<p>Yes, because that one time is good enough to get a real feel or to be “impressed” with any place. What is this big deal with being “blown away” by being on a campus (I feel as if people get these feelings because they had pre conceived notions of what the place will be, positive or negative, and then naturally, they see and place emphasis on things that fit those pre conceptions)? I never felt that and had visited schools perceptively better than Emory (and some just flat out are), but I couldn’t feel that they were better based on that visit (I just knew by doing research before hand. Even then, I had no expectations and was not always able to tell the differences by a single visit). I thought Emory was beautiful (but so were many other schools) and clearly the academics were great in many areas (because it was a very specific visiting program, I got to sit in classes and the ones I went to were indeed above average, even for Emory or “elite schools”), so that was nice…I guess. However, many other schools invoked virtually the same (I however, visited an LAC and did a weekend there and the classes were small which was interesting) feeling. They were all “good” or at least met the minimal expectations I had. I wasn’t overly impressed or blown away by any of them. I feel like for that to happen, I would need a week or 2. Not, one visit and suddenly “I’m not feeling this”. </p>
<p>And of course, if I was OP, I would go to the cheaper school. Also, I don’t think MBAs are relevant to the OP, just saying…
As for the stats. craze: It is kind of dumb, but it’s the nature of the admissions arms race. All the schools want to claim that they have statistically perfect students (rankings love it, alumni love it, the administration loves it, etc). By perfect, we mean, “knows how to earn amazing grades and circle the right answer on multiple choice tests nearly 100% of the time”. And then what you find is that it hardly takes a “perfect” student to perform well at most of these schools. Many schools’ academic rigor is in fact still below the caliber of the student body (however, students and the administration would never admit that. Students always refrain to “well, it’s way harder than my local or flagship state school where I would have gotten a 4.0l!” As if that should be where the bar is set). You also find that many of these high stats. students are over-rated when removed from a “standardized” academic situation. Sometimes, schools aren’t selecting the best test takers that respond to a challenge well or with any enthusiasm. Many places get the “stick to the formula” (whatever formula they used to get there) types. If a school is fortunate enough, the other credentials of the students will suggest that a majority do indeed have awesome qualities that go far beyond good test taking, making the grade, and resume padding. While you hope that this latter scenario is indeed the case for most enrollees and admits, I imagine many places fall short here (partially explaining differences in intellectual climate across schools). </p>