I am always reading on CC how kids when they visit schools meet with students, profs, etc. I know often that is a personal contact but sometimes seems to be arranged by the school. We never tried to arrange anything like that with my older two kids who had pretty common academic interests.
But my youngest is insanely into astronomy, which is often a very small department, and he is very interested in the equipment and research opportunities which is hard to fully understand online. I encouraged him to reach out to some schools he visited or was going to visit to ask if he could meet up with a student or a professor in the department. He was too intimidated to reach out to any Ivies but emailed some small selective LACs he had visited and liked. One sent back a pretty cold “don’t bother us” response with a link to the department page in the school website. Yikes! Haven’t heard from the other (Wesleyan) yet, but would love to hear if anyone had any success with reaching out to schools like this? Or is it a waste of time or worse irritating to the schools? We are about to visit some less selective schools - would those be more or less open to this kind of reaching out? Has your kid had success doing this?
Yikes is right! One of the biggest and most pleasant surprises we have had in this experience is how accommodating some big public schools are. University of Oregon has been unbelievably responsive. For the University of Washington, my daughter had technical problems in one of the admissions presentations and an AO called her after and they had a 15-20 minute private call. Don’t let the snooty response keep your future astronomer from getting the information he needs/wants from other colleges!
My D arranged prof meetings at about half the schools she visited. Some schools weren’t very accommodating but others went above and beyond. I’d keep trying!
We had great success at Oklahoma and Florida State.
I think, you can reach out to your admissions counselor first. Some will arrange for you. Some will suggest that you contact the department.
While it’s maybe better to meet a professor, some will only set up appointments with academic advisors. Of course, at an LAC, that’s likely a professor vs. a hired hand at a large public
Certainly reach out to the department chair if admissions can’t help and if they’re unable to meet you (a prof, etc.) ask if there’s a student in the program you can contact.
In the end, they are trying to sell you on coming to the school - so they should be helpful. And if they’re not, let your admissions officer know so that they can pull the levers for you…especially if you’re already admitted - because at that point, you hold the power - they want you to come!!!
I don’t have an opinion on your exact question, but having discussed LAC astro with you before, I’ll mention on a related point a fantastic REU consortium in the northeast that is set up for small colleges. The link is currently to a Middlebury site, but they don’t run it; it’s a consortium of member schools who take turns managing the program (must be Midd’s turn), which is a summer research fellowship that is funded by the NSF and provides a unique experience for students at these LACs to research at another institution (schools are encouraged to pick applicants from other member schools, but I don’t think it’s a hard rule). Chosen students spend the summer at a member school, housing and all that is covered, and they are part of a faculty member’s research team. Then they all gather in the fall at one of the member schools (my D’s year it was at Middlebury) and present to the consortium. Very cool. Link and some information from the site is pasted below.
One more plug for Wes: as great as the Keck REU is, D had a very hard time deciding on whether to accept it because of all the great and funded research opportunities going on at Wesleyan independent of the consortium. In fact, she would tell you today that she probably turned down better research opportunities at her own school to spend the summer at one of the member schools, but the experience was valuable and it’s a resume enhancer to have been chosen to research with faculty at another school. Although any of these schools would be fine places at which to study astro, I still think Wes is hard to beat all things considered. But I’m biased. Note: the REU is competitive. You have to be chosen by a faculty member at one of the consortium schools to be involved. It’s not a sign-up.
The Keck Northeast Astronomy Consortium comprises astronomy faculty and students at eight small liberal arts colleges and universities in the northeast. Our goals are to promote astronomy research among our students and to foster faculty and student interaction among the eight campuses. We sponsor a student exchange program each summer and a student research symposium each fall.
Although originally funded by the W. M. Keck Foundation beginning in 1990, we are now funded by the National Science Foundation, under their Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program.
I think Covid has changed some dynamics of this as well. Some colleges have limited non-college related guests, facility access, etc…
It is absolutely worth it to try to reach out. Let them know dates you will be in town. Sometimes admissions officers can assist with introductions.
Also, look for events going on that are public, but have an opportunity to meet professors and see equipment. I know College of Charleston hosts astronomy events on one of the rooftops where their telescope is that are open to the public.
After acceptances are offered, the faculty members are more engaged and welcoming at some colleges - especially for top scholars.
The current issue of Wesleyan’s excellent periodical is out and, lo and behold, there’s an informative piece on Martha Gilmore. I thought your D would find this very informative, particularly if planetary geo science is an area of interest.
As far as reaching out to someone there, Seth Redfield, Meredith Hughes, and Bill Herbst are all very accessible people. Actually they all are approachable and down to earth. I’d have your D reach out again. Nobody in that Dep’t is going to be put off by your kid’s interest or persistence. And though Covid may have changed this, Van Vleck has weekly community events that include tours of the facility(which itself is both a functioning observatory and an astronomy museum), viewing nights and open lectures. They also do presentations for the local schools. It’s that kind of ethos … so they are not likely to rebuff or intentionally ignore a prospective undergraduate.
