Schools you toured that you were surprised you liked or didn’t like?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“ VT has a hulking fortresssy military vibe.”

Yes! We felt that way about it too. We were shocked because we went in expecting to love it and because DD wants a STEM major. Nope. I felt like we were crossing Tiananmen Square when we had to cross that big military quad.

I felt the same! We left early.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Absolutely loved Stanford.

-Mediterranean weather
-Spanish architecture
-proximity to San Francisco, Lake Tahoe
-palm trees galore
-non football sports culture

Stanford is very close to SF but not that close to Tahoe. It's 4 hour drive without traffic.

It’s not even that close to SF. It’s like 45 mins if you have a car?

Caltrain goes from Palo Alto to SF in 30 minutes- no need for a car.
As for Tahoe, it’s indeed a 4 hour drive but I can’t think of any peer college that can get you that close to alpine skiing (sorry Vermont doesn’t come close)

um Dartmouth has it own ski area.

Lol Hardly Tahoe

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of schools talk about honor codes, but we were blown away by St. Olaf, and how outside the dining hall (inside the building, but outside the cafeteria) were just piles and piles and piles of backpacks that students had left so they could go in and eat together. There was a collective agreement that their time there would be screen-free, and would be focused on connecting with other humans. And it was really cool to see that they felt comfortable just leaving their bags / coats / computers / etc. out in the lobby. It showed "we trust each other" in a way that carried far more weight than would be conveyed by a tour guide talking about the honor council or an honor code or something like that.

That sounds amazing. I posted previously that Carleton is high on our list and we will make sure to visit St. Olaf when we're there. Thanks for sharing.

Make sure you visit in the winter to truly get the vibe

[Anonymous]

Bowdoin

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“ VT has a hulking fortresssy military vibe.”

Yes! We felt that way about it too. We were shocked because we went in expecting to love it and because DD wants a STEM major. Nope. I felt like we were crossing Tiananmen Square when we had to cross that big military quad.

That’s a really off analogy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would like to have tours run like our HS has tours -- instead of going with one kid to points on the circuit, have different kids at various points. A STEM kid at that building, a drama kid at the that building, someone at housing, a club athlete at the gym, someone at liberal arts, someone in dining hall. And families can pace yourself. Spend more time at one place or another. Skip whatever you like. And instead of start times at 10 and 11 and 1 just make it open house style from 10;30 to 12;30.

Thats a great idea!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:lol like anyone is looking at Duke and UConn as possible schools. And Duke’s undergraduate enrollment is 6,800 kids hardly big.

What if you’re a CT student who might get a full ride there? Or there is a particular program that is well ranked at both schools?

Duke people are so arrogant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lower ranked school that doesn’t get a lot of love on here, but my entire family loved Rhodes. I was surprised myself.

Stunning campus, small classes and engaged teachers and students, great pre med to med school track, a service/volunteer requirement to graduate, friendly kids who are neither too conservative or too ‘woke’ seeming, and in an interesting vibrant city, Memphis. (And yes, we know there’s crime in larger Memphis, the admission tour addressed it and advises students on what areas to avoid). Dc thought she wanted a SLAC, but so many of them are in small, boring towns. This school really hit the mark in so many ways.

+1 It's a great school, and I know quite a few grads--all very nice and smart! I so think Memphis crime is a big issue that's not being adequately addressed by Memphis leaders.

Memphis & New Orleans ranked as the bottom two out of 182 cities for safety issues. Both are quite dangerous, but New Orleans has a lot of good attributes as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So interesting about the UGA folks. We had a bad experience - they asked everyone from out of state to raise their hands and basically said it's impossible to get in. Our tour guide wasn't great and the only time we could hear everything was when we were on the bus. Athens seemed cool but more homeless than we expected and the campus was charming in parts but seemed really, really big. I know it's a great school and people love it - we had high hopes but DS took it off his list after seeing it.

+1
We had a similar experience at UGA! Our DC wanted a large school, but with a more compact campus where shuttle buses aren’t necessary. VT checked all of his boxes.

