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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I strongly encouraged DS (Class of 2015) to apply and we visited, though he is not a fan of the cold so he was fairly reluctant to go. He's a cellist and I thought he might really click with St. Olaf for that reason and others.

We visited over the summer, which was the only time it would work for us, but we did an official student visit day. We drove 7+ hours one way to the campus, so it was a serious visit - not something done on a lark.

I have to say I was very unimpressed overall and DS was, as well. I realize many qualified students apply to St. Olaf, but DS was on target to be a National Merit Scholar and he had already earned state-level awards for cello performance. Maybe it's naïve, but I thought they might be interested in him even a little bit and put forth even the smallest amount of effort to welcome him. That didn't happen. There were maybe 50-75 students visiting (plus parents) and it was just a cattle call. DS did meet with a cello instructor who was very pleasant and quite accomplished, but DS was not interested in a cello major and the professor was not really interested in talking about anything else related to the college.

The biggest red flag for me was that there was zero discussion of internship placement assistance, career placement assistance, or anything beyond graduation. I had read about The Piper Center, and we walked by it on a tour, but it was not touted whatsoever. I asked one professor about it and she was very vague in her response. My impression was that this is where you go before graduate school. Don't go to St. Olaf and then expect to enter your CAREER field immediately after.

Our visit was so bad that I felt the college was probably not as bad as it seemed and clearly they could improve their recruitment. In the end, DS did not even apply. As we were leaving, DH asked why we had put forth so much effort to visit with virtually nothing to show for it. I thought he had a good point.

[/quote]
We had the opposite experience with St. Olaf. 
We attended during Minnesota Private Schools week so there was a large group. During registration DS had the opportunity to indicate subjects of interest where he wanted to meet faculty. He also marked that he was interested in football so we got connected with a math teacher, a biology teacher and the football coach. The faculty were open, friendly and very willing to spend time with him talking about their subjects. However, we didn't expect the bio guy to tell us about being an English major or the football coach to talk about playing the cello.

The football coach was beyond awesome and the reception they gave DS was incredible. They even had his name on a jersey and locker. When DS opened the locker there was a mirror that said "See yourself as an Ole"

If you have a bad visit, I'm thinking its more about your planning than St. Olaf's delivery.  St. Olaf was a VERY strong second choice for DS. He was torn till the last minute but when the coach of his top choice emailed him to apply ED he did, so he didn't get the chance to be an Ole, but the whole process led me to believe that would have been very happy there and they are a fine school.[/quote]

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