IMO, it is perfectly acceptable for students or PARENTS to send emails to college staff and faculty for any legitimate concern. It is repeated many times on this site “Do not apply to a school that is not a good fit for your career interests, personal needs, financial situation, and personality!” Navigating through the application/admission process with my daughter this past year has proven to me that college websites can be very confusing, out of date, and vague. They try to make them fancy and eye catching, at the expense of functionality. We have had many questions where we needed answers in order to make an application or acceptance decision. We found many answers here on CC, and we found many others by making direct contacts (probably 10 emails in total). We were, for the most part, very impressed with the responses we received and they were very helpful. One of the most helpful non impressive response was from a Department Chair at one school who she asked “I have been doing research on my intending major of XXX. I have found that there might not be many job opportunities with this major. Can you tell me anything about job placement of your recent graduates in this field?”. The Department Chair responded with something along the lines of…“Well, I think a couple are in grad school”. This from a VERY small university who could very easily keep some sort of records on their job placement rate. On the other hand, my daughter got a very pleasant, helpful, and detailed response from a Department Chair of a graduate program that she may want to apply to in four years - and she told her that she probably wasn’t even going to get her undergrad degree there! You can bet that school is on her list for grad school if she sticks with her intended major.
These emails were not sent to try to impress or show interest in the school, but were just legitimate concerns about academics, job opportunities, career planning, and appropriate “fit”. I don’t see anything wrong at all with asking questions - after all, we are paying them to educate our children and our children will be spending four years of their lives (or more) in college, so both parents and students should be well informed.
And finally, my daughter got waitlisted at a very highly ranked private university - we were shocked she was not outright denied. The only reason I can think of that would have gotten her on the waitlist was the interest that she showed in the school by visits, camps, local seminars, interviews etc. There was a place on the common app for the school which wanted a list (with dates) of all these events - and she had about six to list. So some schools do take note of these things.
Just my 2 cents.