The trouble with college visits

Parents Forum
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<p>I think it is important to do an overnight visit at any school that your S or D is really interested in. We visited probably 7 or 8 schools with DS and another 10 with DD. Both then had an overnight visit at their favorite school. The overnight solidified it for both and both ended up attending the school they visited a second time for an overnight. </p>

<p>I’ll echo what many have said about tour guides making or breaking a visit. We’ve had many good ones but a few bad ones as well. It doesn’t hurt when the tour guide is “hot”. I’m pretty sure both my H and S can recall the name of the pretty little tour guide we had at Rice and that was six years ago!</p>

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<p>MacTessa2, we attended a large info session & various tours at Pitt this summer. They did a really good job organizing all the logistics. They had tours of the city, their upper & lower campuses, info sessions, etc. We also had a nice lunch. We had two student tour guides who were excellent. Also, if you attended this session at Pitt, your application fee is waived.</p>

<p>One thing I did notice after touring two ivies and other schools is that the ivies don’t even bother getting your name. I guess their attitude is we’re getting 20,000 applicants so who cares who’s on the tour. Meanwhile, schools like Emory are sending my daughter thank you letters for visiting.</p>

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<p>I agree with the above…but done in addition to taking the tour. The tours (if done right) are a great source of info about college history, traditions, activities, etc. That kind of info really can’t be had by only doing your own thing at a campus. </p>

<p>But, I do strongly recommend hanging out on the campus before or after the tour…see what the students’ attitudes are…see the “culture” on the campus…see what the kids are wearing…eat at the campus dining venues…explore the library…</p>

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<p>With 1st D we did the world tour, by the time we got to Wake Forest I knew we had gone crazy, 3000 miles from home at a school that wasn’t even remotely near her top 10 list, yet we were standing there Through good weather and bad weather, good tour guides and bad tour guides, big names and small names, but when it came down to it D chose the school she felt the love from, which came from her friends that were already there. It was the first school we visited:)</p>

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<p>we are also traveling hither and yon, and wouldn’t be surprised if the choice ends up being an hour from home… but feel better for exploring all options and adding some geographic diversity in this competitive area…</p>

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<p>We are planning some visits this spring to driveable (e.g., 6 hours or less driving time) locations. We won’t have ACT or SAT test results back, but we’ll have a pretty good idea of junior year grades and D took and did very well on the PSAT. While one never knows, she has always tested well, so for the 6 or so visits we’re planning, I think it’s worth the risk of the scores not winding up in the range they should be for some of these schools to give her an opportunity to check out small vs. medium and rural vs. urban schools and see if she has a preference. I went to our well-regarded state flagship (and hated it). D has made it very clear she’d really like to go to a smaller school, and I’m fine with her going that route, but she knows that she will only applying to schools where there is a possibility of some kind of merit aid. The whole college search/selection process is totally new to both of us.</p>

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<p>

Yeah, I was guessing that too. And the description of College B’s setting, though considerably less specific, made me suspect either Union or Bates.</p>

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<p>My daughter did not like one of the schools because of the hotel we stayed in. I must admit the hotel was pretty disgusting (I thought about sleeping in the car) - it really clouded her view of the college & surrounding area. And if Murphy’s law holds true - this will be the first college she is accepted to offering the most $$ - LOL :).</p>

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<p>My son’s first interview was intended to be a practice one, since the only reason we visited was that his friend liked his visit, so he was willing to go. Now, it is his first choice and I am fearful that, if he does not get in, it will because he is too shy and modest to sell himself and too inexperienced in interviewing.</p>

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<p>My big surprise came when S rejected a university that everyone thought was perfect for him after attending the accepted students weekend. He said he found the other students to be cold and socially awkward, and he felt as if he would turn into a person who never emerged from his room if he went there. He loved it at his first visit. Go figure.</p>

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<p>We did about 15 visits for my D (who’s counting?) , starting summer before Jr year. This was complicated – and exhausting – because she was essentially doing two parallel colleges searches, one for music performance and one for regular humanities. We looked at big public Us, small LACs, conservatories, you name it. Ultimately, after all that, she decided NOT to pursue a performance major and chose our enormous instate public U out of five very fine choices, including two Ivies. </p>

