@simba9 I agree, squeezing Miami into an afternoon after the 2 hour drive from Denison is a recipe for not being cranky and rushed and not giving Miami a fair shot. The OP might consider visiting Columbus musuems, art districts, etc. in the afternoon and getting to Miami U that evening, then touring Miami in the morning, and doing Earlham (30-40 minutes away) in the afternoon, and then calling it a day. Or, do Ohio Wesleyan in the afternoon after Denison, as it is about 40 min away, and then driving to Miami U for the evening and touring Miami in the morning.
@wisteria100 Absolutely. It’s not written in stone yet. As others suggested, I need to see if schools are avail for tours during that time period. If not, then we will go at another time. We also want to make a trip to NC to see U of Richmond (on the way), Davidson, Wake Forest and Elon. Those seem to be the big state trips for us. After that, there will be visits scattered around the country to maybe one or two schools at a time.
@Midwestmomofboys Earlham sounds great, but sadly my D has made it clear she wants Greek life and a fooball team and for a school not to be too artsy (coming from an artsy kid). Ohio Wesleyan, on the otherhand may be worth a visit. Do you hear good things about it?
If you are looking at Miami, I would also suggest you look at Ohio University in Athens. They have Greek life, a football team (with an awesome band) and not too artsy.
At this point…
MIami is only scheduling tours through August 4. No weekends.
Kenyon has no tours from August 17-22. No weekend tour dates.
Denison is scheduling only through August 18 right now. No weekend tour dates.
The “no weekends” is for the summer…I have no idea what happens once school resumes.
@citymama9 Ok, then Earlham definitely off the list (is this the student who likes the idea of beautiful sorority houses?) On OWU, we once heard the adage that OWU was easy to get into, not so easy to stay, but that could be ancient history, given how much schools have changed in the past 20 years. Another possible one to look at around Columbus is Otterbein – we were there for spring season match, and there was huge Otterbein student turnout for an off season event – looking at the crowd, students seemed happy and the student body (or at least the ones watching sports on a spring weekend afternoon) were very low on the purple hair quotient. Otterbein is on the north east side of Columbus, and OWU is further north west.
Thanks again @thumper1 So much help here:)
@Midwestmomofboys LOL. Yep, she’s the girl who wants the beautiful sorority houses. However, we toured Bucknell and they don’t have typical sorority houses, but she still loved it, so there is still hope for her:)
Will research Ohio Univ and Otterbein. THanks.
@citymama9 I would also suggest adding Ohio Wesleyan to your list. Many good things happening at this school - we were impressed by their mini-grants and theory to practice grants and their global scholars program. They have some great new housing options too. We live near OWU and both of my Ds considered attending, but ultimately decided it was too close to home. Both of my Ds visited all of the Ohio schools on your list. They both ended up at Miami.
I regularly drive from central Ohio to Manhattan and it’s 8.5-9 hours (and Wooster would be closer). Not that bad at all. But you’d certainly want do it the day before any visit.
Wooster-Kenyon-Denison are close (45 mins or so between). Miami is OUT west near the border with Indiana, at least 2.5 hours from Denison. If you’re going out that way and want to add a LAC that has a similar feel skip Earlham and look at DePauw. Major Greek life, sports, pre-professional feel. But another 2.5 hours west. Or check out OWU on the way to Oxford for Miami, it’s sort of on the way, a little north.
If you don’t see scheduled tour/info session at any of the LACs at the end August, call the admissions office. I’d be very surprised if they didn’t offer some help.
I second calling the admissions office. That’s how we were able to tour the nursing school facilities and meet with a nursing advisor, in addition to whatever tours were going around. We got better information by calling ahead and getting it somewhat tailored to our needs where possible.
We didn’t look at the colleges you are looking at, but we looked at everything from state schools to private universities (all in Ohio). The only one that couldn’t accommodate us was a larger state school that schedules big tours - including specific colleges within the school - nearly every day of week. I’m hoping that one is tailored enough for our needs.
DePauw’s sorority houses are beautiful. I think it is where Kappa Alpha Theta was founded.
Alpha Chi Omega, too.