I’m originally from the Northeast, so Worcester a very familiar kind of city and I didn’t think anything negative about it. Not so much S24; born and raised in Chicagoland.
I thought Clark was a really good school and the red brick buildings didn’t turn me off at all, but honestly I agreed with S24 about the less than stellar swag. Individual reactions are so, well, individual.
Look forward to hearing what your S24 thinks of Holy Cross and Clark. We tried to get S24 to look at Holy Cross (since he was willing to check out Salve) but that was a no-go for him.
I was not impressed by the swag at oberlin, same 80s vibe for a very alternative school. Maybe that is what everyone is going for now!
I am not sure when we will be able to see all of these schools, may have to wait until fall break!
As for school bookstore swag, S24 liked the offerings at Wheaton, Salve, UMass Amherst, and Hampshire. It really was only Clark that stood out in a bad way, lol. Good to know about the current Oberlin swag issues; I do wonder if the 80s aesthetic is making a comeback (fingers crossed those two schools are anomalies).
It’s getting hard to visit now. Unfortunately, a lot of schools don’t do tours on the weekend which makes it tricky. S24 can’t take any more days from school this year - he’s already used up the allotment they give the kids for college visits. We’ll do some over the summer (not ideal, I know) and try to to squeeze any others in this fall. He will probably do ED (and ED2 if necessary) so it is critical that he do in-person visits for those - any RD schools we don’t see can always be seen if he actually gets in.
Yes, we are waiting on the response from his likely ed school to arrange a visit there with the music department and teacher, that will be the top priority. The rest will have to wait, he has school on Saturdays and it is hard to miss until Memorial Day, not sure June visits are worthwhile
We were very impressed with our tour of Richmond and a friends son is about to graduate. Friends second son is at Northwestern and she says, between the two, her son at Richmond has had a better learning experience with more opportunities for research and internships and stronger relationships with professors. I love Richmond and hope my S24 applies!
After many emails to various people, I finally got a nice lady from ACT to help get his March scores. I knew the problem but no one would listen. But, now relief. He has a great score without studying. But, now he might want to study and improve just a point or two for more money. As his plans are to be a doctor the lowest undergrad cost is the game we are playing,
We liked Clark a lot–down to earth, obviously they care about the individual student, and they have a balanced mindset about the college experience vs. the career and life afterward. Caring about swag is really weird, in my opinion. It has nothing to do with anything substantive.
We toured 2 over spring break. Central Michigan and Western Michigan. She really liked the art facilities at Central, and the tour in that area was very nice. It was given by the department head and lasted a full hour. He took us inside classrooms, all the facilities, etc. But, the campus was boring feeling and the example dorm room was not impressive. She is comparing to her brother at Bama, so it’s tough! And upside is that many stores are walkable, which she is looking for. Not much for entertainment for her though, but not awful. She said it’s at the bottom of her list now, but if she applies and gets a big scholarship, she’d visit again to see.
Western was a success. The campus felt overall nicer to her and the dorm was nicer too. The dorm we saw have pods with 15 double rooms and a shared living area and kitchen and 6(?) bathrooms. It felt like a good way to meet those other 28 students, rather than the entire building. The downside is the campus is pretty isolated from shopping, but they do have a bus system. And the engineering campus is a bus ride away as well. She liked that there are broadway style shows that come right on campus often. Right now, it’s at the top of her list.
We probably won’t do more tours until she’s making decisions next spring.
I’m so glad the tours are good! Wow are they better than any my S22 had! Seeing dorm rooms, going inside buildings, etc. All pluses.
I have decided that I have officially lost my common sense in trying to figure out if we should see more schools this spring. Just made appointments for one local school that he can see in the afternoon next week and two schools in Virginia before memorial day weekend. Is this worth the expense and missing school and work! He has a fully booked summer and will take a full load of classes plus music school on Saturday next year so it won’t get easier, UGHHHHH!!!
So we have seen 4 schools, two reaches that he loved and two matches that he hated. I want to get to see some more matches/safeties (well one is a reach) to see if he likes the vibe and the place so that we can be more confident that if he doesnt get into a super reach ED that he will have places that he likes. I think that with our early choices we got the vibe wrong and want to make sure that we now have it right.
If it were me, I’d visit likelies/safeties at this point since you’ve seen two reaches, especially if he has an idea of his ED1. I wouldn’t spend more time visiting reaches unless they were conveniently located near the safeties.
We are revisiting a likely school next week and then maybe adding on a few more visits to others in the fall if D24 wants to keep looking, but she feels like she’s seen enough at this point to have a good list of places to apply.
IMO, reaches can be researched online and visited after acceptance. I do agree that finding a likely that matches vibe is important, and it can take time to get that right.
We definitely need to visit more likelies/safeties - so far it has been mainly reaches (with 2 high targets ). It is hard to identify these schools as he isn’t interested in our state flagship or any of the other NE flagships. We are considering UWMadison - not typically a “safety” per se but no student with S24 stats (or, tbh, lower stats) has ever been denied there from our HS and he isn’t looking at CS or Engineering so it could be a more likely possibility. Must spend more time on this, for sure.
totally agree, if you look at SCOIR my S has stats that have never been denied admissions at several schools that have 20-30% admissions rates but that is definitely not a safety. My understanding it is a school that there is a more than 90% likelihood of admission so it does depend on the student. We are considering schools with 50% or greater admissions rates and good records with our school safeties, but they are only a true safety if you are willing to pay for them and they are a good fit for your kid, that is the part we are struggling with!
