Although I enjoyed touring colleges with my children, the older two each did some visits and attended some accepted student programs on their own. I found this particularly beneficial for my son who had to fly and navigate ground transportation for a few visits. My thought was that if he attended school there, he would need to do it on his own for 4 years so it was a good opportunity for him to see the ease of getting to and from a particular school. In each of these cases, however, the school provided housing and sometimes ground transportation. I plan to do the same with my HS senior this year for some visits.
We visited few schools that we didn’t feel the surround area was not safe and D1 didn’t necessary notice. There was one school both D1 and her dad loved, but when I was walking around I noticed students were too serious and studying too hard. On one of first sunny days after a long winter, no one was out on the quad playing frisbees or just hanging out, and the library was jammed pack. They told me it was their midterm exam period. D1 ended up turning it down for another school.
As mature as your kid is, I think to have another set of eyes there would be helpful. Kids could be very impressionable , a bad host or one ugly building, could make him cross off the school. We would go with our kids to pick out a new car, one would think a potential 250K purchase would warrant more scrutiny. I did a lot of things on my own when I was growing up, but it didn’t mean I wish my parents weren’t there. They weren’t there when I moved in either because of emergency overseas business trip for my father. Both of us wished we could have done over.
I sent S1 on a college visit cross country on his own. It ended up being the one he “picked” and I saw it for the first time when we got him there for freshman drop off. My reasoning was that it OK because he would have to ultimately get back and forth for vacations on his own so it was a good thing to experience the travel piece before choosing the college. I love to do college visits but for some reason I couldn’t go on this trip.
I did all my own college visits without parents. My parents were working and I don’t think it was so common decades ago for parents to be escorting their kids. I didn’t deal with hotels because I was able to arrange to stay with students overnight on campus, which is much better than hotels anyhow for evaluating the school.
My kid was involved in a school activity where some college visits were informally squeezed in as side trips when they traveled. So there was a group of 10-12 kids on college tours with 2 parent chaperones–a lot of missing parents. I attended 2 of these college tours and I missed a third. Yes, I would rather have seen the last school, but it wasn’t convenient for me to be on that trip. Better the student visit alone than no visit at all–they are the one who will be attending the school.
I went with my dad. Road trip that was a blast. Driving 72 hours and covering 4100 miles in 12 days he was needed.
For the tours he joined in, but always brought up the rear. If it was a solo meeting or tour he would excuse himself. After I ask him why, he stated this is your decision not mine. I appreciated his take. I had a page for each college that I filled out during the visit and after we left I would list pro and cons of the University. This paper I shared with my parents and will be a resource I go to when making my decision.
Note for parents attending. Let the students lead the pack on tours and the questions during meetings. STAY IN YOUR LANE.
So far D has gone with me or my friends. But she’ll need to do some on her own during the fall/spring. She has traveled on her own before so it won’t be a problem.
When my kid visited three top choices as an accepted student, she spent the entire time on her own. I wanted her to make a decision based on her own perceptions. As far as initial visits, adcoms wouldn’t know or care, but I went along out of curiosity.
On the group tour D went on, they were asked to keep a list of questions/impressions in mind as they toured, and to pill out a page or two in their journal (just a blank notebook) as soon as possible after each tour. This list included things mentioned above, like the surrounding area, meals in the caf, student activities on the quad, etc. When D first came home (very sleep-deprived and worn out) she thought that one school that I thought she’d have liked wasn’t for her. Later, when she was rested up, she reread her notes on that school and realized she’d been impressed with everything about it. She ended up applying and being accepted, and it remained one of her top choices right up until the end. I don’t think H or I could have been any more thorough in our observations than she was.
But the brings up an important point-if you’re going to tour a whole bunch of schools at once, it’s not a bad idea to write down your opinions for later reference, or you might not recall which was which or why you prefer one over the other.
A friend of mine has a rising junior and he is interested in applying to our alma mater. My piece of advice to her - which I will repeat to anyone here whose kid is considering a school parents attended - is to let a legacy kid do a tour by himself so his impressions and observations are not “tainted” by parents’ memories or warm fuzzies.
We went with my kids on the legacy tour, but walked around campus on our own while they did the official tour.
Back when I was in h.s. I flew out and went on the visit alone.
Both my daughters applied to my alma mater, both were accepted, neither went on an official visit, and neither attended; I graduated from the state flagship, which is 15 miles from our home and whose campus they had already spent much time on. I didn’t particularly encourage them to attend; I thought they’d prefer smaller schools, which both ended up at.