<p>the time we spend in our school and collage are memorable till our whole life and the amazing part of all the year were picnic ,parties etc when we complete our school we missed that environment but some how we found in our collage life the trips the parties…collage trips were so fantastic and the friends,teachers and all the members of collage enjoyed so its a great gift “education”</p>
<p>^obviously not an English major…</p>
<p>Having been to both, I would say that the Yale tour and info session are worthwhile, but the Harvard tour is perfunctory at best and definitely a waste of time. My niece, whom I accompanied to the Harvard session, was very unimpressed with the info session also and thought it was a waste of time. She found the admitted students’ weekend much more valuable. So I’d say skip Harvard and visit if you get in. Just strolling around Cambridge and the Yard for an hour will give you at least as much of an idea of the place.</p>
<p>I would contact the admissions office and see if they can set up a student who will meet with you for an hour or so during the weekend. Chances are there will be a tour guide/overnight host that the admissions office has who is willing to do so.</p>
<p>I contacted them before I came here. Yale open house was nice but I just left Olin and I didn’t have a very good experience. Mainly because I’m not super outgoing in crowds, so I was hesitant to go up to them while they were doing their big project thing. As a result, my mom was anxious to leave and told me to go up to them or stop stalking them. Needless to say, I left.</p>
<p>Is it a lot easier for other prospective students to go up to current students? I just don’t even know how to start.</p>
<p>If you have specific questions about the school, you can just strike up a conversation with someone who doesn’t look like they’re terribly busy. Just remember it’s just one person’s opinion…</p>
<p>To avoid missing school, we have been scheduling our daughter’s college visits on her high school’s “no class - teacher conference workdays”. She gets about 1 of these no class days every 2 months which is enough to visit all the colleges she’s interested in.</p>
<p>Ok, well here’s my opinion:</p>
<p>If a school has an info session, ATTEND IT. Especially if its one of your top two - this can change everything. I went to an info day at a school I had absolutely no interest in and wouldn’t have thought twice about and then completely fell in love with the school, was super impressed by all the things they had I never knew about and hadn’t heard of anywhere else. Then I went to an info session a few days later at a different school that I had thought was a viable option and absolutely hated everything about it. </p>
<p>That being said, be realistic too. Yale and Harvard are obviously incredibly hard to get into, even for the top top students. Weigh your odds first and then decide - but I wouldnt recommend skipping out on any schools even if all you do is drive around/walk around their campus and go in to a few buildings. Can really tell you a lot. </p>
<p>Also, if you feel that you didnt’ get a good sense for a school’s “vibe”, there are websites that have student reviews about a lot of things, my favorite one is College *******, its really well done and tons of reviews. Take them with a grain of salt though, as with any kind of review process people who are extremely dissatisfied tend to be more motivated to loudly bash their stuff.</p>
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Students eat, they play frisbee, they sit outside reading a book or paper. Approach a few and explain you’re a prospective student and wonder if they have 5-10 minutes to chat. Having already read thru a good book on admissions, you have already come up with a set of questions that you’d like to get the student perspective on.
How about (smiling) “Hi, I’m Amy, and I’m a HS senior here visiting X. I was hoping to talk to a few students while I was here, so I was wondering if you have 5 or 10 minutes to talk about X?” </p>
<p>Remember you don’t know these people, they don’t know you, and unless they have a camera in their hand your pic isn’t going to appear on youtube or facebook. Honestly, 15 minutes after you’ve left they’re going to have forgotten all about you. Its not really a big deal.</p>
<p>writergrl94–Olin parent here. I’m so very sorry you had a frustrating experience at Olin. There is no doubt in my mind that if you had just approached the students, they would have been happy to answer your questions and/or get someone to give you an informal tour if they were working on a deadline (very likely). The students there are so friendly, and they love to talk about their school! </p>
<p>Regarding admissions–please remember it’s a very small school, which means a small staff (one on maternity leave), so they cannot offer formal tours all the time. It’s unfortunate, though, that they didn’t at least encourage you to come to campus and just talk to students. If you find this difficult on a 300-person campus, it will be much harder at a big school!</p>
<p>Please don’t let it discourage you from considering Olin, I guarantee this is not the norm. If you have any other questions, PM me or post them on the Olin forum and I will try to answer.</p>
<p>It is terribly difficult to get any real sense of the atmosphere of a school in two days. I think I would focus on whether or not I liked the architecture.</p>