We went to an informational session last night for Duke. **** I realize that they do not struggle to find students.*****
But there was about 100 kids at the session when it started, and about 30% of them got up and walked out in the middle of the session. It was as exciting as watching paint dry. It was a 40 minute slide show of just about nothing that you can’t find on their website. I have never noticed people just leaving mid session before.
Adults were playing games on their phones, and I even saw 2 people take calls without leaving the room, though they did move to the rear of the room.
The speaker was from admissions and just seemed so bored to be doing this session.
So, I wonder why they even bothered. They would get the students anyway. Even the brochures were boring.
I have wondered about this too.
Some years ago, D and I visited a smallish LAC in a SE state. This college, while having a decent reputation, has not had full enrolment for about 10 years–short about 10% of class size target.
In any case, poorly signed visitor’s center was shabby, and dirty, but full of visitor families. Not having trouble getting people to tour!
Cups from morning session under chairs, wadded up Kleenex on floor. 2PM session began closer to 2:15PM. Admissions person did not want to be there. Monotonous voice, poor projection, hurried thru general material. Questions? A long sigh, then perfunctory answer, in almost every case.
Tour was led by students who barely had a pulse, and certainly no personality. Shuffle, shuffle along. Point and say “this is a building where you might have a class.” Shuffle, shuffle: “If you like to eat, there is a cafeteria in that building.” Shuffle, shuffle.
You get the point.
Everything this school did screamed, “We don’t care if you come or not.” In fact, everything said, “We don’t care about !”
I’ve been to 2 like that. Both were highly ranked schools with more applicants than they know what to do with. But remember that your kid never deals with admissions again after acceptance. I wouldn’t think about it too much.
We attended one of those, too. Not a nationally-ranked school, but one my daughter was interested in before the tour.
That was the only tour we ditched. She’s still applying, because they have her program, but they are at the bottom of the list. Something we couldn’t put our finger on, but we both agreed there was something conveyed during our visit that didn’t sit right.
Conversely, there were presentations and tours that we both remember in a positive light, and those admissions folks made it clear that they loved their school and they seemed to love her as a future student.
Personally, I think admissions sets the tone for the school. If you can’t be enthusiastic about your own school (and employer) who can?
Yep. My alma mater, in an old lecture hall that I used to sit in which hasn’t seen a fresh coat of paint in 30 years despite the price going up to $62,000/yr. and new buildings springing up all over the place. Not one welcoming person on the way in, there was no video, nothing engaging, nothing that made me even want to go back (and I LOVE my alma mater). The tour guide was late because he went to the wrong location, sped through the tour, didn’t get us into a room, but was able to spend 15 mins. talking about sports while completely forgetting to mention the new multi million dollar academic building being constructed complete with cranes as we walked by. When I brought that to his attention, he found out I was an alumna. The tour professionalism of the tour immediately changed. Go figure. The vibe I got was, “If you don’t apply, we don’t really care as we have more applications than we know what to do with and there are 100 more just like you lined up”. I’ve always felt pride for my school up until that info session/tour, and wrote a letter to admissions afterwards. I was so disappointed. And, our kid, rightfully so, isn’t applying :).
Lovely school Bucknell, but same experience just this year, the person presenting was “just not into it”–I assumed maybe she was just having a bad day. Fortunately the student tour guide was positive and enthusiastic–as were other students that we met. Definite keeper in the application process after seeing the facilities and talking to students who over the top love their school.
We’ve had great presentations and really bad ones, really, really, bad ones (here’s looking at you Columbia–but you’re big enough you can take the criticism : ) – but if the facilities aren’t kept up that would be a greater concern about overall management / morale / financial health.
Back when D1 was looking at colleges for engineering we visited both UIUC and Purdue, though similar on paper, the difference was striking. UIUC didn’t provide a place to park and the admissions officer came off as put out and condescending. The campus seemed dirty, the dorm they showed us was old and everyone we met just seemed like they didn’t care if you were there or not. Maybe we just went on a bad day. Purdue felt welcoming and genuinely encouraged D to like Purdue. We had students who when we were looking at a map asked if they could help us find where we were going and the engineering seminar made me want to study there (that would not be a good idea
Yes, unfortunately it was at my alma mater - the absolute worst info session I have ever attended. It was in a room with about 300 people, and the person giving the session was totally unprepared - no microphone, no visuals, no prepared talk. After about 5 minutes of mumbling, he opened it up to a free-for-all Q&A, and since there was no microphone, nobody could hear anything going on, and the parents kept asking the same questions over and over. I was really embarrassed. We ended up walking out halfway through. Fortunately we went to another info session at the same university for a different division, and it was fantastic - my daughter is a freshman in that division now.