<p>But along the way, here were some of her assessment factors: </p>

<p>– She loved the Eastman School of Music (had she pursued violin performance) but refused to do the tour of the University of Rochester (Eastman’s parent U) and said she wouldn’t even consider it.</p>

<p>– She thought the U of Chicago was wonderful (but was afraid of her HS AP calc teacher – who turned out to be her #1 fan) and wouldn’t ask him for a reference. And you need a math or science reference for UofC.</p>

<p>– Northwestern would have been great for music OR humanities or a combination of both. She found nothing wrong with it. But it was too 'manicured and suburban." (This is a kid from the rustbelt northeast who likes a little grit)</p>

<p>– I thought Brown would be a great fit for her, and she did too, before visiting. Decided she wanted a little more structure than Brown’s open curriculum. (I think this might have been a wise, know-thyself, kind of decision)</p>

<p>– I insisted she at least LOOK at a couple of LACs, even though she was adamant that she wanted a university. So we visited Williams, a short hour drive from home.<br>
she loved it – but remained unshakable in her convictions: “If I wanted small and rural, Williams would be at the top of the list.”</p>

<p>I could go on, but you get the picture…</p>

<p>18 months of visits helped her refine her own ideas of what she wanted. The visits weren’t perfect, the schools weren’t perfect, but the PROCESS was invaluable.</p>

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<p>As an aside, I always wonder when I see something like “decided she wanted a little more structure than Brown’s open curriculum”. Why? Because she couldn’t trust herself to register for courses that might be out of her comfort zone? Because her intellectual curiosity wasn’t powerful enough to get her to ask an advisor to suggest appropriate science courses? Because it offended her that, although SHE might take a varied selection of courses (like 98% of Brown students), there might be a couple of kids in her dorm who didn’t?</p>

<p>I mean, really! If you think a broad education is valuable, but you need an external threat to get you to take a math, science, or foreign language course, then it’s hard to believe that you even belong in a serious college. And if you are offended by the idea that people should make their own educational choices without being required to do certain things, that seems awfully immature, too. But those are the kinds of terms in which students often cast their reaction to Brown.</p>

<p>As far as I can tell, there are really only three potentially valid objections to Brown’s policy from the standpoint of a student. I rarely hear anyone raise them, and they are not terribly strong:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Because there is no requirement that everyone take some sort of science course (or math, or English), there may be a dearth of courses designed for people like me. No Physics for Poets; no easy-peasy English comp. (I don’t think this is actually true, though, at Brown.)</p></li>
<li><p>I prefer a system in which everyone takes certain courses in common, so that there will be a shared frame of reference for everyone at the school. (Fine, if you are going to Columbia or St. John’s College. Maybe the University of Chicago or MIT. Otherwise, this doesn’t distinguish Brown from your college.)</p></li>
<li><p>I am afraid that Brown’s open curriculum will attract students who are not as broad-minded and intellectually curious as I, and who will limit themselves to one narrow area. (Yes, it may. Five of six of them. And they may actually be interesting people, too.)</p></li>
</ol>

<p>So what’s behind this common, knee-jerk reaction to Brown? Some sort of latent teen-age fascism? There have to be RULES! ANY rules! There are ALWAYS rules! Without rules, there might be CHAOS!</p>

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<p>JHS, your post seems unnecessarily defensive to me. orchestramom didn’t say her daughter “objected” to Brown’s curriculum; she just said that she, personally, “wanted a little more structure.” What’s wrong with that? Does everybody have to be the same? Some people like things open-ended; some function better without “the crazy you get from too much choice,” as Joni Mitchell put it…is that really such an egregious character flaw?</p>

<p>As I said earlier, I suspect my own son would be happier and do better in Hampshire’s relatively open-ended curriculum than he thinks he would. But that doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with him preferring more structure. This isn’t about right or wrong, it’s about what works and feels comfortable. </p>

<p>You refer to “latent teenage fascism,” but it’s not orchestramom or her daughter who seem to be thinking in authoritarian terms here.</p>

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<p>My daughter didn’t care for Brown, because she thought that a college ought at least have an OPINION about what makes an educated person. She opted for U Chicago. The upshot is that she occasionally likes to flatter herself that she’s a more rounded, “better educated” person than her friends at Brown. But a part of her also recognizes that although those schools seem to be poles apart, the students have an interesting affinity for each other and most of her friends could thrive at both.</p>