The way DD looked at it is that every response from AOs, Profs, Finance, etc was insight into the culture of the school. Rude responses were very telling for D20. She did all of this at the very beginning of covid; this is how she viewed “no” responses:
Pleasant “no” responses with offer to speak or email: she appreciated the responses and thanked them for their time and did some electronic follow up.
rude “no” responses, she crossed the school off the list.
She wanted to be at a school that was supportive, welcoming and excited to have her as a student; that included the professors in her major. All of the schools were match/safeties. Good luck!
just an fyi- sometimes students are reaching out to the wrong faculty member…so a “rude” response might be an auto-response from a professor out on medical leave, the “if this is an emergency call the departmental secretary” type of message because the faculty member is attending her mother’s funeral overseas, etc.
I would not extrapolate from a “no” that the college itself is not supportive, welcoming and excited. Sometimes stuff happens and a random email from a HS kid won’t always get the most welcoming response, especially if the faculty member is out on leave, doing field work in Peru, etc.
Reading these responses I realize perhaps he made a mistake by emailing the admissions officer assigned to our area rather than the department directly? I will try to encourage him to email the department directly though he may find it even more intimidating.
I think admissions is the place to start - they should either:
set it up for you or
let you know - reach out to the department directly…and if they are really nice…they’d say…reach out to so and so and here is their info.
One thing I’ve learned - you can’t hold the admissions department against the college.
Miami (Florida) is god awful - but that’s not to say it’s a god awful school - I wouldn’t know.
Charleston - not too great - but the school is wonderful.
Admissions is a sales group. These are people with quotas, etc. and many are overwhelmed and frankly, why you want them to care, in many ways the individuals are just widgets to them and if they don’t love their job/duties as many in society don’t, the are sometimes just going through the motions, etc. vs. giving you the love you expect.
It’s not easy to do because as a human being that first interaction is so important - but I’d recommend grading the school for the school itself and outside the admissions office.
I have no doubt that every school is different is the point.
One can certainly go to a professor directly Many of these kids are intimidated - even writing to admissions - so the single point of contact may help them.
But I don’t think there is any 100% right way - whatever works for the student is what they should try.
Just trying to simplify - because as @relaxedmom said her student may find it intimidating.
For us, this would have been step 2 - i.e. if it didn’t happen through admissions, we’d have reached out to others.
At FSU and, OU, admissions handled everything…my comment related to C of C admissions not being great was the non-visit related questions my daughter or I would always call with.
Other schools, it could be different.
I think whatever achieves the final goal for the student - that’s what they should do.
I have several friends/colleagues who took that approach.
A former colleague who is a Duke alumnus was so put off by the Duke admissions presentation at their in-person visit that she supported her twin boys in not applying. Apparently it was one of those, “you are lucky to even be here listening to us” kind of things.
I have had negative feedback from a couple of people about Amherst’s presentation - I guess similar to the Duke complaint - “do you know how elite we are?” kind of thing.
I can’t say it doesn’t make sense. These people are the face of the school, but our approach was to assume there is a whole life to be led behind these people with whom you’re unlikely to interact again. Said another way, I’m pretty convinced that Amherst is a great place to spend 4 years despite some (allegedly) snooty front office people.
Rudeness from a professor might be another matter however.
I have attached the link to the department so that you can readily access their contact info. In my experience the professors are very open and enthusiastic about talking directly to prospective students.
I’ve heard HS kids complain of a “rude email” from a professor- which when forwarded to me, was a reasonably polite “The departmental administrative assistant keeps my calendar- his name is Joe, this is his email, please reach out to him and he can find time for us to connect”.
That’s not rude. That’s what would happen if you emailed- out of the blue- the Director of Supply Chain management at a company you wanted to work for, or if you emailed the head of the EPA to complain about the labeling on a can of hairspray, or likely, even the mayor of your own town if you wanted to schedule a meeting. That’s what professionals do.
You’re going to avoid a college because a random professor (who might be on book leave, who might be emeritus and retired 4 years ago, who might be in the middle of chemotherapy) won’t respond to every single HS kids email with “Golly, It’s so great to hear from you, I’d love to give you a tour of my lab, please let’s do it at your earliest convenience and if I happen to be scheduled to speak or teach at that time I’ll just drop everything”.
I tried to explain to these HS kids that “here’s how to get time on my calendar” is not considered rude. But they can’t hear that message.
I would agree. In fact, I don’t think there is any reasonable read of that response that could be characterized as rude. In fact I might’ve advised my kids “that’s about as good as it’s probably going to get. he’s willing to meet with you!”
To be clear the response wasn’t actually rude on its face but it simply said thank you for your interest and referred him to the link to dept website. No response at all to request to meet with student or professor in the dept which was the entirety of the email ds sent.
