It depends on the school. At Penn it was always right in the middle midterms, the school put on minimal programming, so we usually went another weekend.

It is a good idea to make a weekend visit to see your DC every semester. Facetime or messaging or whatever is not a substitute for actually being there to see how your DC is feeling.

I don't think that semesterly visit has to be during the official Family Weekend though. Other weekends would be fine.

Offer to take DC's friends out to dinner. It helps to understand who they are friends with and to watch that friend dynamic.

Just want to shout out the mom who took my kid out to dinner on family weekend, when my husband and I could not attend, and asked "do your parents hate you?" because we we were not there. She was completely serious. Fortunately my kid laughed it off.

I have 3 kids. The oldest 2 went to UMD and were only 30 min away. We just visited with them at other times because the campus was a zoo parents weekend. They knew they could come home if they felt like the odd man out but they never chose to. I visited a few times a year to drop something off and take them to lunch. If we’d been out of state, we probably would have attended freshman year but it’s a huge expense when they jack up hotel rates. Our youngest is going to a very small school 4 hours away. We will attend parents weekend for sure freshman year. Hotels in the area aren’t crazy and we feel like there would be little for him to do alone if everyone has visitors. But I wish parents weekend wasn’t so soon after we drop him off. Why do most schools choose September?

Try it the first year and see what you think. You can only really decide if its worth the expense if you have gone. Each school and each student is different - so what you get from it will vary.

I'd say it's worth it to go once.

I enjoy going to parents' weekend - it's a great check-in time with your kid. They haven't seen you in a few months, they are happy to see you, they actually want to get a nice dinner together, and maybe share a little bit of their campus and experiences with you. I rarely participate in any of the school-planned activities - I'd rather do stuff on my kid. I have found that the school typically slows down the level of homework around parents' weekend, so my kid usually has some time he can actually spend with me, versus other random weekends. Since my son doesn't have a car - he loves the fact that I rent a car and we can go shopping, explore the area beyond his school, just get away from the campus. For me, the time together has been well worth the expense.

My DC went to Michigan and family weekend was a big deal and a football weekend. We went 3 of 4 years and had a great time. DC would not have been too thrilled if we showed up on another weekend when other parents were not around. Plus it was nice to meet the parents of DCs friends.

Just discussed this recently.

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1327088.page#32186288

Totally depends on school, some have a lot going on and some don’t ( between my 2 kids I’ve had one of each.) Big benefit IMO is that showing up for parents weekend guest feel weird, tons of parents are around, nobody’s going to feel self conscious about it. But rolling in in on a random weekend when kids are just living their college lives can feel more disruptive, more pressure on them to feel responsible for entertaining parents.

Yes. We go and attend some of their off campus parties. Lot of parents to meet there. Did avoid the keg stands ourselves.

Are you the Chicago parent? J

Nope...choose another weekend. Cheaper and less crowded.

No, it is usually crowded. If you want to visit pick an off weekend.

If your student attends school across the country, is it worth the time and money to go to family day?