Visit far flung colleges or not?

Parent Cafe
1

Middle child is HS senior. Wants engineering, and wants a school with decent nuclear engineering, which limits choices some (he’s not locked into nukes, but wants the option, at least). Ga. Tech is #1 choice, others include Missouri S&T, Wisconsin, Michigan. We’re in the St. Louis area, so Missouri S&T is in-state (and close), the others, not…

He’s got a decent chance at Ga. Tech admission, I think (35 ACT, high GPA), but it’s a tough school. Missouri S&T is pretty safe. Not sure about Wisconsin or Michigan. (And while, at the moment, Ga. Tech is the clear leader if accepted, it’s not totally clear he’d choose Wisc. or Mich. over Missouri S&T, if Ga. Tech rejected).

Anyways, he’s had some degree of direct exposure to all 4, but in varying ways.

For Missouri S&T, we visited, had a tour, and then got about an hour+ session with a nuclear engineering prof that was just the prof and us. Our son was really impressed with the prof.

For Ga. Tech, he went there twice, for about 3 weeks each time, with Duke TIP, during the summer (most recently about 2 years back). So he saw the campus, extensively, and they may have given the TIPsters a mini-tour, but I don’t think he really got a full-fledged admissions style tour, much less anything focused on engineering.

For Michigan, he toured with his older sister in spring, 2016 I think, but the focus was on older sister’s interests - not engineering. For Wisconsin, we got a drive by look at the campus on a cold November day (around Thanksgiving) a year or two back (no tour).

For “demonstrated interest”-type admissions purposes, I’m not sure if he’s got it anywhere other than Missouri S&T. (I don’t remember if he signed in at the Michigan tour or just his sister.)

For purposes of an engineering-focused tour, I don’t think he’s done that anywhere other than Missouri S&T. And his general memories of the others are relatively out of date. I’m not sure how focused he was on any of the early occasions…

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So, we could scramble to tour one or more of Ga Tech/Mich/Wisc this fall. But they’re all somewhat distant, and not that near each other.

A tour would:
A) Help him firm up his mental images of them.
B) Possible cause some re-ordering of preferences (or not)
C) Give him a view of different engineering programs, beyond the one he’s really seen (at Missouri S&T)
D) Might help with the “demonstrated interest” factor of the admissions process

Last I spoke to him, he’s sort of in the middle on this - wouldn’t mind seeing some schools, but not burning with desire to do so, either. Days off are at a premium in the school year. He could miss a day or two if need be - his fall schedule is not that bad…

2

FWIW, U. Michigan had the best engineering specific tour we went on. They ended up being the bench mark in which she compared other’s school’s tours.

3

To add to your far flung options with Nuclear Engineering have you considered McMaster University in Canada?

4

Questions you and he should ask in terms of whether visits are of value.

  1. Are there characteristics of colleges that he will consider that can only be seen in a visit? Would he know what he is looking for on a visit?
  2. Do the colleges in question consider level of applicant's interest? See section C7 of their common data set or admissions tab on collegedata.com . No point in worrying about that if the college does not consider it for admission decisions.

Other schools with nuclear engineering:

Idaho State
MIT
North Carolina State
Oregon State
Penn State
Purdue
RPI
South Carolina State
Texas A&M
USMA
UC Berkeley
Florida
UIUC
UMass Lowell
New Mexico
Tennessee
Virginia Commonwealth

Note that Wisconsin overadmits frosh engineering majors, then weeds them out with college GPA requirements significantly higher than 2.0. For nuclear, a 3.0 technical and 2.5 overall is required to continue: https://www.engr.wisc.edu/academics/student-services/academic-advising/first-year-undergraduate-students/progression-requirements/ . Some other schools admit to a frosh engineering program; students may have to meet a GPA substantially higher than 2.0 or enter a competitive admission process to get into their desired majors.

5

We visited several far flung schools and I don’t feel that it helped us. When she was waitlisted it felt like a waste of a trip (although we had some nice family time). She got into 2 schools that consider demonstrated interest that she had never visited or interviewed. We then had to make a dash to visit before May 1. I would research as much as possible to narrow down the list then visit after acceptances.

