I loved University of San Francisco; my son was hugely unimpressed even though he loves SF and the Bay Area in general. He thought it was too small, in a sleepy and boring part of the city, and just didn’t seem like a fun campus. Sigh. Much to my disappointment, he crossed it off the list.
Yay @citymama9 – my husband and I went and met there, we LOVED our college experiences there! Naturally my D17 who does want a LAC prefers Union C just to aggravate us. Edit: “there” meaning Skidmore, sorry. I get excited.
@Otterma I truly love that story. That is when you know you’ve found the right fit. When you are so comfortable that you can do things you wouldn’t ordinarily do. The vibe must have been just right for him. Wonderful!!!
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@JenJenJenJen Does your D want a more preppy, Greek environment
No, @citymama9 – she wants the comfy feel of a LAC but with a strong bio dept. She won’t be rushing any sororities, that’s not her bag. I actually think Skidmore would be great for her (and double legacy! She could get in no prob!) but I guess her dad and I talked about it too much and she rebelled. Teenagers!
Where does your D want to go, so far?
Guess I’m the only one that thinks it’s a little silly (presumptuous) to “cross off” colleges that have 10% acceptance rates based on a tour guide and architecture.
Love this thread, so finally chiming in . . .
First, I find it funny how people react differently to the same places; definitely speaks to the need to visit.
Moved up:
UVA - One of our first visits; considering it as a possible safety. Loved the campus; just great overall feel and very well maintained. Tour went inside various buildings that looked really modern. DS said he could see himself there.
Duke: One of the best info sessions, super impressive. Our tour guide seemed brilliant and was doing some interesting science/medical research and was also in the marching band. So it really connected for my son. Facilities looked great, although we did not see dorms. DS said “I want to go here!”
Vanderbilt - Looked great on paper so we decided to visit. Weather was terrible and our flights were cancelled in both directions, but we loved the school. Personally, I thought it was a perfect if only it was a little closer. Everyone was super friendly and our tour guide emphasized the balance she has there between work and social life.
Yale - Hard to say it went up, since it was a top choice on paper. Loved everything about it. I had heard about the video but didn’t tell my son. He loved it! Funny that some people hated it. He had the song memorized and later mentioned it when emailing his admissions person. Info session was among the best we heard. Tour was only ok because there was unexpected snow and we didn’t have proper clothing. Did the science and engineering tours too, met with music people, kids showed us their rooms, swiped us into the dining hall, etc.
Moved down/off:
UNC - Visited on the same trip as UVA and Duke. It did not compare at all. They moved the info session due to crowds, and we had to wait to be escorted over, only to find they had already started. Info session was nothing special, but fine. Tour was terrible. Tour guide spent about 20 minutes describing the story of the water fountain, and then the traditions of what happens if they beat Duke. Not much about the school, except that several times he talked negatively about students who cared about their work/arrived early/sat in the front of the class. That was a huge turn-off. It would have been a safety for my DS, and his #1 criteria in looking at schools was not to feel out of place academically. Honors program would have been great and he could have graduated in 3 yrs, but it was just not a good fit. I really wanted to like it b/c it’s considered a top school, but it just didn’t work. Then the tour guide talked about how his father made him turn down Columbia to go there.
Swarthmore: DS didn’t think he wanted anything so small, but I insisted we visit since we were nearby and I thought he should at least see an LAC. Campus is beautiful. Info session was terrible. I was expecting a very intellectual vibe, but the admissions person sounded like an 80s valley girl which was just really odd. But the people in the audience were trying so hard, asking all sorts of questions that could easily be answered from the website. We did a lot of eye rolling. The tour guide was very enthusiastic about the school, but it just wasn’t a fit. DS thought it was too small and didn’t offer anything in exchange that was better than some of his other choices. Also, just from superficial people watching, it didn’t seem like his crowd. And the music dept was underwhelming.
Stayed the same:
Cornell - DS liked it, but didn’t love it. It wasn’t a favorite before or after the visit.
Penn - DS liked it. First school we saw, so we didn’t really know how to look critically, but DS was excited about it.
Off List - University of Delaware, just no, walked on campus about 5 minutes before both D16 and D18 said no, actual reason stated, independently by both kids without hearing what the other one said “it is in the middle of nowhere” (it’s not btw). College of Wooster (D16) after a good visit on a bitter cold winter day “If they could just pick it up and move it to a city.” Lessons learned - D16 really wanted an urban campus.
Moved Down List - Ohio University (D16) - too rural and depressing dorms. (It’s my alma mater, I was crushed)
Moved Up List - Loyola Chicago (D18) after a very reluctant drive by visit suggested by Mom on the way to visit Marquette for D16, “Ehhh, yeah keep that one on the list”. Marquette (D16) was only on list because Mom thought it would be a good fit, D16 decided it was the right size (campus and student body size), amiable engaged professors, specific major availability…and of course it is the winner! Lessons learned - sometimes, just sometimes, Mom does have a good idea!
Put on List - Pitt, a random visit because we were in town checking out Duquesne.
Stay the Same - Drexel, Duquesne.
Never made it on List (for the entire family) - TAMU, after years of attending LAX tournament in early February “the campus looks like a state penitentiary, it’s depressing and for such a large student population, where are all the students on the weekend?”
I love threads like this…for those of you who are naysayers, rather than looking at the negative, kids won’t want to look at a school because someone bashed it on an anonymous website, try looking at it from a different prospective. I know I look at these thread to get an idea about universities that have not hit my kid’s radar yet. For example, we looked up Furman for D18 because of this thread (it was an off the list school for someone) and will need to investigate it further. Kids are smart they are not going to cross a school off their list because Suzy Q Stranger crossed it off because she hates hills.
