What school dropped off the list because of your visit?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I disagree with everyone claiming visits are a waste of time. Perhaps people are saying this now...because they can’t visit? Consoling themselves?

We started out with a long list of possibilities, and the visits really helped us narrow that down:

How did we like the trip from home?
How was the food in the dining hall?
The dorms?
The distances between things on campus?
Safety of the surrounding neighborhood?
Were there Dining/shopping options nearby?
A shuttle to the airport or shopping?
Any wow features? (We saw a farm, lakeside Field station, ice cream shop run by the Ag students, equestrian center, arboretum, waterfront)
How did the kids interact on campus?
How did they dress?
Were faculty generous with their time?

These are just some examples, but they helped my child figure out whether she would be comfortable in her new home.

12:41 here. Thank you. For all of you claiming tours are pointless and a kid's stats alone will narrow the field, that's fine for you. Some kids want to get a sense of whether they like a campus before applying somewhere, and there is nothing wrong with that. If you have the time and the schools are in driving distance, why not go see them? My child wanted to visit the colleges before applying (it was not me pushing this) given that she had never been to a college campus, and she knows a lot of seniors who applied to schools sight unseen and are visiting now to help decide where to go. Quite a few applied to schools they say they would not have bothered with had they seen the campus first. The tours clarified things for my child and narrowed her list further (and certainly did for me when I was looking myself). The virtual tours and online experiences do not convey the scale of a campus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I disagree with everyone claiming visits are a waste of time. Perhaps people are saying this now...because they can’t visit? Consoling themselves?

We started out with a long list of possibilities, and the visits really helped us narrow that down:

How did we like the trip from home?
How was the food in the dining hall?
The dorms?
The distances between things on campus?
Safety of the surrounding neighborhood?
Were there Dining/shopping options nearby?
A shuttle to the airport or shopping?
Any wow features? (We saw a farm, lakeside Field station, ice cream shop run by the Ag students, equestrian center, arboretum, waterfront)
How did the kids interact on campus?
How did they dress?
Were faculty generous with their time?

These are just some examples, but they helped my child figure out whether she would be comfortable in her new home.

With the possible exception of your last item, I've never seen a more superficial list in my life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why do NOVA posters insist that "nobody" can get into UVA from NOVA? According the SCHEV UVA accepted more than a third of FCPS applicants and a similar number from Arlington, Alexandria and Loudoun. That's a lot of nobody.

New poster here - the SCHEV data is really illuminating and I think most people don’t know it exists. It definitely proves high numbers of kids getting into UVA, VT, JMU etc as you mention. I looked recently at data for the NOVA counties for all those schools and compared with some of the smaller VA counties. In every case more students admitted and higher percentages admitted from NOVA all of which makes sense because there are more qualified applicants. Also JMU admissions rep said recently more kids from NOVA are admitted because NOVA kids tend to apply to more schools and go out of state more than other parts of Virginia so they already know not as many will accept so they make more offers. The smaller schools with fewer slots (UVA, WM) will be more competitive but this is not unique to Virginia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I disagree with everyone claiming visits are a waste of time. Perhaps people are saying this now...because they can’t visit? Consoling themselves?

We started out with a long list of possibilities, and the visits really helped us narrow that down:

How did we like the trip from home?
How was the food in the dining hall?
The dorms?
The distances between things on campus?
Safety of the surrounding neighborhood?
Were there Dining/shopping options nearby?
A shuttle to the airport or shopping?
Any wow features? (We saw a farm, lakeside Field station, ice cream shop run by the Ag students, equestrian center, arboretum, waterfront)
How did the kids interact on campus?
How did they dress?
Were faculty generous with their time?

These are just some examples, but they helped my child figure out whether she would be comfortable in her new home.

With the possible exception of your last item, I've never seen a more superficial list in my life.

Really? Those are all worth considering. I think it's silly and an over-generalization, but people rip on Vanderbilt and southern schools all the time for people over-dressing for class. If you want a walkable campus, the distance between buildings on campus will matter. Some students need to factor travel expenses into the decision, so the trip from home matters. I get the food probably shouldn't be a dealbreaker, but the rest are valid to varying degrees.

