<p>I asked my son (a freshman) if he was looking forward to Thanksgiving break, and he said not really, that he actually liked being at school, not that he didn't like being home too. I'm sure he added that for my benefit. :D</p>
<p>It got me to thinking as to how we have been so lucky with his school choice, and if there was there more than luck involved. I know a lot of families haven't been so fortunate, and some of the problems are completely out of their control, such as having a problem roommate. </p>
<p>There are, however, factors we can control. For instance, if you have a child prone to homesickness, a cross country college selection would probably not be suitable.</p>
<p>My tip is to explore several schools including some that may be just outside the student's comfort zone. </p>
<p>My son had wanted to attend UVA since elementary school, and was reluctant to consider at any other schools. We encouraged him to at least look at other schools since this was such an important decision. He toured several different types of schools, from LAC's, to large private schools, to small public schools. We also felt it important that he consider different types of locations; from metropolitan to rural.</p>
<p>In the end, this cemented his decision to attend UVA, but it also helped him realize that there were other schools that he could be happy attending if he wasn't accepted there.</p>
<p>I would love to hear what you think are the most important factors in assuring a good college experience, especially as a new senior class is finalizing their school lists.</p>
<p>We went right by insisting on an overnight visit, including attending classes.</p>
<p>There is a lot of emphasis on this board about "visiting" campus. Is a visit the tour, spending a few hours, or an overnight? We insisted that our sons spend an overnight and attend a few classes at their top 2 schools. They had already visited these schools more than once, taking the tour and attending info sessions. Both sons changed their minds about their top choice schools after spending an overnight on campus. They had been warned by the son of a family friend not to judge the school by the student host. One son will graduate this spring the other, like coronax2's son is a content freshman.</p>
<p>At present we have a college fresh. and soph., boys. One is at a large main campus state u. and one is at a small private college. The priorities were different for each for a successful college experience. One saw the large state u. main campus and knew that was exactly where he wanted to be. He is very happy there and with their program and academics such as the diversity of classes and selection. The other son, also an athlete, wanted to add varsity Div. 1 sports to his college education.Therefore, his college choice involved finding a coach who he was compatible with and who liked my son and wanted him on the team. This was easier said than done. It was really difficult to find a coach who would use my son as a starter as he did not have a state or national ranking, only a district ranking and with freshman playing opportunities on tennis teams rare and often non exsistent. There are so many foreign players on varsity college teams these days and they are good players. Secondly, this son really wanted to give the private college route a try. We have 4 kids and our older ones also attended large universities.After spending so much time on c.c. I was convinced these smaller schools have much to offer also such as smaller class size and more interaction with profs. with less competition and therefore more chances at good job placement. I was able to influence this last son as to the benefits of a smaller private college. He is really happy with his choice. Not only has he become a valued member of his college sports team and enjoys the training and matches, but has become acquainted with everyone in his major. He has been asked to help with paid research in his major and is involved in other campus activities. I would say this choice has resulted in his blossoming as a young adult.</p>
<p>It depends so much on your kid. My D visited about 25 colleges in making her decision; some were just drivebys since she didn't like something once she actually saw the campus. She actually interviewed with 6 colleges and applied to five; two of the colleges she rejected based on the interview. She's quite happy at Reed and will graduate in June (thesis permitting!).</p>
<p>My son looked at what he wanted to do--engineering--and applied to MIT and CalTech without having visited either, much less doing an overnight. He had visited MIT at age 12, but that was a social visit with his uncle, so I wouldn't count that (although that <em>was</em> when he decided he wanted to work at the Media Lab, where he's currently happily doing some research). He felt that there was no point in visiting, since it was all about his fellow students (notice that he didn't say professors) and that he wanted to be in that particular environment. He's alternately miserable and happy at MIT--depending on how many problem sets and tests he's got and how his Media Lab projects are going--and also plans to graduate in June. (He's always enjoyed complaining about his academic environment, so I discount a lot of the "miserable"ness...)</p>
<p>My son, now a college junior, never wanted to plan for college, talk about college, or visit colleges when he was in high school. He visited only two campuses (both more-or-less at gunpoint) and applied to only those two schools (his flagship state university and one less selective university a couple of hours away). He completed the applications at the last minute (also at gunpoint) and never discussed them again. If anyone brought up the subject of college, he would say "I don't want to talk about it."</p>
<p>My take on all this was that he was having a hard time facing the fact that he was going to go to college and was very nervous about the whole prospect. I seriously expected that he would be miserably unhappy once he started college and would decide to come home and do his first two years at the nearby community college (or simply go back to his old job in a retail store, which he liked very much).</p>
<p>Then he arrived on campus (the flagship state university). He was fine there from day one and has been ever since.</p>
<p>Go figure.</p>
<p>My daughter, now a high school senior, has been talking about, planning for, and visiting colleges more-or-less continuously for the past two years. Maybe I should start worrying...</p>
<p>Marian -- I hear you. My son's response to the whole college-selection process has been, "Huh? What?" Because of his CollegeBoard scores, he's been tapped for a program at UWashington called "Emerging Leaders in Engineering." He's been invited to campus for special programs, has met some students and faculty, and he's been invited to apply for "special" scholarship programs. Every time he goes to the Dub he gets more nervous about it (not that he can articulate that...). Last week we spent a day at the University of Portland, a pretty-well-regarded private regional bachelors/masters school, and he had a great time. He still views Caltech, Rose-Hulman, Olin, and Harvey Mudd as his top choices, but I think UP might have just passed UW -- despite not having near the breadth of engineering coursework available, or the reputation. There's a pattern here -- I think junior is a little freaked out by really big schools. All of his favorites are small (although it would be hard for me to think of Caltech as "warm and friendly" -- he thought "these are my people" after our visit). </p>
<p>Anyway. He'll probably decide to go to Ohio State or Arizona State and love the huge campus. Kids. What can you do?</p>
<p>At the risk of being accused of sexism - it is interesting that so much of this falls down gender lines. Maybe it is the shopping vs buying thing, there are very few items my husband and son would willingly shop for - gadgets, electronic gear, maybe cars - everything else is buying only. College comes under the buying category.