@JenJenJenJen I actually heard that Skidmore had strong sciences. Maybe your D can take another look… My D is finishing up Freshman yr, so who knows where she will want to go. Right now she says that her dream school is Vanderbilt (sight unseen). I tried to explain that it is almost impossible to get into that school. The only thing I am sure of is that she will go somewhere with a pretty campus. LOL Anyway, I had looked at Union’s website, and it actually sounds great. I liked the whole Minerva thing.
After seeing references to this you-love-it-or-you-hate-it video from Yale in this thread, I finally just decided to go find it. Well, my D and I couldn’t stop watching even though it was way past the acceptable length for a marketing video. All I can say is we both want to go to Yale now!! 
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I’ve said it before on this thread, so I’ll say it again: It is no more presumptuous for a potential applicant to cross a school off their list for such reasons than it is for a school to strike an applicant off their list for having taken a foreign language up to only year three, not four or five.
Or, looked at another way, given that there are quite literally thousands of colleges in this country, and hundreds that are at least somewhat selective, when it comes to thinning a list of schools to apply to, of course some decisions will be made on tenuous grounds—but that’s neither presumptuous nor silly. Rather, it’s the only possible way to go about it, really.
Moved Down:
Vanderbilt- This one moved down after she applied and interviewed. Her interviewer kept stressing Greek life to her and asked her 4 times if she would consider joining a sorority. Beautiful campus.
Cornell- Loved it, loved the campus. Decided she did not want to be upstate and wanted to get away from so many from her HS who attend. There were 5 from the previous years HS class all living on the same floor.
Duke- She hated the layout of the campus. On the day of our tour she said “nobody looks happy.”
University of Richmond- gorgeous campus but too small for her. This school ruled out all small schools.
Pitt- great school. did not want urban. applied anyway. This applied to all urban schools that we looked at (she did not apply).
UConn- She did not like the campus.
Moved Up:
Emory- She loved the campus and loved the students. The tour guide commented that she gets up at 3 am to discuss biology concepts that she finds interesting- my daughter liked that (go figure).
UVA- Loved the campus, loved the traditions, loves Dean J!
Wake Forest- She liked it. We thought it was too small for her. She liked the idea that students in Greek life did not have separate housing, they stayed in the dorms. To her, this made it less “exclusionary.” She also liked the idea of having 14 students in a class.
UNC-CH- Loved it. Loved the campus. Loved the tour guides (multiple visits). Loved the Gillings School of Public Health. Loved the fact that so many freshmen were able to actively engage in research. Loved the school spirit combined with strong academics (spoke to a few OOS students). After speaking to students she learned that classes can be small. Being OOS she knew it was a very high reach regardless of her scores and rank.
Lehigh- She loved it. Towards the end of senior year she came to realize that it may not be for her, despite loving the school (if that makes sense).
Stayed the Same (her opinions after our visit remained the same as before our visit):
Binghamton
UMD-CH- liked the school but she expected to like the school.
Agree that it is perfectly fine for a kid to mark a school off a list for reasons that may make no sense to anyone but them. I caught a bit of flack from a few people who didn’t like the fact that my D never considered any schools in Texas because of gun laws. The gist was that it was paranoid to worry about guns on campus and that she shouldn’t be afraid of something that is unlikely to happen. Well, a kid has to make a list some how. They can’t consider all 4000 colleges. If a kid doesn’t like guns, or grey buildings, or even hills, then so be it. I may think it’s silly to not like hills (and I do) but I guess it’s a perfectly legitimate reason.
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@citymama9 and @JenJenJenJen , my D goes to Skidmore with the intention of being a Bio/Math double major. After first semester, she decided she preferred chem to Bio and Math even more so looked like Math/Chem. Now going into their semester its Math/CS? or Chem? or ?. The upside of an LAC is that she still doesn’t have to declare for nearly another year. She will have completed her Math major requirements end of sophomore year and so has a little wiggle room for the second double. I was a little unsure about the strength of the math and science departments (still am honestly) but they’ve done right by her so far. She was offered a job tutoring chem students and will be doing a 10 week research program this summer involving CS and Chem work, which I think might be unusual in some schools.
I think this is a good point, and an unintended consequence of all the visiting/applying that happens now that didn’t happen when many of us applied to schools. The more information we give to kids, the greater chance that decisions are going to get made on what may seem like relatively small or transitory things.
Isn’t that also because in the end, the differences in undergraduate education for most degrees is not as different from school to school as the schools would have you believe. It really comes down to the more superficial aspects (in a parent’s opinion anyway) in the end.
@candjsdad Re Franklin & Marshall, just goes to show you that different things happen on different visits to different people! We have visited several times and saw no overtly religious presence, although I know they have excellent facilities and you can seek it out if you want (we don’t, and we’re sensitive to keeping education and religion very separate).
@Musicmom2015 if you are OOS for UVA and UNC, be especially careful about viewing them as safeties.
My S eliminated several colleges/universities because they were ‘elitist’. When I asked him for further clarification, he couldn’t/wouldn’t articulate much further other than to say that he thought that the kids thought they were elite. I was (and still am) stumped because some of these tours took place on some VERY warm summer days where the only impression I had was how close the buildings were with AC. I didn’t recall interacting with a whole bunch of students. So he must have seen/felt something. Meanwhile, the school where all the girls (okay, many of them) wore Uggs and other fancy boots, and all the guys (yes, practically all) wore North Face jackets – that one stayed towards the top of the list. I realized I could no more predict which school he’d like than I could predict the weather.
@sevmom, I think my OOS kids would love UVA and UNC but you are right. I think the correct number for UNC is 86% in-state students required by the state. I also wonder how much kids like to go to a state school outside their own state that is filled with in-state kids. I’d love to talk to someone whose child made the decision to go to UVA or UNC from OOS to see if they felt like they fit.