Colleges your child crossed off the list after visiting, schools that moved up on the list. Why?

Parents Forum
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August 2017:

Lafayette (DOWN):

Lafayette has a pretty and compact campus. It has the small class sizes and close relationships among students and professors that you would expect of a liberal arts college of its caliber.

My son’s student interviewer was really fun and gave him spontaneous dating advice, “You’re good at trivia? You should bring a girl to a trivia contest so she can hear you.”

But the college may be a bit too traditional for my son. There was a lot of talk about the sports “rivalry” with Lehigh. It is a Division One school, and football and other sports seem to be a very big part of campus life-- at least our tour guide talked a lot about sports, and there were sports-oriented signs and posters all around campus. Fraternities and sororities sound like they are a significant part of campus life. There seemed to be a lot of single sex housing, and the tour guide mentioned that an all-male dorm was one of the most popular options. My son said he prefers things not to be “so separated by gender.” He likes co-ed housing, and gender-neutral bathrooms. He also noted that, while he liked and enjoyed his interviewer and could benefit from the dating advice, at his other schools no one would dare assume that the person they were interviewing was heterosexual!

On the plus side, freshmen can take a Dog Course, and there is even a house where upperclassmen can live with and raise guide dogs!

Lafayette is an excellent college, and the possibility of a Marquis merit scholarship makes it tempting, but it just wasn’t a great match for my son.

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August 2017:

Franklin and Marshall (DOWN):

We ate two meals there, so we got to know the dining hall! The food was good.

It was a very pretty, compact campus. Lancaster was a bustling town, with a minor-league baseball stadium, a surrounding community that includes some Amish people, and lots of stores and restaurants.

My son liked that, during freshman year, you live with people with whom you are taking a course. In fact, in an initial email they sent him back in the fall of 2015, it was the description of the house system that first attracted him to Franklin and Marshall.

We spoke with four students working in admissions, three of whom were part of fraternities or sororities, which seem really, really big here— which was a considerable minus.

It was a pre-orientation week, so in the dining hall, we saw international students, the football team, and also the girls’ soccer team, which might have been comprised entirely of clones with blond ponytails.

He had his worst interview of all, because the admissions officer spoke a lot and listened very little.

But then again, the small classes and considerable academic opportunities sounded fantastic… and there was a dog park adjacent to the campus, so that was exciting!

Again, this was a great school, but less of a match for his personality than comparable colleges Connecticut and Skidmore.

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August 2017:

Princeton (DOWN):

This was a gorgeous campus, with the most dramatic building exteriors, but the tour did not enter a single building! My son complained he should not have read the Wikipedia page beforehand, because he learned nothing new on the tour.

We had visited Skidmore during the same trip, and as we were walking back to the parking lot at Princeton, my son said, “I guess I’d go here if I got in, because then I could always say I went to Princeton, but I really like Skidmore a lot more.” Unplanned, his father and I both reacted by chorusing, “Me, too,” and we all laughed.

It stayed on the list because, hey, it’s Princeton- the most competitive, biggest-name college he had selected to tour and apply to. But he applied ED to Williams, which he liked a lot better. He liked small colleges best.

Maybe Princeton for graduate school?

THIS CONCLUDES MY 21 COLLEGE VISIT REVIEWS. WHEW!

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@TheGreyKing LOL, you have so many overlapping schools with where my oldest son toured and applied. He ended up at Bowdoin. Almost all the same safeties were in consideration – F&M, Lafayette, Skidmore, etc. He didn’t do ED so it was more of a factor. I haven’t been able to get any of my kids interested in Skidmore so far despite the fact that we frequent Saratoga Springs because we have a cabin we use often in Summer and occasionally in Winter in Lake George just 30 minutes away. None of them even wanted to take the formal tour or apply. He liked Lafayette more than F&M and F&M more than Dickinson (mostly because the Dickinson campus was too much part of the city street grid and the interview was so encouraging at F&M). He was offered a Marquis Scholarship (which we weren’t even aware existed – he didn’t have to apply independently of the application). That’s put it at the high on the list for our next kid though. I also like how great their reputation is for internships, externships and job placement. Many better schools underserve this. Like you, the frats and sports emphasis is a con for my kids.

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@TheGreyKing We live in the Princeton area so it was the first tour we did just to figure out what they were like. Other than the orientation they didn’t go into any buildings with us either. Yeah, the tour was pretty useless.

