We will be in the Washington, D.C. area in the next week or so and would like to visit American University along with George Washington University. We have followed the directions for arranging for a day visit that are listed on the school’s website. Three separate emails have been sent over the last three weeks to request a visit. When we didn’t receive a response to the first two emails, my son called the Assistant Director of Admissions who my son had met previously in an area interview. He gave my son the admissions number, which we called. We were then directed to do exactly as we had done before and resubmit the same form. Still no response.
How do we get a visit at this point?
We live on the West Coast, so this not a visit we can make at just any time. Of all the schools we’ve worked with, we’ve never seen such a lack of responsiveness.
When my son visited American, I am pretty sure he just showed up. I would call them again and ask for confirmation that they received your form. Another suggestion would be to print out the form in a pdf and email it to them. Honestly, we love the school academically but the administration can be a crap shoot.
I’ve emailed the form to them three times. I called again today and they suggested I send the same form for the fourth time. I was also invited to call back again tomorrow (after being on hold for 11 minutes) to talk with the person who coordinates Friday visits.
I am glad to hear that you love the school academically. It’s one of my son’s top choices as he is very interested in foreign service. The fact that they have a sailing team doesn’t hurt either.
Maybe we will just show up. I think I’ll have him try contacting a department directly as well.
My DS handled all of the visit reservations for American through the online portal. He had no issues at all.
I just emailed yesterday requesting a Day Visit (2 weeks from now), will let you know my experience with this.
I received a response this morning, and the admissions office was able to fulfill my request and offered me classes within my intended major! No issues at all.
Update: received an email this morning saying they are unable to accommodate my request as they are booked “the entire month of April”. Asked if I wanted to be added to the waitlist. Luckily AU’s class schedule is public; will go sit in on a class myself.
Update: I called Admissions again, was placed on hold for 11 minutes, and finally spoke with a young woman who promised to follow up on our request. We had a response the next day and have a visit arranged for this week.
Thank you for the ideas. Because our visit only includes a tour, lunch, and one class, my son is going to approach the professor after class and see if he/she has the time to talk or if there is someone else in the area of his major that he can talk to. Now that he has been to a few schools, he’s getting bolder in seeking out the information that he needs.