<p>Hello! I just received my acceptance on Friday and am thrilled. Upon perusal of the admitted students site, I found that Smith is offering to pay for me to go to Discovery Weekend and Open Campus in April, which is really icing on the cake. I'm pretty sure that more info about it will come in the mail, but I'd like to get a head start so I can begin to make travel plans.</p>
<p>On the website it says that Smith will pay for the cost of travel - I'm assuming this means airfare, but does this include car/bus service to and from the airport? Will I be staying, eating, and sleeping on campus for the entire weekend (April 15-18) or will I need to make hotel reservations? If I decide to bring a parent, how does the booking, etc. work?</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for sharing your knowledge.</p>
<p>Feelingisfirst, congratulations! Sorry I can’t answer more, but I imagine you would be staying on campus the whole time; it wouldn’t make sense for them to fly you to the school and have you stay elsewhere. If no one answers your questions more completely on CC over the weekend, I’d suggest you call Admissions on Monday; they’ll know all the details. Good luck!</p>
<p>Yes, it includes travel from the airport to campus, and then during the weekend you will be hosted by a Smith student and sleep in her room. You’ll either eat in the dining halls or else they’ll have meals arranged for you (I think it’s a mix of things if I remember right). If you bring a parent I’m pretty sure they would have to buy their own ticket, arrange their own transport from the airport, and stay in a hotel, so it would be totally separate from you. </p>
<p>Open Campus and Discovery Weekend (which a few years ago were merged into basically one event) are both really fun, really well organized events as far as admitted students days go IMO. As a Gold Key Guide I gave tours and sat on panels and hosted prospies for these, and I also worked at booths during the activities fair representing the student orgs I belonged too, so I’ve had a pretty up close look at it.</p>
<p>There are parent activities during Open Campus (Thursday-Friday), so your parent would be able to do Smith-related things, but I don’t think there are any during the Discovery Weekend (Friday-Sunday) portion. However, Collaborations is this weekend, where your parent would be able to see first-hand all the work Smith students and faculty did collaborating together (Collaborations and Discovery Weekend are always the same weekend, entirely on purpose).</p>
<p>Hey!! I"m an admitted student going to both Open Campus and Discovery weekend.
You call the travel agency they provide and they will arrange your airfare. You do not even have to wait to be reimbursed, Smith just books it for you.
They will pick you up from the airport, and then you will be on Smith’s campus and everything will basically be taken care of!!</p>
<p>Hey all! I am currently deciding whether to attend Open Campus as well but I can’t find anywhere that said it could pay for all the traveling fees. Please give advice on what to do?</p>
<p>jcbaby, I just scanned the previous posts and there’s no indication of how to do this. Somehow (I don’t know where I got this information) I have a hunch that you simply look at the email Smith sent you about the weekend and there should be a listing for a travel agency. You call them and they book everything for you and charge it all to Smith. Take a look at your email. Hope this helps!</p>
<p>If you’re just going to Open Campus, your airfare and travelling fees aren’t covered. They only cover them for those invited to Discovery Weekend who live a certain distance away from campus. Sorry, but there are SO many people that come to Open Campus, it would be impossible for Smith to cover the travel for all of them. The Discovery Weekend group is much smaller.</p>
<p>Thank you for the quick replies! How is Discovery Weekend different from Open Campus though? And even though I was admitted, how come I was not offered to come to Discovery Weekend? (I never got an email btw, CarolynB).</p>
<p>I attended Open Campus with my daughter last spring. We were really on separate tracks the whole weekend. We checked in at the indoor track building and she disappeared from radar almost immediately. There were a bunch of parent-oriented things to go to - talks about different aspects of Smith’s academics and student life, and there was a reception for parents. My daughter and I crossed paths mainly at one of two STRIDE-oriented events. She and several other prospies were made very welcome by their student hosts, who really went out of their way to show the prospies a good time. It was a fun weekend.</p>
So excited.</p>