How to determine fit if you don’t visit?

[Anonymous]

We started with a goal of seeing schools before applying, but my DS got tired of the travel, so he built his list as a mix of places he knew he liked and some that looked good on paper. Once he received acceptances, we went to see 1 or 2 places from the latter category. That worked out for us.

[Anonymous]

Visiting was key for us because my DC didn't put a lot of time into researching each school on their own. We were surprised at some of the schools they loved and others that they didn't. If you can't go in person, there is a ton of info that can be found online through virtual tours, YouTube videos (lots of students have channels), TikTok, reading strategic plans, the school newspaper, podcasts about the school, podcasts by the students. etc.

[Anonymous]

This issue goes all the way back to Plato & his levels of reality. There is just no way you can substitute even the best virtual or 3-D experience for the real thing, no matter what Bob Guccione claimed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have visited some campuses that have either made my DC become excited about a school or made them reject the school. They know they was a mid to large sized school that is not too urban or in the middle of nowhere. They will probably apply to 15 schools and we can’t possibly visit all of them. A few have pretty low acceptance rates so we kind of want to make sure the application is worth it. In the other hand, I also think it’s good to see safeties bc DC does need to feel good about those, as well. How did you handle it if you did visits? We’ve already pulled out schools that are under 8k students, in the middle of a city or too hard to get to.

Try not to care so much about fit.

For a nervous or fragile student, maybe fit’s a big deal.

But, really, for a well-adjusted student, fit shouldn’t be such a huge thing. What matters is affordability, educational quality, access to the desired classes, access to jobs and internships, and that the school not be actively abusive.

But, if a decent school is an imperfect fit, that’s an educational experience.

Along the same lines, it’s important to tell kids that college is what they make of it and that they’re responsible for making their college their dream school. Maybe there are some extremely terrible situations, such as Black kids stuck at what turn out to be very racist little colleges, kids with arthritis who discover that cold weather hurts their fingers or woud-be physicists stuck in anti-intellectual schools.

But at most reasonably big, reasonably selective schools, there are all sorts of people. It’s up to the students to find friends and fun experiences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have visited some campuses that have either made my DC become excited about a school or made them reject the school. They know they was a mid to large sized school that is not too urban or in the middle of nowhere. They will probably apply to 15 schools and we can’t possibly visit all of them. A few have pretty low acceptance rates so we kind of want to make sure the application is worth it. In the other hand, I also think it’s good to see safeties bc DC does need to feel good about those, as well. How did you handle it if you did visits? We’ve already pulled out schools that are under 8k students, in the middle of a city or too hard to get to.

Visit the top choices and make sure they are top choices. Then apply. If you get in and think it's a contender (.matches profile for major, size and location), go visit.

FWIW, between the 2 kids, we visited about 15 schools (only one overlap as far as where they applied/we visited, the Ivy where spouse is an alum - eldest got WL, youngest pulled their application after getting in elsewhere ED)

[Anonymous]

We visited a lot of colleges, including admitted students day at several. Then DC got off a WL at a school we'd never seen and picked that one! Very happy there, but wow what a waste of money visiting all those other schools.

In the end, kids can manage to be happy just about anywhere if they get involved doing something they enjoy.