CMU. Meet in the Admissions Office and sign in with snobby office staff that are focused solely on letting everyone know that they will get “demonstrated interest” credit for coming. Walk across the Cut to the University Center in the pouring rain to be packed into an auditorium. AO did nothing but show video after video that we could easily have seen online. Two tour guides show up 15 minutes late for almost 200 people. They don’t split the group into two, so very few people can hear them.
Caltech showed a video that was so bad they apologized about it!
We only went to CMU for accepted students weekend. Their tours and presentations were stellar. They even had umbrellas, since of course it was raining.
Info session at a small rural school was given by a young woman who had grown up nearby and was now working admissions. I remember feeling that this is not what I hoped my kids would be doing when they graduated from college!
Another info session went on and on about how important it was to figure out why you wanted to go to college and if you figured that out it would come out in your essays. At the time it seemed super pretentious, but actually that kid really did learn a lot about himself through the application process.
Princeton was like this…I got the impression of “We are Princeton, apply if you want”.
Whereas all the public U’s were “We have this and this and that and really, we are great! Please apply”
We loved our Princeton tour. Probably the most engaging of any of the student tour guides we met. And to each question about “but can I get in” he’d shrug and say, “listen to your guidance counselor- I don’t know you and I don’t know if you can get in, or if you should come here based on your other options. But I promise you, if you don’t apply, your chances are zero and I love it here”. And it was clear he did.
But the very top of our list (despite the fact that none of my kids applied for various reasons) was JHU. It was a sweltering hot day in August (and if you know Baltimore, you know sweltering) and the Director of Admissions (not a student, not an assistant) was standing on the steps of the building where the presentation was being held handing out ice cold bottles of Poland Spring from a huge barrel. Shook everyone’s hand, thanked them for showing up on such a miserable day when they could have been at the beach, told the parents “if you have any questions during the process make sure to call my office.” Told the kids “it’s ok if your parents call. Trust me. We don’t keep a notebook where we blacklist any kid whose parents made the phone call”.
JHU clearly not for everyone but boy, were they working on their A game.
After the information session at Stanford, QMP remarked that the admissions staffer seemed “vindictive.” Interesting word choice. She also said that she refused to believe that she was less qualified for Stanford than our tour guide. Same tour,
Guide: Uh, you might want to step over that.
Tour participants, looking down, see desiccated squirrel on the sidewalk.
We showed up for our scheduled tour & info session at one small, prestigious LAC and found out it was cancelled for the day. We’d driven 7 hours to be there and they didn’t so much as apologize. The staff was unfriendly, and it was awkward, and one of my daughters was mortified. We stayed overnight and attended the next day, and the actual info session and tour were wonderful, but the office experience left a sour taste in our mouths that never went away. We have several alumnae in our family and were prepared to love it but neither of my daughters ended up applying.
@blossom, the Princeton tour was fine, it was the info session that was uninviting. It kept reminding everyone that admission is very selective. Got it the first time. For sure by the second time.
Info session at Stanford. Admissions officer basically said he got in because he’s Native American, so apply if you are Native American. He totally confused the poor parents about the difference between need-blind and meets-full-need. I wasn’t clear on whether he understood it. And, he got a degree in business from Stanford and this he’s an underling in admissions a year later?
The tour was great though. It was a huge group, but our tour guide was the director of a theater group, and she was great at projecting to the whole group. They were short a microphone, and she didn’t need one. We would have liked someone who knew anything about STEM classes, though.
Oddly enough, that was one of my favorites. D didn’t apply (core=no way), but the info session was one of the best I’ve attended. A senior-ish admissions rep led it and she was very enthusiastic and energetic and was able to present Columbia in a great light and answer questions thoughtfully and completely. Tour was just OK, not bad not good.
Agree about CMU. hated the tour (wayyyyy too many people and our group was led by 3 students - how about you guys split us up into, um, 3??) and the info session only emphasized that not only will you probably not get in, we won’t meet your financial need if you do. That one was also led by a “real” adult admissions officer. D didn’t apply.
Somewhat agree about CMU. We went for an admitted students event. The general events were reasonably good, but the event for the CS program combined both prospective students and admitted students. The room was packed, and they spent most of the time talking about how admission was hard and what scores/grades you needed to get in. Same group on the tour of the CS building. Sitting in on classes was helpful as far as academics, but he never got a good feel for what it would be like to attend.