Happy Spring everybody! I am a junior and i plan to visit some top colleges with my parents in early August for about a week or two. I sadly do not know what i wanna major in so i basically just pick lots of colleges that are high ranked(Harvard, Yale, Princeton etc. are just for visiting, i probably won’t apply to any Ivy. And the rest for me are mostly “reach” schools. My SAT score is 2230(CR710, m790).
This is my second year in America but i am from Shanghai, China. I will be back home for summer so we are gonna fly to whatever city on the east coast from Shanghai and then fly south to start my senior year while my parents will fly back home.
I did some research on the locations of the colleges and i excluded some inconvenient or remote ones such as Williams(no offense). Transportation preferences are planes, amtraks, and metros or subway(within the city). Or we can rent a car with a tour guide but that’s gonna be super exorbitant. Since it’s only March and most schools are not open for campus visit registration in August, i can’t determine the specific schedule for every college. I’m here to ask for suggestions for a route or itinerary, like the order of the places to go and how to get there. I really appreciate your advice.
Here’s my college list by states i guess:
NY: NYU, Columbia, Cornell, Colgate, Hamilton, Vassar
MA: Harvard, Boston College, Boston University, Amherst
CT: Yale, Wesleyan
NJ: Princeton
PA: UPenn, Swarthmore, Haverford
MD: Johns Hopkins, Georgetown(Washington DC)
I also included Dartmouth and Brown but it won’t be very possible.
I list a lot of colleges here but i am sure some of them will not be realistic to visit. So just give me your advice. Thank you all so much!
Why are you visiting schools (Ivies) that you will not be applying to? Wouldn’t it make more sense to visit the schools that you intend to apply to, including some match and safety schools?
Yeah that’s true… But my parents and I just want to have a view of those prestigious Ivy schools since we are already there. Maybe we will just go take a look and not spend two hours. Perhaps some are too inconvenient to go then we will just not go I guess.
Since that’s the case, I suggest that you come up with a list of colleges you likely will apply to/are qualified for, and add the close-by Ivies en route between.
Does your school have a college counselor who has helped you with a list of safeties and matches?
Are you interested in a rural or city environment? Small college or major research institution? Engineering or liberal arts? What is your GPA? The more details you can provide, the more helpful CC can be in suggesting an itinerary.
This is a very ambitious trip nearing on impossible without a car. If you want to rely on flights and public transportation limit your trip to NY, Boston, Philly and DC.
easier to shop cities. Lots of options in Boston. Fly or train to NYC. Train to Philly with possible stop at Princeton. Train to DC and hit DC areas. Schools outside of cities will be difficult on mass transit.
As the mom of a D who just went through the process (and visited over half of the schools you named above in your original post) I strongly suggest that you make time to see safety and match schools and not just look at the reach ones. Some of the matches and safeties may consider demonstrated interest.
That’s too many schools to visit in a week or even two. Try to pare down your list by researching the schools and figuring out which ones appeal to you the most.
It’s true that most people would drive to visit colleges, but I will tell you that my daughter and I traveled to a bunch of those schools by train and bus and it can be done. But it’ll take more work to research the routes and schedules. Good luck!
@GnocchiB For my college preference, I don’t prefer rural. And I am interested in both national universities(fairly small) and LACs. My Last year’s and current GPA is 4.0 because my school only offers AP Spanish. It’s a small private school with about 150 high school students. I self studied AP world history last year and got a 5. Also, I just took the TOEFL since I am international and got a 108(Just okay). I’m the secretary and Treasurer of the Student Association of my school. And I help my peers with math tutoring which is like one of my community services.
Agree that you need to cut down the schools on your list to a manageable number. The most we ever did in a day was 2 schools. Otherwise they all will start to run together in your mind.
I would take out the Ivy schools you don’t plan to apply to and add in some safety schools. It is so important to find a couple of safety schools that you would be happy to attend.
Can u guys list some schools in those areas that would be considered safety based on my information? I probably won’t apply to LACs for safety. Would Penn state be considered one?
As a Chinese national you have to be very strategic about where you apply. Chinese students that are American citizens are overrepresented at many of the colleges on your list, so as an international your hill is much steeper to climb. Boston College is a good choice, though.
If you don’t want a rural school why are Colgate, Cornell and Hamilton on the list? While not rural, Swarthmore, Vassar, Amherst, Haverford and Wesleyan are not urban.
You will be a strong candidate for a number of schools. Ivies/top 20s will be reaches as they are for almost everyone.
Just looking at the original list you posted, here are some “if you like X you may like Y” thoughts off the top of my head - other posters will have additional opinions.
I’m assuming you are a male so not going to suggest women’s colleges (Wellesley, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Barnard).
Trinity College (CT), George Washington/American (DC), Temple/Drexel (PA).
@OnTheBubble Thank you for your advice. Unfortunately it’s arduous for Chinese students to get into almost every prominent university anyway. And then for the location issue it’s pretty complicated. If I go to a LAC, I will most likely go to a national university for graduate school afterwards. In my opinion, location would not matter that much in this case. Of course suburban would be more ideal since resources and opportunities are closer( like The Claremont Consortium which are all 45 minutes from LA). And if I go to a national university I would also prefer suburban or mid-sized city like UCB which is about 45 minutes drive from San Francisco.