ChatGPT is great for mapping routes and time frames/places to stay. Did a big summer trip through New England using the plan AI created for us.

Doing some online tours. Might put him on train himself for some. Did a couple when school not in session. For some reason it feels depressing to me to spend spring break song this. Maybe it would be fun if the admissions weren’t so brutal now but it just felt like giving up the really small amount of family vacation time we had to visit schools that would more likely than not reject them.
I think we are going to focus on some of the ones where he might conceivably ED. We did that for older child — flew out by herself to visit one school friend was at, then her dad took her up to New England to visit 3 more in 3 days in September of her senior year. Oh and her dad also took her up to NyC for an afternoon in spring of her junior year to look at a school there. She liked the first one enough to ED so that was it—we had never even seen it. If she hadn’t gotten in, we were going to try some additional visits in December or after admits came in.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't forget about accepted students days/tours.

The college my DS ended up attending, we didn't visit before applying. But visited after he was accepted and it sold him on the school.

Zero judgment, this is a true question from a PP. doesn’t this risk being a waste of time working on college apps if the student doesn’t even know if they actually like the school? I know lots of people do it this way, but if visiting before applying is an option is there a reason why you wouldn’t?

With the Common App it really wasn't much extra work, and I'm not sure if these schools had anything supplemental, or at least anything that time-intensive. I guess I would have just been out the cost of the application.

We moved to the west coast but DC wants to go to school back east. I’m a single mom and could not get enough time off from my new job during the school year to do the whole campus visit thing. We’ll just do visits during the summer and then maybe quick extra-long-weekend visits this fall to the couple of top contenders. It’s not ideal and I hope DC doesn’t get dinged for not doing campus visits, but it is what it is.

Anonymous wrote:Don't forget about accepted students days/tours.

The college my DS ended up attending, we didn't visit before applying. But visited after he was accepted and it sold him on the school.

Zero judgment, this is a true question from a PP. doesn’t this risk being a waste of time working on college apps if the student doesn’t even know if they actually like the school? I know lots of people do it this way, but if visiting before applying is an option is there a reason why you wouldn’t?

Don't forget about accepted students days/tours.

The college my DS ended up attending, we didn't visit before applying. But visited after he was accepted and it sold him on the school.

Anonymous wrote:Summers, spring breaks, long weekends, etc. We just took every opportunity we had to do tours.

We did the same. We roadtripped a vacations/family visits and worked in tours (or at least set foot on) over a couple of years so it was a casual exploration. We did hit a number of schools in the summer which is less than ideal, but the campuses weren't completely dead (Christmas/Winter break the exception). Personally, I think it took the pressure off of trying work in visits during senior year and helped to decide where to apply.

Anonymous wrote:I would also not spend a lot of time visiting reaches, except for potential ED schools. DC got into some, but not the ones I would’ve thought more possible, and in the end, there was plenty of time to go visit after acceptance.

+1 we focused on visiting safeties, in-state matches. The goal was first to narrow down any preference for type (big/small, urban/small town, etc) and then to find safeties they really liked.

With DC1 the "type" tours were a few days in Sophomore year spring break to see schools a short drive away. He had a strong preference for the big school/college town/big sports school. Used junior year spring break to visit a few of those.

DC2 had tagged along on the sibling's "type" tour and attended a summer pre-college program before junior year at a LAC. From those experiences she was pretty focused on small, rural schools. We found it most helpful to attend some open houses early in junior year. Those are generally on weekends so she didn't need to miss school. It let her see more of the programs and facilities she was specifically interested in. Then, junior spring break was used to visit about 5 schools that were farther from home. Also used a couple random days off school to take standard tours at in-state schools.

Do you just not bother until the application results are in, and only visit where your child gets in?

We had an idea that -generally- large state schools didn't track interest. Apply and see where you get in. And when you know final costs to compare. And then visit. We settled on this approach after earlier most college visits did not result in the college making DC's List. Saw 8, 2 made the list which included (practically) a parent-forced in-state. In case they wanted to stay in-state. They did not.

Start with a few contrasts. We live near Philly, and started with Temple (large urban), St. Joe's (mid-sized Jesuit), Villanova (selective Catholic), and West Chester (state school). These alone are wildly different, but all good for the right kid. A different kid could have picked Penn (Ivy), Drexel (good for STEM), Swarthmore (highly selective LAC), and Bryn Mawr (women's college).

Do a few easy visits, and if your kid has a burning desire to see a school that requires a flight or a day off from school, you can be selective about those.

Another parent of a rising junior. I’m starting to compare DC’s school calendar with when colleges are in session to hopefully minimize missing classes. An early release day might let us pull DC even earlier to make an afternoon tour at a school within an hour or two. See if colleges have school on Columbus Day or Veterans Day and use those, traveling the afternoon before as soon as school gets out. This works both for driving distance and if you have the resources for a quick trip with a direct flight of maybe 2hrs or so.

DC is currently interested in multiple schools in Boston so that will be our fly in over spring break. Basically, yes your kid will likely end up missing some school or some weekend sporting events but unless you want to wait until admitted, it can’t be helped.

Also, you didn’t ask but at the advice of friends we plan to lean hard into virtual sessions as much as possible beforehand.

Anonymous wrote:We're so busy during the school year, we've never visited colleges then. My oldest did a tour the summer before senior year - it was during the pandemic and we woke up a little late. My youngest is doing a tour as a rising junior right now: we took the last week of school off, because her internship starts right after.

If you want to do a road trip, first you eyeball your college list, and how long it takes to drive from one to the other. Then you book college tours, far in advance. Get the admissions tours as well if they offer them. Colleges closer to home can be done during the school year, but somehow we didn't get around to doing that.

Me again. Each time I made the visit list myself, because my kids were clueless at first. I built it knowing what they gravitated towards (DC1 geopolitics, DC2 biology), and given academic stats/admission profiles. We visited urban and rural schools, large and small, because I didn't know what they wanted in those categories. DC1 decided he wanted urban schools thanks to the tour, and went to a safety he really liked. DC2 confirmed she preferred wilderness - we'll see where she actually ends up. We stuck to the northeast/Quebec, because we didn't feel like traveling elsewhere, but DC1 did apply to St Andrews (got in, went elsewhere), and DC2 might apply to schools in the northwest (we'll visit only if she gets accepted).

We're so busy during the school year, we've never visited colleges then. My oldest did a tour the summer before senior year - it was during the pandemic and we woke up a little late. My youngest is doing a tour as a rising junior right now: we took the last week of school off, because her internship starts right after.

If you want to do a road trip, first you eyeball your college list, and how long it takes to drive from one to the other. Then you book college tours, far in advance. Get the admissions tours as well if they offer them. Colleges closer to home can be done during the school year, but somehow we didn't get around to doing that.

We looked at schools where we were. Around where we lived and where we happened to be visiting. First it was a mix of sizes and locations. Our oldest gravitated to larger state schools. Our youngest gravitated to medium small schools.

I did what my dad did. He gave me a black sheet of paper with a line drawn down the middle. He said put down what you think you want from a school on the left and what you don’t want on the right. Size, distance, urban/rural… I wanted a marching band where you did not need to be great musician….

Then, you know the grades and scores and budget. Get a Peterson guide and find a few schools that match.

^ I will add that we’ve been fortunate logistically that DC wasn’t interested in schools more than a few hours away. Longer drives or flights, we’d have done what we could, but unless something was an ED potential, those might have waited until accepted student visits.