<p>I dunno, as imperfect as an overnight is, you're about to drop $200K and an investment of four years of your kids life and you're worried about missing an athletic event???</p>
<p>Another data point, another way to weed out the losers from the winners, seems to me it beats a coin toss. I insisted on overnights for my kids before they sent back the little postcard, if only because I didn't want the tearful phone call in October which started with, "if only I'd known...". There is no college which is perfect, but in my mind, a kid choosing between Cornell and Columbia ought to be able to visualize life in Ithaca vs. life in Manhattan. Even if it's only for the kid to realize that he/she won't be able to afford Broadway, nights out at Lincoln Center, or whatever-- to me, knowledge is power.</p>
<p>blossom, I'm not worried about her missing an athletic event, SHE is worried about missing an athletic event. She's already informed me that if graduation is the same day as the championships, she's not going to graduation. :)</p>
<p>regarding missing school for college days. Our official policy is two days. However, if the office knows that a student is looking at a college out of town or out of state they will make a concession but the student has to bring back some proof of having actually been on a college day. I would expect that your hs may be the same and suggest that you call the attendance office to check.</p>
<p>Only one of the colleges that S looked at had classes going on in the summer, that was the only overnight he could attend. They put four prospies in a room together, which worked out really well. </p>
<p>He had a great overnight, and was able to compare notes with the other kids looking at the school. Well, maybe not compare notes, but they did get lost together on their way to classes. And it did take three of them to figure out how to get into the combination locked room.</p>
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She's already informed me that if graduation is the same day as the championships, she's not going to graduation.
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<p>Our baseball team had a game on the same day as graduation. Not a single member of the team was at graduation. A vice principle went out to their game (on the road) and did a little ceremony on the pitchers mound between innings.</p>
<p>I agree that if your child isn't comfortable with complete strangers, an overnight isn't necessarily helpful. However, attending an "accepted students" event, even if you don't stay overnight, could give the student a taste of what the other students also considering attending are like.</p>
<p>As to schools not offering "official" overnights, we never used that route anyway. For both my children, I contacted an oncampus organization with which they had an affinity, spoke to the exec director, and requested they find a student with whom my student could spend the night. Out of a total of 7 overnights done by both kids, only one host turned out to be a loser (this assessment was from my VERY tolerant and accepting D); the others gave my kids a positive experience at each school visited.</p>
<p>S actually asked US if he could do two official accepted student overnights. This time he apparently was going to pay attention, now the pressure was on. I think he was bored at a lot of those earlier tour/info sessions; wanted to leave most of them early except for a couple. A lot of these colleges are, at heart, more alike than different. Very similar student bodies, especially. Same with these 2. It mattered to him if there was, for example, activity on campus at 2AM and he wanted to see for himself (he's a night owl). And where you could get a snack at midnight. Sometimes it's the littlest things that make the difference.</p>
<p>Picked the school about 6 USNews places below the other; plus twice as far away from the gf. In his case the overnight was the deal maker.</p>