But the info session was interesting. It was possibly the most honest session we did. The Admissions Director straight-up said that they value GPA (relative to your school’s profile) highest factor by a substantially higher margin that anything else, then SAT/ACT test scores, then way down essays, EC’s and everything else. Most schools just read you the generic talking points about the “holistic application process.” He also said that you are largely competing with your peers and alumni of your own school, which really rung true throughout the process. They know how difficult your school is, how well the most outstanding students historically have done, how much EC’s they were able to take on while doing it, which EC’s were considered major accomplishments at your school versus simple clubs, etc. They probably even know how well former students from your school did once they arrived at college. So they have a lot of targeted data.

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@TheGreyKing You did this thread proud. I vote for you as the MVP. Thanks for sharing. I enjoyed each of your reviews.

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Thank you, @citymama9 @citivas @homerdog @Lindagaf

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Interesting take on Wisconsin (Madison). Crossing University Ave or Park St between classes not a big deal and not done for most classes. I would NEVER want to drive those streets during that time, however! I’m sure locals avoid them. Hundreds of students crossing (some going under/over those barrier chains between intersections). The lake, hills… so much. I don’t want people to think the main thoroughfares in town require going through campus or that they cut the campus into parts.

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@TheGreyKing its been fun reading your thoughts on all these colleges, so many that my D and I toured as well. I would like to correct some information about Skidmore though, where my D attends. Yes, the first semester is often a triple, although it is my understanding that triples are becoming less the norm now as they get a handle on their increased applications. In general, most students will have a double the first year and either a double or single the second year. Most of the dorms are in “pods” where there are three rooms (one single and two double) all with fantastic 10’ window seats (5’ in the singles) and share a very large hall closet and a bathroom with private shower and private toilet and shared sink space. Juniors are split… either singles or apartments, their choice and most Seniors choose the new apartments.

It seems you either love or hate the grounds at Skidmore. I love the outdoorsy feel, the trails around campus, the quad where everyone gathers. The arts/theatre program is great, Beatlemore being an annual highlight. My D works in the theatre and gets to attend a good majority of the shows. She is a STEM student at Skidmore where they are working hard to build those departments.

Being able to walk to a great college town, Saratoga Springs, is great! They utilize their outdoor seating year round with heaters and there’s always something going on, comedy shows and live music, a good movie theatre, suburb shopping if you can afford it, window shopping if you can’t lol. There’s also the outdoor concert venue nearby and of course Albany for the big name concerts and the airport.

We toured ConnCollege, well, actually we drove in and drove back out. The campus appeared too small and too far removed from any life, sitting atop the hill on a pretty main road if I remember correctly, but nothing within walking distance.

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Thanks, @NEPatsGirl. I agree that Skidmore is a wonderful college! It is great to hear that your daughter is enjoying it.

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I tend to love classical looking and manicured campuses, but I loved Skidmore with it’s modern buildings. I remember driving into the campus thinking it reminded me of a sleepaway camp with those big trees.

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Both kids absolutely hated University of New Hampshire. Their visit day was pretty disastrous, with tons of people crammed into a compact campus, DS nearly having a meltdown in the dining hall, and a guide who couldn’t answer even basic questions about art and humanities programs and only took the group into science buildings. I sent the twins back on a “regular” day and DD just kept reporting on the “sad” studio arts building in the shadow of the brand-new labs she has zero interest in. They are juniors and UNH is probably the strongest school for her that is affordable for us, so now we’re tasked with trying to change DD’s mind about it (I agree with DS it would not be a good fit for him).

The kids toured St. Anselm with a club. It came off the list for the most hysterical reason: the guide went on and on about “intervisitation” hours in the common areas, and my boy-girl twins found it strange and uncomfortable (DS came home from the tour and said “It’s like they want to keep my sister locked in a tower!” and we laughed and laughed). DH and I chuckled that after 14 years spent hearing about “Keep him/her out of my room”, the single-sex dorms ended up being dealbreakers for them.

Plymouth State moved up on DS’s list on the strength of a great tour, friendly professors, and a sense of community. We toured Castleton for DD (on the rec of some CC folks) and it became a contender because she was excited about the theater and arts scene, and even covered in snow the campus and area was gorgeous.

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My daughter toured UNH over Thanksgiving break while visiting her dad in NH. She liked it more than she thought she would, but didn’t like that there were roads running through campus. The biggest negative for her were the dorms. She said they were tiny and cramped for three people and she couldn’t see herself living there. We haven’t seen dorms on any other tour.

The only two other schools we’ve toured so far were UCSD and UCSC. She like both a lot. We weren’t sure we’d like UCSC but it has some gorgeous views of the ocean. I didn’t like that there didn’t seem to be a real defined center of campus, but it didn’t bother her at all. She’d happily go there.

Next I’ll likely take her to see ASU for a Barrett tour. Once we learn which UCs and CSUs she’s accepted to, we’ll pick a couple to see before she makes her decision.