[Anonymous]

Maybe there is a difference between high-achieving students and everyone else. Generally, high-achieving kids want to go to the best academic school they can get into and their family can afford. Period. If the kid gets into Harvard, it doesn't matter what the food tastes like, whether or not the dorm is air conditioned, or if there is a nearby Starbucks. IT DOESN'T MATTER. However, if the goal is to get an average education at one of 3,000 schools across the nation, perhaps, food, dorms, recreation facilities, sports teams, etc. matter. Just keep in mind, you're paying for an eduction, not a country club. Sure, if you can have both, so be it, but it's sad if you're selecting a school based on comfort over learning, IMHO. But, to each his own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I disagree with everyone claiming visits are a waste of time. Perhaps people are saying this now...because they can’t visit? Consoling themselves?

We started out with a long list of possibilities, and the visits really helped us narrow that down:

How did we like the trip from home?
How was the food in the dining hall?
The dorms?
The distances between things on campus?
Safety of the surrounding neighborhood?
Were there Dining/shopping options nearby?
A shuttle to the airport or shopping?
Any wow features? (We saw a farm, lakeside Field station, ice cream shop run by the Ag students, equestrian center, arboretum, waterfront)
How did the kids interact on campus?
How did they dress?
Were faculty generous with their time?

These are just some examples, but they helped my child figure out whether she would be comfortable in her new home.

12:41 here. Thank you. For all of you claiming tours are pointless and a kid's stats alone will narrow the field, that's fine for you. Some kids want to get a sense of whether they like a campus before applying somewhere, and there is nothing wrong with that. If you have the time and the schools are in driving distance, why not go see them? My child wanted to visit the colleges before applying (it was not me pushing this) given that she had never been to a college campus, and she knows a lot of seniors who applied to schools sight unseen and are visiting now to help decide where to go. Quite a few applied to schools they say they would not have bothered with had they seen the campus first. The tours clarified things for my child and narrowed her list further (and certainly did for me when I was looking myself). The virtual tours and online experiences do not convey the scale of a campus.

If there's some schools within a 2 hour drive of home, sure, go see them. But from the posts, clearly some people have toured the country to see a variety of schools. I'm sure they had fun, and some were probably part of a larger vacation, but the idea that everyone should strive to do the same is not only impractical, but also unnecessary. If your student needs to see the physical campus of 20 schools before they send applications, they/you do not know how to make a college list. OTOH, if you just want an excuse to tour the country, so be it, but be honest about your goal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The negative vibes on my lengthy visits post are upsetting. These are my kids impressions of their campus tours and remember they were seventeen or so. My comments followed. The Wahoo who responded so negatively may not have read that my son who did attend law school at UVA loved it as I duly noted. His jab at the chip on my shoulder about W&M maybe did not catch that three out of four of my children were not impressed with their visit. The Duke responders should register that I was still in favor of them applying . This thread was about visits to colleges..not the schools themselves. Everyone kindly sip your wine and back the fork off.

I wouldn’t sweat the nutty parents on DCUM, particularly those that crawl out of the woodwork anytime UVA comes up. I commented once that my kid wanted a west coast SLAC, so didn’t apply to UVA, and a dozen UVA alums jumped in to say variations of « sorry your kid didn’t get in ». I think most people who go to UVA are lovely people, but there are alums on DCUM doing the school a real disservice by being so nutty.

you do realize that most of those people are in fact UVA haters, just looking to stir up trouble and give UVA a bad name. Most of the time, the haters are the ones that bring up UVA at all, doesn't take a genius to see what's going on here.

So you are saying they bring UVA up just to get people ticked off at UVA? Perhaps. Tough to say.

DP - No, it's not that they are "ticked off" - it's because either they didn't get in, or a child didn't get in, or, like us, we learned sophomore or junior year that there was no point in even applying because our kid didn't have the necessary stats. There's only 3750 slots and just under 50,000 applications this year. Many of the ED and EA slots went to first-generation, URM, Blue Ridge Scholar, athlete, low-income, legacy, spectacular TJ kids, so the folks you have just good, well-performing unhooked kids are out of luck. Someone worked out that there are 38,000 applications left for 200 positions or something impossibly difficult like that. So we pay taxes but never even applied in-state to UVA (DD went to another VA school). So the pattern I see is that when someone can take a potshot, they do, but it's usually sour grapes. The other flagships are much larger so there's less rancor, plus Virginia parents really want to take advantage of the in-state tuition unless they have adequate savings (which personally is very difficult to do for three kids at SLACs at $80K a year, like my own). And, due to Covid, more families than ever need to take advantage of in-state offerings.