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<p>This is such a wonderful thread about the pros and cons, and funny and helpful things about college visits. </p>

<p>We all know it makes us crazy not to identify schools, so people are mentioning names so the readers can get an idea of what the poster’s experience was like and apply it to their own.</p>

<p>It would be a shame if the ID’ing of colleges becomes the focus of the conversation.</p>

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<p>I worried that my computer nerd would take nothing but computer courses if he went to Brown. However he ended up at Carnegie Mellon which thanks to a generous AP policy has let him take almost nothing but comp sci, math and physics. Oh well. </p>

<p>My younger son is looking at some places without requirements, but he’s the sort of kid who wants to be well rounded.</p>

<p>While I sort of think that colleges ought to have opinions about what makes one educated, by the time the curriculum committees are through with making the rules, I generally am not too happy with the rules. (It’s been particularly amusing seeing Harvard struggle with their Core Curriculum - I’ve hated both versions that followed what I had.)</p>

<p>As for naming names I’m sort of interested in seeing them. It’s been clear to me from other parts of CC that some people loved the Tufts guy that my son and I found so off-putting, while at other places people clearly had a different officer doing the info session.</p>

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<p>gosh JHS! I’m totally surpised at your reaction to my post. Yours are generally among my most favorite posts to read, and I’m not sure what I wrote to spark your comments. You are usually one of the first posters to point out when others have set up straw men, and yet your post is chock full of them. </p>

<p>For the record, my daughter really liked Brown (and applied, and was accepted), and the open curriculum was initially among its attractions for her. She wasn’t “afraid” of the school, or of making independent educational decisions, or of intellectual rigor. She didn’t “object” to anything about Brown and wasn’t “offended” by its philosophy, its students , or anything else about it. She also liked the Uof Chicago, which some might argue is Brown’s polar opposite. She liked a lot of schools.</p>

<p>In any case, my post was intended to illustrate, in a light-hearted way, exactly how irrational, insubstantial and eccentric kids’ reactions and rationales to schools can be. Just like many other posts in this thread. So I’m not quite sure why you chose to pick on mine.</p>

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<p>Since these visit stories are so amusing (and informative when colleges are named, although I understand reasons not to), I hope everyone actually posts at least some official CC “Visit Reports” because I have found them very helpful, especially for smaller schools where not many people from my town have been.</p>

<p>Although Visit Reports tend to be drier than the stories above, I do recall reading of a tour guide who mentioned she was transferring out and the Fairfield tour guide whose low cut blouse made a very negative impression on the parent (who did not mention her child’s reaction, which may have been similar to the reaction to the Rice guide mentioned above).</p>

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<p>JHS: I agree. My D has expressed a preference for distribution requirements. If she wants 'em fine, but why subject everybody else to them. It’s moot for us, since Brown isn’t in the mix, but she’s going to see Smith, which is similar. We’ll see what her reaction is.</p>

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I certainly hope your daughter – and other prospies - aren’t deterred from applying to Chicago simply because of that requirement. My daughter is the most un-math/sciencey person you could imagine, and she went to an artsy high school that didn’t offer AP’s or advanced math/science in any case. She did get along well with her chemistry teacher from sophomore year-- and he was flattered and eager to write a letter of rec for her. He also was a new teacher and it was his first LOR ever… it showed! (he meant well, but it was one of those generic letters, lacking in detail, that won’t really do for competitive admission). (My daughter did not use that letter at any other schools --nothing wrong with it, but it just didn’t supply much additional info.)</p>

<p>My daughter was accepted at Chicago despite a yawner of a LOR from the science teacher, and I don’t think that the letter hurt in any way. Chicago does allow students to submit supplemental LOR’s, and my daughter chose to submit one from her foreign language teacher, as she made clear on her app that she hoped to continue her language studies in college – so she certainly had the opportunity to supplement with info she felt more important to her application. </p>

<p>Anyway, the point is – a student really doesn’t need to have amazing letters from their AP teachers – I’m sure Chicago just wants to get a sense of the student from different perspectives. I just wouldn’t want any future students to be deterred from applying to Chicago for that reason. </p>

<p>(Also, my daughter chose option #5, “topic of your choice”, for her Chicago essay – in case anyone is deterred based on Chicago’s notoriously creative and quirky essay topics. )</p>