No, both of my boys made multiple visits to the school thet landed at. The rule was no visit, no application.
That latter rule seems a little harsh IF you are considering schools in remote locations. No visit, no attendance was our rule. And we visited a LOT of schools to try to figure out which ones to apply to. By the time those visits were done, we had a pretty good idea of what would and would not fit.
I’d like to throw out another view. I think it is important to visit a college campus or two early in the process to start the discussion of what is important to the student, but I don’t think it is absolutely necessary to visit the schools you apply to. There is a ton of information online, and if you have a good feel for what you want, I think it is as likely to be informative as a short term day visit that is all too easily influenced by the tour guide, the weather, and how tired one might be due to flights and hotels. I think one should be guided by their budget (money and time) and the needs of their child. With my D, I was pretty sure she would be happy in a college as long as it offered a strong program in her major. As it turned out, we intended to visit the school she eventually selected, but we never worked it into her busy schedule. She saw her college for the first time during a summer orientation. I’m not saying this is the best way to approach it, but it can definitely work. She is thriving at her school beyond our best expectations. I’m not really a believer that there is one perfect school and that you can know enough ahead of time to pick it out. I think there are many good schools and that a well prepared student can thrive in most of them.
Students almost never accept an offer at a school they haven’t visited. Plus, the cost of a mistake is significant. You will hear people say, “Well, you can always transfer if it doesn’t work out”. But transferring has big drawbacks. Transfers usually get no merit aid, and often get worse need based aid. Socially a student had to start over when almost everyone else developed friendships freshman year. Sometimes all the credits don’t transfer.
But it makes a lot of sense to be targeted in visits. Get a copy of the Fiske Guide to Colleges and read carefully. Confirm that you are visiting more matches & safeties than reaches when it comes to stats. Run net price calculators on the school websites before deciding to visit – there is no reason to visit a school that is unaffordable.
One thing to consider is visiting a couple types of schools in your immediate area to get a feel for the different sizes/types of schools. Maybe tour the state flagship and a nearby LAC to see how they feel to your kid before planning visits.
I agree with @intparent. We’re in the Southwest and we started in junior year by visiting colleges in So Cal since it was an inexpensive trip and my husband went to CMC. We visited UCLA, UCSD, USC, Oxy and the Claremont Consortium. Then we visited Northwestern while in Chicago for a wedding and visited Georgetown while in DC for a family vacation. That helped her get a feel for the size of college she preferred. UCLA and UCSD were both too big for her taste. USC stayed on the list because of the potential for a large merit scholarship. She had been on the Stanford, Harvard and Berkeley campuses in the past for debate tournaments (and had no interest in Harvard or Berkeley). She planned to apply to Williams and Amherst sight unseen just because she liked LAC’s. We figured it wasn’t worth the expense of traveling cross country to visit them though unless she was denied to Pomona and accepted to one of them. But she got into Pomona ED1 so we never had to think about the other options or schedule more visits. I do wonder, though, if she had visited Williams or Amherst whether she would’ve still wanted to apply ED1 to Pomona or might have decided to apply RD to all 3. From a selfish standpoint I am happy she landed much closer to home. But if you are thinking about applying binding ED somewhere, then you may want to err on the side of more visits instead of fewer.
So far most of the colleges we have visited have been eliminated or bumped down the list, which is frustrating. But he had absolutely no idea what he wanted in a school so it has been a good education in that basic way, and it has started him thinking about what is crucial vs what he can live with. Our budget and time are limited so our thinking is that rather than doing more big trips, he’s going to have to do most of his pre-application research from his desk and then probably visit a few options once he is accepted. Because merit money will be a part of the decision process, we will have to apply to more colleges than we’d like anyway. Seems painful to visit and maybe fall in love with colleges that may not be options.
It is frustrating, BUT it also means he does not end up applying to a bunch of schools that in hindsight are not suitable/acceptable to him.
One of the problems with "desk hunting’’ for merit schools is that colleges where you are eligible for merit tend to be colleges where you are at the top of the heap academically, and it can be harder to find a college where a student feels the fit is good. So getting on campus is pretty important.
Remember that they literally have maybe 5 weeks to decide which acceptances to visit, book visits (expensive on short notice for flights), and get around (potentially all over the country) for accepted student visits. Kids are super busy with senior ECs in April, and parents may not be able to take much time off if they go along. My D2 did three (spread out, of course 
– Chicago, near Philadelphia, and near LA), and that was utterly exhausting. I don’t think she could have done another. If you are going to wait to visit, make sure your kid has at least one school that you KNOW if affordable and you KNOW your kid will get into (EA or rolling admission is great!) and you KNOW your kid will be happy to attend if the other options don’t work out. Otherwise April will be a pressure cooker.
@porcupine98 Which schools did you visit in OH? I think we may end up with a roadtrip there and would love your itinerary! We are mostly looking at LACs there…
My D attended a school she didn’t visit first. We didn’t have $ to do long distance campus visits, and this school was a reach. She was initially waitlisted and made plans to attend a local school, then in early June she was offered a place off the waitlist. She had three days to decide and she accepted. The first time she was on campus was at move-in. She has had no regrets.
With her younger brother we knew more about college admissions and got some low cost visits in, focusing on schools that met full need. He fell in love with a school he hadn’t heard of before, didn’t even know how to pronounce, in a state he had never been to before, applied ED, and was accepted. He graduates in a few weeks.
