For fun: first impressions of colleges based on tours...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My sibling ruled out UCLA. Cause “too many stairs.”

LOL - we toured many schools but the minute DC stepped foot on the UCLA campus, DC said, this is the one. I'm not going any where else. Campus is spectacular and the vibe is super smart, ambitious kids enjoying the laid-back California lifestyle.

Luckily DC got in and is loving life in Westwood!

[Anonymous]

My DD thinks Davidson is haunted, Georgetown and W&M too LOL

Incidentally she is at UVA, a similarly "old" school but she doens't feel the haunted vibe LOL

[Anonymous]

Mount Holyoke: Classic New England with a gothic vibe and an incredibly chatty tour guide

Smith: Reminded me of visiting my great aunt - fun downtown

Vassar: Lonesome

Hamilton: Rural and miniature??

Northwestern: Gorgeous beach, cute small city with Bavarian (?) architecture, ugly modern dining halls

Georgetown: Too compressed in a corner of the city

UVA: Horsey and dull

UMASS: Enormous, fun town, skyscraper library, lots of concrete and hippies on a hill

GWU: Seemed like a conglomeration of hotels

NYU: Too spread out

Columbia: Dark and shadowy in a way I cannot explain - like didn't get sunlight

Conn College: Preptown and small

Skidmore: Not polished -- seemed like a small progressive high school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Every college we toured: "We have over 200 clubs! There's a club for everyone! We even have a CHEESE CLUB!"

I think we toured the same schools. My kid likes cheese, so it was a line that worked, lol.

The year we toured with DS, all the schools mentioned having a "chocolate milk club"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mount Holyoke: Classic New England with a gothic vibe and an incredibly chatty tour guide

Columbia: Dark and shadowy in a way I cannot explain - like didn't get sunlight

Conn College: Preptown and small

Skidmore: Not polished -- seemed like a small progressive high school

Never been there, but that is my impression from campus pics!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid didn't like Williams bec/ it was raining when we were there.

It poured buckets when I visited Williams as a HS senior (back in the Dark Ages, yes). I can remember hearing the sound of the rain hitting the roof of the dining hall. I can remember the feeling of my boots sinking into the mud as we walked around the campus. Every other school we visited was bathed in glorious New England fall sunshine, with blue skies and leaves in crimson, orange, yellow. But when I got home, I told my mom that I really wanted to go to Williams. Why? No idea, really -- it just felt right. Loved my four years there and am still a loyal alum . . . though our class had a rainy commencement and has had many rainy reunions.

[Anonymous]

It's so interesting that some people will notice and fixate on a particular visual detail. I toured Haverford with DS, who liked it, though I can't recall anything in particular he mentioned about it. A couple of weeks later, I was chatting with one of his friends who had also toured the campus. This was our conversation:

Friend: "Remember the white room with the red drapes where they talked about the honor code? There was something really weird about that."
Me: "I know, right?"

Why the heck were we both so obsessed with that image? BTW, both friend and I attended colleges that pride themselves on their honor codes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DC quotes on visit a week ago:

Rutgers - “New Jersey is weird” (Yup but you don’t have to pump your own gas!)

Temple - “Edgy and kinda cool. Not sure if I want my next four years confined to five city blocks…” (Actually was way more impressive than expected.)

UMBC - “Where is everyone? School is in-person, right? Is this one big circle all there is? Where is there a coffee shop I can walk to?” (Answer to that last Q is none.)

UMD - “College Park isn’t that great. But it doesn’t matter I probs won’t get in anyway.” (Truth)

Yikes. Please tell me your DC is looking at schools besides these!

Yeeeesh! Just when I thought I found a fun thread where no one was gonna be mean...

DP. It's obviously not a fun thread. It may be a bit cathartic, though, for some parents to make snide comments about schools they don't want their kids to attend or that their kids have next to no chance of getting into.

[Anonymous]

^ It's funny when it's obviously a kid's random reaction, so many of the posts are curated put-downs obviously coming from the parents not the kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We toured a lot of colleges with our kid. Almost all were immediately and often illogically hated and these are the reasons why. This was in spring and fall of 2019.

