We did not visit schools that my DS was absolutely opposed to going to; however, we did visit a few that he considered "safety" schools.

For those of you who think that the parents shouldn't come up with a list of schools, what you need to understand is that some of us have kids who have no clue what they want to study, where they want to go, or what schools are known for what things, yet they are wonderful students with a bright future ahead of them. In my DS's case, the only schools he had ever heard about were the ones that DH and I had attended, both out of state schools which generally accept kids with lower GPA's than his. I came up with a list of schools for us to visit, based on the size of school he wanted (large), and the stats of the students, and we did a lot of tours during his junior year. By the time we'd visited a few schools, DS was finally "into" the process and he had a better idea of what he was looking for in a school. He ended up attending his first choice, and is very happy there.

Don't criticize parents for helping to guide their kids; many of the children need the assistance to get started in the college-selection process.

My DD is a senior. We visited UVA and W&M the summer before Junior year. Back then she was not interested in colleges at all and had bad grades in sophomore year. The visits really helped her gain focus on academics and prepare for SAT. Spring break we visited Cornell. In summer we visited Duke and UNC-Chapel Hill. At that time, colleges became real and she started to get realistic. In the fall we visited Penn State and VA Tech, and the local schools. These school were not on her list, but I insisted on including them as her safety. She got accepted by Penn State in early Dec and we visited Penn again.
Now she is happy with going to Penn, even though she didn't even want to consider it at the beginning. We are still waiting for in-state schools but I heard it is hard to get into UVA or W&M. Between Tech and Penn is going to be a hard decision but I think she will pick Penn.

My advice for OP is, as long as the two visits served the purpose of getting him motivated, you can wait till summer to do other visits.

The fall is not too late. Too late to start but not to late to visit more schools. OP he will probably sing a different tune when classmates start visiting schools in the spring.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Love thy safety. You will need to insist that he finds a school - I'd say 2 to give him choices - that he likes (and visits!) which are admission/financial safeties. This is the first thing to nail down. Reaches are always more fun to ruminate about -resist this. Work from the bottom up.

Agree completely. Start with a list of schools that you can afford and that he is likely to be admitted to. Tell him he MUST apply to some schools on the list. He can choose or you will do it for him. If merit aid is important to you, visiting before applying is wise.

And I agree with PP that it is not too early. You want to visit campuses while school is in session and you want to make visits before EA/ED deadlines next fall. It's possible to do some visits in September/October 2014 if necessary, but it can be needlessly stressful to wait that long.

"You want to visit..." This is precisely the problem. It's not about the parent - it's about the DC. Chances are they will NOT be that interested early in the process i.e. before spring of junior year. Sure go look at a few schools, but these trips are only informational at best. Your child will probably not be that interested yet. Believe me, after seeing about two schools they all start to look and sound the same.

The kid also needs their SAT scores to have an idea of what schools are realistic. Some kids take them in January of junior year or March or June. Timing here is key. Take them too early and you risk scoring low. Take them too late and you won't know where you stand.

Bottom line. Resist the urge to run the show. We made this mistake with DC1. DC1 ended up transferring. We are letting DC2 lead and it is going much better. DC2 is picked and is applying to 7 - all 7 visited Spring break or later. Applied to 0 of the five schools we visited earlier.

I'm the "you want to visit..." poster. Yes, I agree that spring of junior year is the right time to make college visits, and that earlier can be a complete waste of time (depending on the kid), but I also assume that if you have a junior and need to make college visits this spring, you are starting to think about your travel plans now--especially if long drives or plane travel is involved. That's what I meant when I said that now is not too early. Now is the time, IMO, to narrow down the list and start making plans to visit schools.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Love thy safety. You will need to insist that he finds a school - I'd say 2 to give him choices - that he likes (and visits!) which are admission/financial safeties. This is the first thing to nail down. Reaches are always more fun to ruminate about -resist this. Work from the bottom up.

Agree completely. Start with a list of schools that you can afford and that he is likely to be admitted to. Tell him he MUST apply to some schools on the list. He can choose or you will do it for him. If merit aid is important to you, visiting before applying is wise.

And I agree with PP that it is not too early. You want to visit campuses while school is in session and you want to make visits before EA/ED deadlines next fall. It's possible to do some visits in September/October 2014 if necessary, but it can be needlessly stressful to wait that long.

"You want to visit..." This is precisely the problem. It's not about the parent - it's about the DC. Chances are they will NOT be that interested early in the process i.e. before spring of junior year. Sure go look at a few schools, but these trips are only informational at best. Your child will probably not be that interested yet. Believe me, after seeing about two schools they all start to look and sound the same.

The kid also needs their SAT scores to have an idea of what schools are realistic. Some kids take them in January of junior year or March or June. Timing here is key. Take them too early and you risk scoring low. Take them too late and you won't know where you stand.

Bottom line. Resist the urge to run the show. We made this mistake with DC1. DC1 ended up transferring. We are letting DC2 lead and it is going much better. DC2 is picked and is applying to 7 - all 7 visited Spring break or later. Applied to 0 of the five schools we visited earlier.