[Anonymous]

Takeaways from this- (have just seen multiple people report in this thread)

Schools that surprised people in a positive way:
Pitt
UMD
Columbia

Schools that surprised people in a negative way:
Tufts
Carnegie Mellon
Duke

Schools that went both ways- both exceeding expectations and falling short for different families:
Chicago
Northwestern
VTech
William and Mary

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to comment that with all these colleges’ marketing budgets, it is baffling that so many can’t get the tour and info session consistently right. Should be such an easy thing to fix.

I have been on several tours where you could not hear the tour guide some or part of the time. Unacceptable.

I have been on tours where the group never enters a university building (this is post-Covid) except the admissions office. Unacceptable.

And on and on…

Same goes for admitted student days. Both parents can’t come because you are all booked up (top SLAC) so the donut-hole family can’t decide together on a 90k investment? Unacceptable.

Stuffing parents into a crowded room where they can barely move and can’t find where the coffee is because they can’t see it (top 20 National university)? Unacceptable.

This little things matter…

I feel the same way. It is like when I go to a hotel and it feels like the person who designed the bathroom has never used a bathroom before.

Tell me what makes you unique.
Train your tour guides.
Make it so we can hear tour guides.
Let us go in buildings.
Tell us how to eat a meal in a dining hall (extra points for a discount!)
Etc.

Huge pet peeve when I can't hear the tour guide because they talk while facing forward and walking. They need to be trained to stop, turn around and face group before starting to talk.

The tour guides at Penn State did the tour entirely walking backwards while speaking to us, except when crossing the street. Impressive.

But, yea, agree, some of the tours were annoying because I couldn't hear. They need to have a mic or something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bowdoin

Bowdoin is an attractive small school in a nice, but very small, town. More like an elite NE prep boarding school than a college, but, if the student wants small, then Bowdoin should be given consideration.

High-schoolish aspects include administrators/teachers who will call the student if the student misses class. Also, everyone knows everybody else & their business. And you will see the same faces day-after-day as well as the same social cliques. Nevertheless, strong academics and a good fit for a cliquish type student.

Did not like Bowdoin College because it was/is too small (fewer than 1,800 students) and all the admissions director/ass't director ??? talked about was getting Goat's Head Soup in a different college town in Maine known for its Somali refugees. Weird. We wanted to hear about Bowdoin, not Lewiston, Maine (home to Bates College).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tours can be a double-edged sword. In some ways the Covid kids had it best - no pressure to tour, no getting swayed by silly things like weather or a bad guide. OTOH I know of several kids that year that wound up at really bad fits...

Touring during Covid meant walking around empty campuses on your own. There was still weather, just nowhere to go to get out of it. Or to pee. Even so, it was more useful than virtual tours but, I'd prefer a normal tour with a bad guide anyday.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Absolutely loved Stanford.

-Mediterranean weather
-Spanish architecture
-proximity to San Francisco, Lake Tahoe
-palm trees galore
-non football sports culture

Stanford is very close to SF but not that close to Tahoe. It's 4 hour drive without traffic.

It’s not even that close to SF. It’s like 45 mins if you have a car?

Caltrain goes from Palo Alto to SF in 30 minutes- no need for a car.
As for Tahoe, it’s indeed a 4 hour drive but I can’t think of any peer college that can get you that close to alpine skiing (sorry Vermont doesn’t come close)

um Dartmouth has it own ski area.

Not in the least bit comparable to skiing in the Sierras

DP. Agree Sierra skiing way better than northeast. That doesn't make Stanford a good school for skiing though. Round trip to Tahoe is 7-10 hours on the road depending on traffic. Dartmouth hill is tiny but it's is a 15 minute shuttle ride from campus. It's very easy to ski a couple hours with friends.

Of course best school for skiing is University of Utah.

yes, but most people don't go up for just a day to Tahoe. But, if you go to the closer ski resorts, you could do a day trip to Tahoe. We've done it a few times.

CA really can't be beat in terms of outdoor activities. The weather is gorgeous pretty much year round.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Didn't like--

Duke, UNC or UConn. Too big, too much emphasis on sports.

JHU--I was hoping the rigor would appeal to DC but he just saw stressed out students.

Swarthmore--didn't like anything about the campus, the tour guide. It all felt very forced.

W&L-- I didn't like that it was next to VMI and had to deal with their traffic.

My kid is at W&L and there is very little interaction between the schools. VMI doesn’t attend W&L parties. You might see a few VMI students in town walking but in general they remain separate.