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^^^West coast represent, right on. Was beginning to wonder if anyone looked at west coast schools. I don’t know many of the east coast schools discussed on here, but what I have learned is there seems to be an endless number of small colleges on that coast. I am always surprised to see so much discussion on CC about a school, then look it up and see it only has 2200 students. I think every poster on here must be in the six degrees of separation realm.

We were pleasantly surprised about UCSC as well. It had a great diverse balance to it, and definitely a solid intellectual feel. I guess the era of the Volkswagen vans covered in bumper stickers has moved on from there, but for some reason we thought it would be more hippyish and slummy feeling. Not at all.

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I am in Los Angeles for the break, and I just visited UCSB, UCLA, and USC. I don’t have much interest in the UCs, or really any other California schools. I am OOS too, so it would very expensive to attend a UC. The schools that I am really looking at are the LACs in the northeast (like the NESCAC), but I am not visiting until February. However, it was still nice to see how some of the colleges are in California, even if I don’t have much of an interest.

The first school I visited was UCSB, and it was the only UC school I was considering applying to. After my visit though, I definitely think I am going to apply. The campus is absolutely stunning! UCSB is on the northern outskirt of Santa Barbara, and you can see the ocean as you are driving in. It was an absolutely perfect day when I visited (75 degrees and sunny), and there were lots of people at the beach surfing or putting their feet in the water. Unfortunately, the rest of the campus was pretty dead. I walked around lots of the academic buildings on campus and found them to be really nice, and the layout of UCSB was easy to navigate. The dining hall and dorms looked really good too. The dorms are right next the beach and the lake on campus, which is beautiful. There are also running trails along the beach and the lake which I am thrilled by because I love running and the outdoors. I didn’t spend too much time at UCSB, but I am very interested. The academics are really good, and I like the town of Santa Barbara too. I really can’t get over how nice the UCSB campus is though. It would be so nice to go down to the beach to study or just relax.

As for UCLA and USC, I probably won’t ever consider them again. I was shown around UCLA by a senior who goes there. He did a good job selling the school, but I just really didn’t like it. The campus is pretty and everything, but I really don’t like how urban it is. It is composed of a bunch of large buildings, and it seemed a lot harder to navigate. UCLA is way too big for me, especially since I am primarily interested in LACs who have 5,000 or less students. I also didn’t like Westwood very much. There are homeless people in the area, and even more around USC. This saddens me because I am apart of a homeless helpers club at school. My brother showed me around USC, and I pretty much felt the same way about USC as I did for UCLA.

It probably seems illogical why someone with my interests would visit these schools, but I am glad I got to see them anyways. At least this confirms for me that I want to go to a smaller school. I do really like UCSB even though it has around 18k undergrads. Being out of state however, it probably wouldn’t be very realistic to attend if I got in because of costs.

*Although Ponoma is in the area, I don’t have any interest visiting.

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Olin down. Great school just too small. We saw the whole freshman class. It is about 10 min to walk the whole campus. She wanted slightly larger. I think it is a great school but I agree tiny.
Wellesley loved
Brown loved
Dartmouth loved
MIT loved
Harvard loved
Princeton loved
Yale loved
NYU down
We were unable to tour Stanford and Caltech due to significant family medical issues. Can anyone in the area give us input? I figure if DD gets in then we can check them out.
ps. I think between our two kids we toured 18 colleges. We saw a total of 2 dorms. We were told they don’t offer anymore for safety of the students. I think it is a good idea. We can look online.

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Most of the schools listed do not take you into the buildings either.

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In common with your list, we toured MIT, Princeton, and Harvard. We liked them all. We also toured Stanford, where our son accepted and is currently in his sophomore year. We are biased, but the Stanford campus is great. Gothic Spanish Architecture in the original buildings with new buildings (engineering quad for example) taking a modern spin while keeping the Spanish flavor. Manicured grounds, numerous fountains, and the weather can’t be beat. We toured the entire campus including dorms. I assume that’s still done on the tours.

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UCSB is a nice little campus and Santa Barbara is a nice wealthy area, but note that this year, the mountain fires forced the school to close for some time. I believe this will be more common occurrence. UCSB has many homeless people also in the downtown area. I visited Santa Barbara area several times and joked to my wife that rich people on the hills don’t like coming down to the downtown area because there are too many homeless people. Nice weather attracts many homeless people I guess. While UCSB is a nice little campus near the ocean, I liked UCLA campus better.

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My daughter crossed Oregon State off her list after we visited. She was concerned about how it seemed to be out in the middle of nowhere, town was too small and “boring” and the absence of any Asian students. She’s Chinese (adopted) and we live in the SF Bay area.