Marian also may have a point about leaving home - many women I know, myself included, handle stress by ruminating, researching, planning - "shopping" in a sense. Guys tend to not want to talk about anything, never mind something as stressful as leaving home.</p>
<p>My son has been happily "shopping" since last winter, so it can't be completely gender-based. We've visited 20 campuses on 4 different trips. We never tried to see more than one in a day and kept notes on each. I expect he'll want to do some overnights before the final decision.</p>
<p>I will say that I want to talk about it more than he does (another good reason to hang around on CC), but he's getting really excited as it gets closer to decision time.</p>
<p>I think visiting is completely overrated. Drive-by, afternoon-and-tour, or overnight -- all it gives a kid is a bunch of extremely vivid, extremely random information. An impression that can be "accurate" (in the sense of predicting how the kid would feel if he or she spent real time there) or not.</p>
<p>When I was 17, my least successful visit was to the college I wound up attending. After I had been there a month, I couldn't imagine loving anyplace more, and I still can't. My daughter had a disasterous visit to the college she is now attending quite happily -- two days of fighting with her mother nonstop. She wrote off one school that would have been perfectly great for her because the tour guide was too jock-y/frat-oriented (at a school with fairly minimal athletic and fraternity culture by any objective standard). Her entire friendship circle crossed one fine LAC off their lists because two of them went to a class there where they thought people made dumb comments.</p>
<p>What's important is their attitude. The vast, vast majority of schools we discuss here offer a wide variety of great experiences to kids of different interests and inclinations. If the kid goes in expecting to find a good niche (and realistic about what a good niche means), the kid is likely to be happy. Of course, a good visit helps create a good attitude, but visiting stinks as an evaluation tool.</p>
<p>I too have a son who would have been happy as a clam at our flagship state university and would not have even bothered applying anywhere else if he had not been urged (forced) to. He thought about applying to a few more selective schools out of state but gave up on that once he realized all the work involved (essays, interviews, visits) to get into selective colleges, and in the end, he only applied to 2 other schools that he knew were on top of my list and that I had felt best met his needs in different ways (large state university, small local LAC, mid-sized out of state university). He actaully ended up choosing the OOS (my top choice for him) but only after we did a visit after he was accepted and had received a decent aid package that put it in the running financially. </p>
<p>I should also add that we were also looking at colleges quite differently from most families due to S having mild Asperger's and I at least was looking at some factors that most males (certainly not S) probably would not have, in order to come up with different kinds of "best fits" for S to consider. </p>
<p>And although my S is probably an extreme example it still illustrates the whole gender aspect -that gender plays a big part in both the ease or stress of the selection process and the student's happiness at the college they end up at; I would also agree with what cangel said about the "shopping vs buying" aspect and in large part I think this very much reflects the differences in the socialization of girls and boys in our society; females have been brought up to be the primary consumers for many products where there are literally dozens of choices and thus have been taught beginning at a very young age to focus on the very minute details and differences between them especially for products where the primary difference is merely one of individual preferences. </p>
<p>Related to this, I think that males tend to take a more pragmatic view towards both shopping and their college education and often see both the products they purchase (other than their "toys") and their education as a means to an end (why else would duct tape, for example, be able to be used in a million ways by guys?), whereas females are more into the details and the entire "process" aspect of both shopping and their educations. </p>
<p>As a result, perhaps males are better able to "make the best" of wherever they end up? In S's case, I am sure that part of why he is happy where he's at, is because he did not have specific expectations or preferences going in other than in a very general sense (ie large city vs rural, availability of certain ECs etc) and therefore doesn't really know what he is missing or that he even is missing something by not going somewhere else! (again, S being the extreme example)</p>
<p>Forgot to add cost was always a top concern for our family. We are in a situation where we would pay full freight for all 4 of our children if they went to a top or prestigious university. This doesn't mean we are rich or take extravagant vacations. I have bought specials from the supermarket and clearance rack to save for our kids education. And of course, it's fine for a school's policy to be to provide a free education for students of low income families.But we are not comfortable with this policy. We have worked hard and long hours to save what we could and all our kids are aware of debt. They were all attuned to our nod, that this or that was a college we could afford for them. Time will tell but hey? what's the difference? You can either give them a house down payment or spend it on a prestigious education.We prefer the former. Now , this is just our circumstances.</p>
