p>
<p>Son and I did a 6 colleges in 3 days tour. He can’t remember which is which without looking at the notes and pictures he took. He just wrote out or tweeted some observations as he looked around and snapped some pictures with his cell phone, IMing and putting info on face book.</p>
<p>Actually I’m doing the college tour mainly for getting a sense of the general atmosphere and to get some ideas for the supplemental essays.</p>
<p>See if you can get ahold of a few current students (who are not tour guides or trained by the admissions office), preferably in your prospective major. Ask them whatever you care about. Here are a couple of things I would ask about.</p>
<p>Residential life (if you plan to live on campus): Do most students live in singles or share a room? Do students typically live on or off campus? What’s the party scene like? Are the dorms quiet enough to sleep at night? How’s the food? Where do students typically eat? (the dining hall might not be #1 on the list)</p>
<p>General academics: Is it easy to get into the classes you want, or are there big waitlists? What are typical classes sizes (for intro classes as well as upper-level courses)? How accessible are the professors? Just how painful are the general education requirements? Is it possible to take back-to-back classes, or are there scheduling issues that will severely restrict your options? Do students typically graduate in four years? If not, why not? How committed are students to their academics?</p>
<p>Major-specific: How would they rate the program in your prospective major department? What sort of extra-curricular opportunities are there? (research opportunities, academic clubs, seminars or colloquia for undergraduate students, etc) Is the major very exclusive/selective or is the department generally supportive of everyone who wants to major in it? What do graduates typically do after college? (be unemployed, flip hamburgers, get a job related to the major, go to graduate school, etc) Is there anything else a prospective student should know about the department? </p>
<p>Miscellaneous questions: How generous is financial aid? (any individual student can’t tell you much, but if you ask enough people, you might get a general impression.) How do students get around campus and the area? Does the student body blend well or are there groups that don’t mix? (divisions by social class, ethnicity, national origin, religious views, etc) Anything else you are interested in: hobbies, accommodations for disabilities, etc.</p>
<p>And the most important question of all: Would you choose this college again?</p>
<p>in addition to the campus tour…visit…</p>
<p>The dept of your likely major (try to make an appt ahead of time with the dept head)</p>
<p>The housing (some tours don’t include this)</p>
<p>The off-campus hang-outs (you’re not going to be studying 24/7)</p>
<p>Anything else the tour doesn’t include…the various libraries, any honors programs, etc.</p>
<p>Have fun!</p>
<p>All great suggestions.</p>
<p>Also…spend a little time on the website in advance. You can get a lot of info about % of students on financial aid, availability of single rooms and suites, etc that way; then you won’t waste time or look uninformed.</p>
<p>One question my D asks random students (or the tour guide) that prompts some great answers is: how would you describe the type of person that this school ISN’T right for – in other words, in your experience, when kids haven’t been happy here, what made it a not-great fit for them?</p>
<p>Visiting campuses is a blast. Allow enough time that you don’t feel pressured (several hours), try to sit in on a class, and have fun!</p>
<p>You’re visiting the schools to get ideas for the supplemental essays? Aren’t the essays about you? </p>
<p>It is, of course, important to find some aspects of the school that you can connect to. Can even mention these (in a sentence or two) in a follow up email to the admissions officer for your geographic region (D did this after visiting two of her top schools during junior year).</p>
<p>Check out the neighborhood and community as well as the school. This is especially important at colleges where the upperclassmen mostly live off campus.</p>
<p>One question my D asks random students (or the tour guide) that prompts some great answers is: how would you describe the type of person that this school ISN’T right for – in other words, in your experience, when kids haven’t been happy here, what made it a not-great fit for them?</p>
<p>While the answer to that question might be useful to prospective students, I wouldn’t recommend asking that question to the (likely) student tour guide whose job it is to sell the school, and not have the tour dissolve into why certain students don’t like the school (which may be more subjective then something that can be quantified.)</p>
<p>The problem with that question is that the answer may not really be true. The student tour guide may know someone who left the school complaining about one or two things, but the real issue may have been grades or finances.</p>
<p>A question that got asked to a panel of students at U of Chicago which I thought was quite informative was “If you could change one thing about this school what would it be”. There’s always something that isn’t perfect, but I found that in answering the question, students also gave more interesting answers about what they liked as well.</p>
<p>Mom2, you may be right in some cases, but we’ve gotten mostly great answers (though we never ask this during the tour with other families present-usually at lunch chatting informally with a student).</p>
<p>Some insights have been:</p>
<p>Students here are pretty serious about academics, and some kids wanted more of a party school.</p>
<p>They may have thought they wanted a small LAC, but then found they didn’t like the lack of anonymity (i.e., if you skip class your prof will know.)</p>
<p>They wanted more/less of a sports school.</p>
<p>They changed major, and we don’t have a really strong X-dept, which is what they now wanted.</p>
<p>Our campus turned out to be more/less diverse than they felt comfortable with.</p>
<p>These answers seemed very sincere and carefully thought out. Given what we already knew about each school, they were not surprising, but they were helpful to my D.</p>
<p>but we’ve gotten mostly great answers (though we never ask this during the tour with other families present-usually at lunch chatting informally with a student).</p>
<p>that’s what I should have said. I thought about that possibility when I posted, but forgot to include that as a possible option. :)</p>