6

My older son (computer science) didn’t get into any of the schools he visited, and did get into most of the ones he didn’t visit. We didn’t visit half the schools he applied to because he maintained that all dorms look the same, he only cared about the department, but he was too shy to actually talk to profs, and sitting in on one or two classes doesn’t tell you that much. He was fine with just going to the school with the best CS department he got into. It worked out great for him. He did visit the schools he got into which made spring senior year a bit hectic, but for him, knowing he was making a real choice at that point made a big difference. The accepted student weekends were well done. He got to see people from all the clubs, spend a night in a dorm, and have tours of the department, not just the regular schoolwide tour.

7

Michigan is big on demonstrated interest and as another poster said the engineering tour makes it worth the trip ( plus you get to be in Ann Arbor…zingermans, savas, isalita…etc… YUM!

8

I agree with the previous posters - the Michigan engineering tour is fantastic. It put Michigan at the top of my son’s list.

9

It looks like he has several good options already. They are not “far flung” relative to where you live but rather in relation to each other for visiting purposes. I suggest looking at the Wisconsin campus since it is different from Michigan’s and also great. Purdue might be worth adding to the list but with a nice short list I wouldn’t try to expand it too much. Consider his cultural comfort zone- the Upper Midwest is different than the other areas and his college experience is so much more than just his major.

Of course he will look at things online- courses offered/required et al. Now is the time to apply to several schools and spring is the time to revisit the ones he is accepted to. He can research schools and add applications without visiting them. Be sure you check on finances- affordability is a primary consideration. Be sure to only consider schools where the debt load will not be high and remember to never touch your retirement savings. Do not only consider costs, however. Some schools try to entice high performing students with better financial packages than other schools do.

Intensity does matter. This is something he will need to decide come spring. He may be up to the challenge if he likes the school. He may find other schools can be equally intense for those who desire that.

10

Looking at the US news latest ranking for Nuclear Engineering, the top four are Michigan, MIT, Texas A&M and NC State. That’s a pretty wide range of locations and settings.

Michigan- Big School, cold weather, mid-western, college town
MIT - New England State in Urban setting, Lots of other colleges in the area.
TAM - Big School college town, but near Big city (Houston), growing area
NC State - Big School, suburban setting, also near other major schools and a growing area with RTP

Also note, most of these have a research reactor on campus.

Good luck

11

We did a final ‘far flung’ visit to the West Coast in very early Feb after the rush of applications was done (and her Fall sport had ended). We felt like it would still be ‘counted’ as demonstrated interest in their application review b/c they had a Jan application deadline so it was just a couple weeks later.

It was an LAC and at the time had emerged as D’s top choice so she really wanted to make the effort. It was a quiet time to visit and she got a lot of attention. Two months later she was offered their top merit scholarship so it def. seemed worth the trip to us!! (Though she ended up choosing another college.)

X factor for me – I loved college trips with my daughter b/c of the quality time we had together. So if you can squeeze one or two in this Fall or even in Jan or early Feb – I say go for it and I don’t think either of you will have regrets.

PS – I’ll never forget landing in LA in Feb., getting our rental car, opening up the sunroof and, no lie, the song California Dreamin’ immediately came on the radio. We were gleeful and it felt like a magical winter escape!

12

You could visit after the acceptances are in. My daughter applied to several OOS campuses we agreed we’d visit only after she knew she was in. That worked out just fine, considering she’d visited both her safety and her dream school. So she knew where she really wanted to go to, or would go to if all else failed. In the end, she got into her dream school via early action, and we didn’t make the trips to the other OOS schools she applied to.

13

My older son was interested in CS so a west coast visit made sense to me. After dragging him around to four colleges over spring break junior year he said, all dorms look the same, I don’t care about location, I just want to go to the school with the best CS department. So we didn’t do any more visits. Ironically, he didn’t get into any of the CA schools and we spent April of senior year actually looking at some of the schools he did get into. At that point, while he still didn’t care about dorms, he did think it made sense to see the CS departments in person. Carnegie Mellon’s department did by far the best job of selling themselves and he loved it there.

Younger son loved college visits, but except for U of Chicago was looking at schools within 200 miles of us. So he visited all of them except UC. He actually chose not to visit it until spring because he wanted to see it at its best and not be influenced by lousy weather. UC was absolutely gorgeous in April, and it was a very tough decision.