DC specifically asked to visit on school as a sophomore. We were already going to that state for a holiday so it was easy to take a tour on the way.

Then we visited a bunch of schools on the East Coast as part of a winter break DC's school had as a junior. Turned out that East Coast wasn't at all what DC wanted and ended up only applying to one of the schools visited.

So we then spent spring break of junior year visiting schools in the west. For all of this, we squeezed in short sight seeing. If there is a tour at 9 am and you are finished by 11 am you can see something before a late flight or as a break in driving.

At the last minute senior year we went to one school that DC thought they might want to ED to and we weren't ok with ED to a school that hadn't been vistited. (Ended up not liking it enough to ED.)

In the end, we went to admitted students day for a school not previously visited and applied RD at last minute and that is where DC ended up.

Point is that we made tours into mini- vacations. We had plenty of airline points. And, you can try to visit them all but it's probably better to visit a range and leave room at the end in case they end up somewhere you haven't seen yet.

DC2 wasn't interested in touring until junior year (possibly because of being dragged around in 8th grade on a lot of older siblings tours.)

Anonymous wrote:OP here - makes sense.
I asked because we're going to be near Virginia Tech over Thanksgiving and I was thinking about just going and walking around campus.

How do you know what is a safety and what is a reach for your particular child? Is there somewhere to see an estimate of what GPA, SAT/ACT, and extracurriculars a typical admitted student has?

I think a tour and boo ok sit if you’re passing through makes sense. Keep it light!

There is a lot of data out there. Most high schools use Naviance or Scoir to track admissions over the years for their applicants. You and your student may not get access to that until junior or senior year but it gives some good data points and perspectives. You can also look up the “Common Data Set” (CDS) for any college and see admissions info (average GOA, acceptance rate, test scores, etc). Eventually you may want to create a spreadsheet but it’s still a bit early for that!

My sophomore has been on one college tour, but that’s because she tagged along with her sibling who is a senior. We didn’t start tours in earnest until junior year with our eldest.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here - makes sense.
I asked because we're going to be near Virginia Tech over Thanksgiving and I was thinking about just going and walking around campus.

How do you know what is a safety and what is a reach for your particular child? Is there somewhere to see an estimate of what GPA, SAT/ACT, and extracurriculars a typical admitted student has?

Absolutely visit since you will be so close.

Yes. It will help the kid get a sense of a large campus, a feel for the architectural style and what it's like to be at a college in a town that centers around the school. If they like VA tech, then Penn State is very similar, for example.

Anonymous wrote:Visit after kid gets accepted. Totally different experience.

Yes, my DS was down to 2 schools and the visits made the decision much easier.

Anonymous wrote:OP here - makes sense.
I asked because we're going to be near Virginia Tech over Thanksgiving and I was thinking about just going and walking around campus.

How do you know what is a safety and what is a reach for your particular child? Is there somewhere to see an estimate of what GPA, SAT/ACT, and extracurriculars a typical admitted student has?

Our school used Naviance. You could pull up admissions data for any school and see trends. You can also google "school name" and CDS, but I feel the data from your school is more helpful.

Anonymous wrote:OP here - makes sense.
I asked because we're going to be near Virginia Tech over Thanksgiving and I was thinking about just going and walking around campus.

How do you know what is a safety and what is a reach for your particular child? Is there somewhere to see an estimate of what GPA, SAT/ACT, and extracurriculars a typical admitted student has?

Absolutely visit since you will be so close.

For my eldest we did start in Sophomore year, and I am grateful we did. My second child is a sophomore now, and we will hold off - they’re not quite in the college mindset.

So it’s very student dependent.

If you are looking at schools far away, that require flights, you should start Sophomore year.

There is very little time to see campus when students are there. Spring break is one of the few times. So spring break of 10th and 11th are your best times.

If you are looking at schools that can driven to - you have much more flexibility.

OP here - makes sense.
I asked because we're going to be near Virginia Tech over Thanksgiving and I was thinking about just going and walking around campus.

How do you know what is a safety and what is a reach for your particular child? Is there somewhere to see an estimate of what GPA, SAT/ACT, and extracurriculars a typical admitted student has?

No. Did not visit any school. Kid visited Harvard and MIT when he was in middle school. Kid used to various schools in and around DMV to compete for various competitions or for other programs.

We decided to only visit the schools after he was accepted when he could narrow it to top 4.

Sophomore visits were only to schools where we would already be. Seeing a concert in a different city that happens to have a college of potential interest, book a tour. Traveling to Fl for Spring Break and there is a college 30 minutes away, go check it out. The let's hit 4 colleges in 2 day tours are too much at this age. DC didn't end up applying to any of the schools we saw when they were a sophomore, but they did help them narrow down types of schools. We didn't visit the two reach schools b/c we didn't want DC to fall in love. When they got into one, we visited and DC accepted.

There’s a world of difference between the kind of tours you get on a weekday in the summer and the hoopla of going to the biggest admissions event of fall or spring semester. We’ve done both and for the big events, they’ve had the pep band, cheerleaders and mascot, provided a lunch, handed out tons of swag, allowed us to meet and visit with faculty in dc’s intended fields of studies, had informational sessions on topics like writing your personal essay, financial aid, what support services they offer, and of course, had campus tours. In the summer, you mostly just walk all around the campus with your tour guide and briefly enter buildings.

My daughter was interested in dance programs, so she actually attended some summer intensives within a 4-5 hour radius. That knocked 4 visits out right there.

Did 4 trips for visits at other campuses, mostly on days off. One of them was during the VA private college week over the summer.

She did apply to 3 schools sight unseen that were in the Midwest. We never wound up visiting those in the end. Only one was a yes anyway, and it was just too far and remote vs her other options.

Visit after kid gets accepted. Totally different experience.

We started casually visiting summer between 10th and 11th grade and into the fall/winter. No guided tours, just our own wandering around. She began with 20 on her list, we went to 4 or 5 select ones that represented different environments (urban, rural, small private, large public) and that helped narrow the list from 20 to 9 or so based on what she identified as "her vibe"...

Ultimately we visited 12 and she applied to 5. Has heard from two so far and was accepted to both, waiting on the others!

Anonymous wrote:No, visited around half.

One piece of advice for visiting reaches: if you can afford to, visit any school that might be on the table for Early Decision OR might knock an ED school out of clear top place on the list.

This. We tried to visit ED contenders. I wish we’d had a chance to do a Midwest swing, because I think one or two of those could have wound up in the running for ED, but we didn’t. The schools are still on her list and if she doesn’t get into her ED schools, we will likely do a Midwest trip in the spring.