<p>Many say that visiting colleges will give you a feeling... some sort of vibe in order for you to see if you'll like it there. I've "visited" a few colleges by passing by on vacation with family. We just stopped there and walked around campus for 20 min or less... I don't think that's really visiting and I didn't even learn anything about the colleges. Also, I never got a feeling about any of them. How would you know you'd enjoy being at that college? Would I have to go on an official tour? And when should I go visit? Also... I really want to visit CA colleges but I live all the way in the Mid-West; how can I convince my parents to let me go? (Either by myself or with them, but they are quite busy with work and thes four children in the family)</p>
<p>Is there any way that you could discuss a family vacation in CA with your parents, that would include trips to attractions that they and your siblings would enjoy? If your siblings are younger, are any of them potentially interested in West Coast colleges? With a little homework, travel can be surprisingly affordable - find discount flights, car rentals, motels, etc. that fit your budget. It’s tough with your family situation. Do you have a birthday or something coming up that you could ask that this trip be a gift for? I had some great road trips with my sons, that incorporated college visits with other destinations.</p>
<p>When you visit a college, sign up ahead of time with admissions to go on a campus tour. If you are going when school is in session, ask admissions ahead of time if you could sit in on a class, and try to eat in a cafeteria on campus when you are there. They also have information sessions, but many people find them repetitive with information easily available on the college website. Regarding California, have you discussed cost with your parents? California public universities are pricy for out of state students. There are certainly private colleges as well – price at those depends on whether you qualify for need-based financial aid or merit aid.</p>
<p>afaik the “vibe” is just how rich kids justify visiting schools 5 times.</p>
<p>If you visited over the summer and if you did not take the tour, then you would just be walking around looking at buildings.</p>
<p>Disagree with @foolish. I visited a number of LACs with my D and they had very different “vibes” and she eliminated schools she felt were too preppy, to to artsy etc. to come up with a solid list of schools she could really see herself at.</p>
<p>@foolish, you are living up to your name. It is expensive to transfer if you make a mistake (credits that don’t transfer, lower financial aid or loss of merit aid, social impact). Better to check out a campus BEFORE deciding to attend. </p>
<p>OP is visiting schools he/she has not even been accepted to and does not know if he/she can even afford it to begin with. I agree - visiting after acceptance is important, but before, what’s the point unless demonstrated interest can boost her/his app?</p>
<p>I think it’s important to visit the schools you like the most before applying. I was in love with an LAC on paper and I thought it was by far my first choice. Until I visited it. I hated how small it felt and how isolated the campus was. Until then, the idea of LACs was really appealing to me. In fact, a majority of my applications would’ve been to LACs. But when I finally visited one, I realized I didn’t like them at all. Had I not visited before I started creating a final list, I would’ve applied mostly to a type of school that I actually didn’t like, which wouldn’t have been a fun position to be in. </p>
<p>I agree that one should not visit schools one can’t afford. Which is what the net price calculator and the Common Data Set section on merit aid are used for. Students should look at those before making a decision to visit.</p>
<p>But once that is confirmed, then there is something to be said for visiting schools you are interested in to see if you really would want to go there. The window between acceptance and decision is quite short – late March until May 1, unless it is an EA/ED/rolling admission school. Many students decide to wait until acceptances to visit, but then have to jettison many of their choices. They are in school in April, plane tickets are expensive on short notice, spring ECs are reaching peaks with performances and tournaments, etc. So they ditch some schools that might have been great schools for them because they didn’t ever get a chance to visit.</p>
<p>And I think visiting campus may help with admissions even if the school doesn’t care about showing interest. It really helps for writing the “Why this school?” essay. I’ve been told by admissions officers that the standout essays are the ones that feature a specific story from that applicant’s time on campus or something to that effect, rather than just a rephrasing of the college’s brochures and statistics.</p>
<p>Going on official tours and information sessions really does help. Just take a couple weekend trips to different locations and plan out a schedule that allows you to go on official tours of a few colleges in the area. I agree that there is a “vibe” you get at different colleges–I assume it’s like trying on wedding dresses; when it’s the right one, you “just know.” And sometimes taking an official tour can make you realize how you would never be able to attend a certain college. For example, I thought I would fall in love with Yale, but after I took the tour and went to the information session, I realized it was not a place I could fit in or see myself attending, so I took it off my list. Other colleges I expected to dislike, but wound up falling in love with them. So I’ve found you really never know until you get there.</p>
<p>@intparent By not visiting schools that are too unafordable is that to prevent wanting to go to that school even more? Right now I really love Pepperdine but I know already it’s going to be too expensive even with merit scholarships and I don’t qualify for financial aid. And as for UCs, I was considering but I already have some decent state universities. The CA privates I’m interested in are Pepperdine, USC, and U of Pacific Pharm program (although I’ve heard not many respect U of Pacific?).</p>