<p>"All of his favorites are small (although it would be hard for me to think of Caltech as "warm and friendly" -- he thought "these are my people" after our visit)."</p>
<p>Both my kids had the same feeling after our visit - even my non-science kid! They also really liked the honor code.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>(why else would duct tape, for example, be able to be used in a million ways by guys?)<<</p>
</blockquote>
<br>
<p>Sorry, I must diverge for a moment - we are having a moderate sized Christmas party, and DH and I were doing some preliminary planning for decorating Sat. We were trying to decide if we could affix some berry trees to candlesticks, and his response to how to do it was "double up some duct tape". About ten minutes later, son was discussing how to repair his PSII - you guessed it, duct tape. Later that same day we were back to decorating, mounting some wreaths in the front windows - you guessed it again - duct tape, although i balked this time, they will have to scrape the glue off the windows ;).</p>
<p>1st son--"knew" where he wanted to go. We dragged him to several other schools and after visits, he changed his mind and chose a small, private U. where he was very happy.</p>
<p>D. looked only at a few schools, but applied to the only one that had her somewhat odd major. Very happy from day one.</p>
<p>Son #2: This child worried over schools. Looked and visited several. Visited his 1st choice several times and has been dissatisfied from day 1.</p>
<p>Bottom line. It's a crap shoot :). Or the "happy" kids would have been happy anywhere and the "unhappy" kids would have found problems anywhere. In my family at least, I think it's the latter.</p>
<p>Something about this thread makes me hypothesize that there may be "shoppers" and "buyers". I worried endlessly that my son was not interested in looking at schools, etc...(and of course was prey to the idea that there was something I hadn't done right that this was true). I had two friends whose boys were "shoppers" and quite obsessivly into college thinking/looking so that was my standard. Then, lo and behold, I discovered, through our GC and CC, that there was the "other" style of boy (or girl), who delays, postpones, is indifferent and then says "This is my school!" applies ED (or to three schools all considered equally "fine") and is done...(whew!!) </p>
<p>But then when I think about it--he was also this way about clothes, or colors to paint the bedroom...We'd go (reluctantly) to the store, walk in, deliberate briefly--decide and be gone....Now my daughter......it will be different I'm sure...</p>
<p>So maybe it isn't anything we did right--it is evolution at work....And we are the hapless witnesses</p>
<p>My S was NEVER interested in touring Us (nor was my D). He did tour about 10 because his aunt & I forced him to & D went with us to about 1/2. He never stepped foot on the campus he is happily attending until after he had already sent in his deposit & decided he'd attend (tho we did drive around the campus because hubby & I insisted).
He always said he could be happy at a number of schools & indeed he is THRIVING where he is attending. It is a large private but the engineering department is a bit smaller with "only" 200 freshmen, so he has a place he "belongs."<br>
I think it also helps that we have very close family friends who live only 20 minutes away (tho he hasn't seen them since before Move-In day in August, he will spend Thanksgiving day with them). It also helps that we've spent many visits in LA & the climate is very similar to HI. He wanted a big city & LA is a pretty large one. He also wanted a big enough school, so USC seems to fit that category too. We are grateful that they were very generous with merit aid so we didn't have to make tougher choices.</p>
<p>Our S has always been able to adapt wherever he's been "tossed," including when he was the ONLY new kid in 5th grade & when he was the only 4 year old in a special language program (everyone else was at least 1+ years older). I'm so pleased that he's never sounded happier to me or his cousin or anyone else. He's making tons of friends!</p>
<p>D is a HS junior & still not very interested in touring Us, so we'll have to see how things evolve. She did see a few when we toured with her brother, but she wasn't interested then either.</p>
<p>I agree with JHS, I think it is about the attitude. DS has always loved travel, new places, new environments. He is having a great freshmen year and his roommate's parents feel that one of the reasons their kid is having a great year is because of my kid. Of course, what they don't realize is that he always loves things at the beginning, be it a job, high school, a friendship group. I'm crossing my fingers that he won't get sick of everything by junior year. Of course, there is always study abroad to cure that....</p>
<p>S and H pretended they were on a golfing vacation.</p>
<p>Colgate- stunning golf course- award winning
Cornell- Ok. not too challenging
Bucknell- very lovely, some challenging dips and turns
Penn State- can't recall if they actually played
UPenn- no course , oh well </p>
<p>Notre Dame- Warren Golf Course- wow.....need I say more
Happy Freshman 'domer :)</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that most students are very happy at the college they end up attending. However, I agree with the OP that it is always a good thing for parents to encourage their students to look at a broad range of realistic possibliities open to them.</p>
<p>Our son had a very broad range of colleges on his preliminary and final application list, from small LAC, to midsized universities to the state flagship university. In the end he was able to ascertain that a midsize university combined the benefits of both the LAC and state university while minimizing their disadvantages as he viewed them.</p>
<p>Yep, he is happy as a clam 2-1/2 years later.</p>