JMU: the highway and bus system
VT: hokie this and hokie that all day long
CNU: The walmart down the road had the kitchen knife sets locked behind glass
UVA: hated the campus
URochester: yellow jacket mascot
Lafayette: tour guide referenced Harry Potter and a quidditch team
Marist: tour guide mentioned free tutoring too much
Cornell: everyone was walking and eating alone with airpods in
Ithaca: lots of blue and burgundy hair and black clothes, decided to skip the tour completely
Skidmore: there was some festival in town and lots of guys wearing skirts
UVM: too many beanies for a 60 degree day
Colgate:we literally had to stop the car because a bear was in the road
Villanova:kid misheard the tour guide and spent the whole tour thinking the school had 60,000 students, so had already dismissed it

Ok but seems a little harsh for CNU to be judged based on a Wal-Mart’s display decision.

My kid refused to get out of the car at Roanoke College because the buildings seemed old, after we had driven all that way. I was so annoyed.

You are the second poster to post about "refusal to get out of the car." I really can't imagine how ashamed you must be to have raised such a brat. If my kid did that I'd be refusing to help with college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We toured a lot of colleges with our kid. Almost all were immediately and often illogically hated and these are the reasons why. This was in spring and fall of 2019.

JMU: the highway and bus system
VT: hokie this and hokie that all day long
CNU: The walmart down the road had the kitchen knife sets locked behind glass
UVA: hated the campus
URochester: yellow jacket mascot
Lafayette: tour guide referenced Harry Potter and a quidditch team
Marist: tour guide mentioned free tutoring too much
Cornell: everyone was walking and eating alone with airpods in
Ithaca: lots of blue and burgundy hair and black clothes, decided to skip the tour completely
Skidmore: there was some festival in town and lots of guys wearing skirts
UVM: too many beanies for a 60 degree day
Colgate:we literally had to stop the car because a bear was in the road
Villanova:kid misheard the tour guide and spent the whole tour thinking the school had 60,000 students, so had already dismissed it

Yikes....How big was that colgate bear? Just planning a Colgate, Hamilton, Cornell loop and bears did not really occur to me around there. I was thinki g that was farmland area, not forest.

In 4 years I never saw a bear. If you walk near the pond, avoid the Swans. They are violent a**holes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Every college we toured: "We have over 200 clubs! There's a club for everyone! We even have a CHEESE CLUB!"

we have heard about the lettuce eating club at 3 colleges.

We heard about several squirrel watching clubs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Michigan - Dated. It was probably gorgeous in the 60s, but they need to spend some money on something other than the athletic facilities.

Purdue - Well kept/new. Kind of the opposite of Michigan in this regard.

Virginia Tech - Prettier than I expected. Well organized campus.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We toured a lot of colleges with our kid. Almost all were immediately and often illogically hated and these are the reasons why. This was in spring and fall of 2019.

JMU: the highway and bus system
VT: hokie this and hokie that all day long
CNU: The walmart down the road had the kitchen knife sets locked behind glass
UVA: hated the campus
URochester: yellow jacket mascot
Lafayette: tour guide referenced Harry Potter and a quidditch team
Marist: tour guide mentioned free tutoring too much
Cornell: everyone was walking and eating alone with airpods in
Ithaca: lots of blue and burgundy hair and black clothes, decided to skip the tour completely
Skidmore: there was some festival in town and lots of guys wearing skirts
UVM: too many beanies for a 60 degree day
Colgate:we literally had to stop the car because a bear was in the road
Villanova:kid misheard the tour guide and spent the whole tour thinking the school had 60,000 students, so had already dismissed it

Ok but seems a little harsh for CNU to be judged based on a Wal-Mart’s display decision.

My kid refused to get out of the car at Roanoke College because the buildings seemed old, after we had driven all that way. I was so annoyed.

You are the second poster to post about "refusal to get out of the car." I really can't imagine how ashamed you must be to have raised such a brat. If my kid did that I'd be refusing to help with college.

Lighten up, Francis! Appreciate the humor! Embrace the teenager vibe!

[Anonymous]

NP here -- thank you to everyone who has posted here. I'm enjoying this thread because (1) I can relate to several of the comments on here about specific schools, (2) I feel better about my own kids' strange remarks, and (3) it's hilarious! Thanks to those of you who can keep laughing in spite of some of the trying times in this process. Keep the posts coming!!