I’ve been on over 40 visits. However, bc my kids traveled for their sport, some visits were when we were in the vicinity anyway. Or for six colleges, we went as a family and visited relatives during the summer. We did do a few targeted trips, but I always look carefully to manage cost. I found an incredible deal last summer on multi city flights that was cheaper than flying to one of the cities. But, I had to configure the trip just so for that to happen.
Is is worth it? I thought so. Especially my oldest, we went to Chicago to see the University of Chicago, which she loved in theory. We always see other nearby schools when we visit, so we went to see Notre Dame and Northwestern as well. She ended up NOT applying to UofCh, but Northwestern and Notre Dame she applied to and were her two favorites.
Visits are very helpful, and looking back I would do them earlier (spring/summer of junior year). @intparent is right that April of senior year turns into a pressure cooker. My son still hasn’t not decided 100%, but the top two contenders have been visited. Third place was VT which would have risen to first, probably, if he had gotten some scholarship $$ (which we knew was an uphill battle). That being said, we would have been hard pressed to squeeze in a visit this month. I have been to the campus many times due to my sibling, but son has not visited there.
We ruled out one very expensive school just from the visit. That saved app fees, time, recommendation gathering, additional essays, etc.
$10K seems excessive to me for visits.
@homerdog If you are interested in OH LACs, Denison, Oberlin and Kenyon aren’t too far apart with a car and you could do all 3 in 2 days, squeezing in 2 visits on one day. They all have a little different “flavor” to them.
You’re making an investment of, possibly, $240,000. Of course it’s worth to check out the campus. It’s part of making an informed decision.
That said, remember, CC land is unique. The vast majority of kids never go on a college trip because they go to the local school, and increasingly with a 2-year stop at the local community college.
BTW, We made the trips AFTER kiddo was accepted. That saved us some money.
10K is excessive but sounds like a family choice. Certainly not the norm. Our general rule has been to have a mix of tours pre-application that is targeted and helps narrow the field as well as honing in on what exactly the kid wants in a school. The child does not have to vist all before applying but if they haven’t then the interest has to be quite strong to justify the application as to us, acceptance then means a visit and travel does add up. For far away pricey travel though, a visit post acceptance simply makes more sense to us. We combine visits into geographical areas and will leverage family to stay with when we can, flight deals, planning somewhat far out to get better prices. It’s been a mix of family trips and just the prospective student with one child.
I do believe they are critical. We just returned from one (total cost for our family of 4 was maybe $800 and combined a spring break trip, small vacation, family visit with 3 schools. Long days, lots of driving but very very worthwhile both in terms of those 3 schools but also in how the student felt about those, impacting the rest of the list. That said, even with one kid and parent, hotel, rental car and flights can add up so you need to be selective in what makes sense. Narrowing the field with local visits is very very worthwhile before spending bigger dollars on schools farther away.
@homerdog We flew into Columbus, saw Ohio Wesleyan that same day, then drove to Kenyon, spent the night, saw Kenyon in the morning and drove to College of Wooster in the afternoon (that was a little tight, but worthwhile), next day was all day at Case Western, and the following day was Oberlin and then we flew home from Cleveland. All very distinct schools and the trip was super instructive.
On reflection, I would have added in Denison the first day (or maybe traded it in for Ohio Wesleyan), but there are a ton of schools in Ohio, so you can shift emphasis, but regardless you can cover a lot of ground in a few days.
You can get a lot of bang for your college visiting buck in PA, MA and NY as well – all depending on what you’re after.
Worth it. Usually only one parent along. We started sophomore year. Junior year, summer and senior year our son went on some visits by himself.
@Dolemite - Do you know where I can get a list of these traveling college fairs? My daughter just got an invitation to one next month and I heard about another with a small group of LACs, but I’d love to find more of them.
(and sorry for hijacking the thread)
@LoveTheBard check out: http://www.exploringcollegeoptions.org/ and http://www.8ofthebestcolleges.org/. Also check the guidance dept. website for your high school. Also pick some other high schools in your area (competitive publics or privates) and check out their guidance dept. websites to see if they are posting stuff that your school is not. (I found a small scholarship for my D that way.) Also of course check the websites of colleges you’re interested in. For example, my D was interested in Mount Holyoke but their rep wasn’t coming to her HS. We figured out though that the rep was going to be in town for some other schools, so she emailed the rep and arranged to meet her separately.
Both of my boys ended up.at schools they did not visit prior to acceptances. And both recieved merit.
DS1 was a NMF and added his eventual choice at the last minute because the application was easy and the merit guaranteed. The school had EA so we were able to visit in Febuary and the school was a clear top choice while waiting to hear from his one reach school. We never visited the reach school but did visit about 20 other schools. Some fell off the list, others moved up. We also sent DS1 to a summer program at a school I thought would be perfect for him. While he enjoyed the program, it became clear the school was everything he didn’t want. So all of the visits helped a lot even though he ended up at the 1 match/safety school he didn’t visit.
DS2 ended up at a reach LAC school he did not visit before acceptance. He visited and interviewed at 7 of the 9 schools he applied too. Also visited a bunch of other schools that fell off his list. We tried twice to get to the reach school, but flight issues and weathet plus hard to get to location not near other schools got in the way. Luckily, DS2 got an unexpected early acceptance and he was able to visit before April.