<p>@woogzmama Thanks for your tips! I have a sister who’s only a year younger (who might be interested in CA) while my other two siblings are still in elementary. What part of the US did you guys roadtrip to? We live in the midwest so roadtripping might be a bit hard, but not totally impossible!</p>
<p>While I’m not too familiar with many California schools, my cousin went to University of the Pacific and absolutely despised it. It’s in a really awful town, he got robbed multiple times, he found the academics weren’t very good, and he transferred out after two years. Obviously you can make the decision to apply yourself, but from what I know about it, I would advise against it.</p>
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<p>For a variety of reasons it seems like a bad idea. One because you only have so many days and so many resources to use for visiting. Why spend a day (and maybe travel money) on a college you know you can’t afford? There are ways to learn more about a college without going for a visit. Here are some thoughts:</p>
<ul>
<li>Run net price calculators. Throw out the ones that are not affordable. Be ruthless… no point in applying to schools you won’t be able to pay for.</li>
<li>Check out the websites and online tours.</li>
<li>Read up on them. Read the Fiske Guide to Colleges very carefully if there is an entry, it tells you a lot. Also check out the website c-o-l-l-e-g-e p-r-o-w-l-e-r (sorry, gotta do that avoid *s blocking it).</li>
<li>Go to the CC forum and read as many back entries as you can stand to read. Lots of nuggets of good info there.</li>
<li>Study the major requirements and course catalogs. If you see courses that are really exciting, check the actual course listing and see when they have been or will be offered (you can usually see at least a full year of semesters/terms). Sometimes stuff in the catalog is very rarely offered.</li>
<li>Review things like the study abroad website and EC info online if you are interested.</li>
<li>Email with the college if you have specific questions. You can email admissions, or if you have academic questions you can email a professor in the departments where you have the question.</li>
<li>See if the student newspaper is online. You can often see what the marketing people don’t want you to know…</li>
<li>If the college has any kind of info session or get together in your area, go to it.</li>
<li>Sign up for emails from the admissions office. Some colleges sent out newsletter type emails, etc. that can be helpful.</li>
<li>Look at the Common Data Set for each college. Google “<college name=”“> Common Data Set”. There is loads of info that might help with your decision.</college></li>
</ul>
<p>Once you decide to visit a college, then contact them well ahead of time to sign up for a tour. If classes are in session while you are visiting, ask if you can sit in on a class. Plan to eat in the cafeteria. If you haven’t been on many tours before, you might attend the info session usually offered along with the tour (but those tend to all sound a lot the same after a while, and if you have done the research above before visiting, you won’t learn much from it).</p>
<p>Our whole family included Chicago visits into a family summer trip. My older son and I went up to Boston, made day-trips into NYC and Philly, but the more ambitious road-trips were with my younger son. He, my husband, and I visited GWU in DC, then boarded the auto-train to FL to visit New College in Sarasota. After that, we drove along the Gulf Coast to New Orleans, where we visited Tulane and enjoyed the city. We drove up to Memphis, for more music and barbecue - only driving around the Rhodes campus - then on to Vanderbilt and Nashville. From Nashville, we proceeded to NC for tours of Davidson, Wake Forest, Guilford, and UNC-Chapel Hill. That was in March. In June, my son and I flew to San Diego, and drove up the coast, visiting UCSD, Whittier, Occidental, Pitzer, Claremont-McKenna, UCSB, CalPoly-San Luis Obispo, UC Santa Cruz, Davis, and Berkeley. </p>
<p>My kid visited Dartmouth, Cornell, Columbia, McGill, MIT, Harvard, BC(sort of), and Tufts. For some reasons, kid #2 didn’t like Dartmouth, Cornell, BC(didn’t get out of the car). She liked MIT, McGill and Tufts but overall she didn’t like the whole Boston thing, it was too small for her. Then she visited UCSD, UCLA, UCB, never visited USC but been on campus multiple times. She liked UCSD, didn’t get out of the car for UCB, complained about the distance from the dorm to the main campus at UCLA. We didn’t take the admission tour at every colleges, too me they all sound the same after a while, but so just want can get an idea whether or not it’s even possible to spend 4 years there.</p>
<p>For example, there was one kid who really disliked UCSD when we were touring there, she had a really uncomfortable look, pardon my description, but she looked like she was having a bad case of diarrhea (LOL), I knew immediately, it was not the school for her. </p>
<p>I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have put up with a kid who wouldn’t get out of the car if we had gone to the trouble to go to a college campus for them to see…</p>
<p>Just walking around campus does help eliminate some. One we went to my dd said was too hilly. Another one my husband said the neighborhood seemed too dangerous. Etc.
If you like the campus after walking around, though that’s just one factor.</p>
<p>intparent, I can’t believe it either. I read it here on CC and had the same reaction. When I found out I had such kid after much pleading for her to walk around the campus, I gave up.</p>
<p>Taking the tour and talking to some current students or professors will help determining the “vibe.” At some schools, while taking tours current students immediately went up to me and said hi, which to me, showed the friendliness of the student body, while at other schools they were kind of aloof and the tour guides seemed almost completely scripted. At other schools, when I saw people wearing fancy clothes, that gave off a preppy vibe, while at others the sports teams seemed to dominate the social scene.</p>
<p>I agree that visiting definitely helps, and you should have some idea of where you want to go, so it’s not just a random ,list. But the buildings themselves aren’t going to tell you that much. The people will, though</p>