I wish I had taken more action in developing my own list of colleges. So with regard to the debate on another thread about where to "push" your kid, here's where I'd push the most. (Although the apps do need to get done, too.)

My dad developed my college tour. He did this by thinking back to the colleges attended by women he had dated, in the 1950s, no less, who had impressed him. My mom, the college president's daughter provided almost zero input based on some philosophy about not interfering in your kids' choices. We did add Harvard to the list because my friend wanted to apply, so my mom took us on the 2-day trip to Boston. In the end I got into a great college, but one that probably wouldn't have been my first choice (and my friend and I were both waitlisted at Harvard).

So I say, push your DC to consider more schools. He certainly needs some more good safeties. He can apply to some colleges without visiting, especially if he just needs to retool an existing essay. My own DC is currently attending a college I stuck on the tour at the last moment, which became DC's first choice after the visit. DC's college was in the neighborhood of another college on the tour, and the "add-on" approach makes it easier to broaden his horizon to dark horses (not to mention mixing metaphors).

Anonymous wrote:Love thy safety. You will need to insist that he finds a school - I'd say 2 to give him choices - that he likes (and visits!) which are admission/financial safeties. This is the first thing to nail down. Reaches are always more fun to ruminate about -resist this. Work from the bottom up.

Agree completely. Start with a list of schools that you can afford and that he is likely to be admitted to. Tell him he MUST apply to some schools on the list. He can choose or you will do it for him. If merit aid is important to you, visiting before applying is wise.

And I agree with PP that it is not too early. You want to visit campuses while school is in session and you want to make visits before EA/ED deadlines next fall. It's possible to do some visits in September/October 2014 if necessary, but it can be needlessly stressful to wait that long.

Anonymous wrote:We did a mix of schools. If you do a spring break trip you can visit some of your suggestions on your way to your DCs choices. Agree that you need to find a few comfortable safeties.

As for timing, I found fall of senior year way too late. My DC did one ED and 2 EA apps and those were due Nov 1 (and SAT scores for at least one had to be received by Nov 1 to qualify for EA and transcript requests had to be turned in to the school by the 2nd week of October). So most of the application list and strategy needed to be set by early October. My DC also did a fall sport so with schoolwork, applications and sports had no free time in the fall for visits. We did most in the spring and a few in the summer.

We visited a lot of schools but my DC is applying to 3 we didn't visit. If those are options DC wants to consider then she can visit in April.

I would have to agree. The fall is too late. We hope to get one or two schools in on Spring break and a few in the summer. DD has seven on her list.

We did a mix of schools. If you do a spring break trip you can visit some of your suggestions on your way to your DCs choices. Agree that you need to find a few comfortable safeties.

As for timing, I found fall of senior year way too late. My DC did one ED and 2 EA apps and those were due Nov 1 (and SAT scores for at least one had to be received by Nov 1 to qualify for EA and transcript requests had to be turned in to the school by the 2nd week of October). So most of the application list and strategy needed to be set by early October. My DC also did a fall sport so with schoolwork, applications and sports had no free time in the fall for visits. We did most in the spring and a few in the summer.

We visited a lot of schools but my DC is applying to 3 we didn't visit. If those are options DC wants to consider then she can visit in April.

Many schools do count interest, though, in admissions decisions and a visit shows interest. The most elite schools do not track interest, though.

I would not waste too much time looking for colleges until the summer after junior year at the earliest. DD and DS both were much more interested late in the process. Some things you just can't push it too soon. The time will come. Just be ready to of when it does - August before summer and Columbus Day of senior year is a great time to go.

Love thy safety. You will need to insist that he finds a school - I'd say 2 to give him choices - that he likes (and visits!) which are admission/financial safeties. This is the first thing to nail down. Reaches are always more fun to ruminate about -resist this. Work from the bottom up.

Our DD is still bragging about acceptance to the one school we put on her list. In the end she didn't choose to go there, but it was the most prestigious - so maybe it did some good for her ego to be accepted.

^^ I agree w/22:39 concerning visiting. Visiting a school after acceptance (and all costs are known) is very empowering.

He can always visit schools after he's accepted, there's no rule that he has to visit all of them before he applies. The important thing is that he apply to a reasonable number of schools within reach. If he really did fall in love with two schools, and they are within reach, he should go back in the fall and spend the night at each and attend classes and then decide if he wants to apply early. My DD fell in love with the first school she visited, visited a dozen more and never fell out of love with that school, applied early and was done.

The other thing is that its awfully early to insist on visiting schools. Most of his classmates won't truly start their visits until spring break, even later. So maybe back off and revisit when everyone else is visiting schools. A lot can change in the next few months.

My DS has visited 4 colleges and likes 2 of them (he is a junior). Because he likes these schools he is not motivated to visit other schools. But these schools are not guarantees by any means for him. When I mention visiting other schools, he gives the Goldilocks response: too far away, too hot, too cold, too remote, too urban, too big, too small, whatever. Should I just require him to make a list of X number of schools and agree to take him to the schools on his list? What number should X be? Is it ever wise to insist a student visit a school he claims does not interest him? One of my friends had a rule that the parents got to put a certain number of schools on their daughter's list, and one of the parents' choices ended up being her favorite. Bad idea?