I think they are saying something different. There are people on DCUM who bring up UVA in threads where it hadn't been a topic (e.g. discussion on Pomona College) and inject something like "guess you didn't get into UVA". They could either be an out-of-control pro-UVA jerk, or someone actually trying to give UVA a bad name.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would you move to a home/town you had never seen?

I did, for grad school. Didn't have the time or money to visit, but I knew it was the right program. It was fine.

This. It was the right program. College is mostly an ends to a means with some fun to boot. It is not your "forever home."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of these posts go like this:

“We visited William and Mary on a dark and rainy day. It seemed depressing, and my kid hated it. Later, we toured JMU. The sun was shining, and we had a great meal. My kid loved it.”

If your kid is accepted to both schools, most rational people would choose William and Mary, despite the site visit. And, if the kid chooses JMU because it will be easier, more fun, etc., you didn’t need a site visit to determine that.

Do you have kids in college yet? Because this is actually not at all how it goes. Many people, including my own kids, knew that W&M was not at all the right fit for them, due to several factors. Even though both were admitted, one chose JMU and another chose an OOS university. And guess what? Both are highly rational human beings who knew exactly where they would fit in and be happy. Rankings only trump all else for people who aren’t particularly self-aware.

[Anonymous]

What an odd post. Way did your kids apply to W&M if they knew it was « not at all the right fit for them, due to several factors »?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would you move to a home/town you had never seen?

I did, for grad school. Didn't have the time or money to visit, but I knew it was the right program. It was fine.

This. It was the right program. College is mostly an ends to a means with some fun to boot. It is not your "forever home."

Ends to a means?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe there is a difference between high-achieving students and everyone else. Generally, high-achieving kids want to go to the best academic school they can get into and their family can afford. Period. If the kid gets into Harvard, it doesn't matter what the food tastes like, whether or not the dorm is air conditioned, or if there is a nearby Starbucks. IT DOESN'T MATTER. However, if the goal is to get an average education at one of 3,000 schools across the nation, perhaps, food, dorms, recreation facilities, sports teams, etc. matter. Just keep in mind, you're paying for an eduction, not a country club. Sure, if you can have both, so be it, but it's sad if you're selecting a school based on comfort over learning, IMHO. But, to each his own.

Spoken like someone who had zero fun in college and definitely didn't get a top tier frat bid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe there is a difference between high-achieving students and everyone else. Generally, high-achieving kids want to go to the best academic school they can get into and their family can afford. Period. If the kid gets into Harvard, it doesn't matter what the food tastes like, whether or not the dorm is air conditioned, or if there is a nearby Starbucks. IT DOESN'T MATTER. However, if the goal is to get an average education at one of 3,000 schools across the nation, perhaps, food, dorms, recreation facilities, sports teams, etc. matter. Just keep in mind, you're paying for an eduction, not a country club. Sure, if you can have both, so be it, but it's sad if you're selecting a school based on comfort over learning, IMHO. But, to each his own.

Spoken like someone who had zero fun in college and definitely didn't get a top tier frat bid.

Collar-poppin’ toolboxes unite!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of these posts go like this:

“We visited William and Mary on a dark and rainy day. It seemed depressing, and my kid hated it. Later, we toured JMU. The sun was shining, and we had a great meal. My kid loved it.”

If your kid is accepted to both schools, most rational people would choose William and Mary, despite the site visit. And, if the kid chooses JMU because it will be easier, more fun, etc., you didn’t need a site visit to determine that.

I agree. There is so much hype about college now. Also if you go in a group tour remember that not all those kids are going to be accepted and attend. I also went to grad school without visiting. It was a very elite school and the one that accepted me with a scholarship so I went. Loved it.

[Anonymous]

I think tours are valuable in different ways at different stages in the process.

1. Very early -- to see a range of school types (big/small) and setting (urban vs suburbs vs college town) and see if kid had a strong preference. Some do, some don't. But if you do it's a helpful first filter for the list.

2. Deciding where to apply. If you have a lot of potential schools that aren't that different on paper -- have the program you want, you like the reviews and what you see online, same general range in ranking -- but you don't want to apply to 20+ schools then tours can really help narrow the list based on the quality of life/vibe you get on campus. I think this is most important for finding a safety and a couple matches you can love. IMO it's a waste of time to tour reaches and adds too much stress to the process.

3. After admitted to make the final decision.