When to visit Colleges?

[Joyful]

It is looking like we will have one opportunity to visit some colleges. When do you suggest is a better time for a rising high school junior?

These are my pros and cons... hence my dilemma...

Summer: convenient, but no students/classes

Early Fall: classes are in session, but it is also the beginning of junior's own online courses

Early Spring: classes are in session, but there will be schoolwork due, and studying to be done for APs

[catz]

I think taking them as you get them is always a good plan.  Junior year is so busy.  My kid's a junior right now.  We visited some late summer last year, some early fall, and then we did a road trip in February to visit 5 a little further away.  That's just when we had a quick break in the action.  The junior still had to log on to his dual enroll stuff all week including doing a science lab in a hotel room.  LOL.  I do think it's better to see schools that are in session, but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.  

[katilac]

If your time is very limited next year, I'd try to squeeze in at least a couple right now, even if they are very local schools that she is not that interested in. 

Why? Because each visit we took taught us new questions to ask and things to look for. Because you never know. Because visiting those first few schools is often so exciting that it's easy to lose your head. My kids loved almost every school they toured for a good while, lol. The last one was always the best one. Many schools are quite good at creating a sense of fun and excitement when you visit! 

It might be a little late in the year for Saturday preview days (full days with department presentations, lunch, etc) but almost all schools will have Saturday tours for the next few weeks. And there will be plenty of Saturday preview days in the fall, which makes it easier to manage with school. 

[yvonne]

We got much more out of visits we did while classes were in session. I kind of screwed things up with my oldest by waiting till summer of junior year. With my rising junior dd, we will visit during the school year, hopefully during her breaks. 

[Joyful]

Thanks for the advice! It looks like there are more benefits of visiting while classes are in session.

I forgot to mention that we live overseas. We've been going back once a year to visit family. So, unfortunately, we don't have the option to visit during weekends or short breaks. We'll just have make the best of one trip. =)

Oh, are any of the "virtual tours" posted by the schools helpful in any way? As "previews"? Or are they too staged to be of benefit?

[mirabillis]

1 hour ago, yvonne said:

We got much more out of visits we did while classes were in session. I kind of screwed things up with my oldest by waiting till summer of junior year. With my rising junior dd, we will visit during the school year, hopefully during her breaks. 

 

yvonne - a bit off topic~ish... since you live in my neck of the woods, what california schools did you visit? and you think visiting during junior year during class is the most ideal?

[SanDiegoMom]

Def visit during session.  That decided by daughter for one school because she saw how small the student population felt spread over a huge campus and it felt so lonely to her.  She visited a school that was the same size acreage but larger population and decided she wanted a large school. 

We looked all over the US and she was able to see the difference between a large southern school and a large west coast school.  It made a big impact on her in deciding where she fit, culturally:-)  

[regentrude]

I think the best time to visit colleges is spring of senior year, after acceptances are in and when the student has to decide which of the schools to attend.

It means that you don't have to waste time visiting all the schools the student didn't get in, or which are financially impossible (assuming they have sent out the fin aid offer yet). The student is also in a better position to ask specific questions and get information beyond what is posted online anyway.

I conduct visitor tours for our department, and it is very different whether juniors or seniors tour. The juniors usually have no questions, and their parents ask things like what to do with the degree, which does not actually require a campus visit to find out. The seniors approach the visit very differently, ask more specific questions, and take away more info that is specific to the department and not readily available online.

 

ETA: But if you want to go in jr year, yes, summer is pretty pointless. You get to see buildings from the outside. Most students won't be there, and most faculty won't be there either.

[yvonne]

21 hours ago, mirabillis said:

 

yvonne - a bit off topic~ish... since you live in my neck of the woods, what california schools did you visit? and you think visiting during junior year during class is the most ideal?

 

We visited Claremont McKenna, Pomona, Pitzer, & UCSD in CA.

Having been through this with my boys, I am definitely planning to visit colleges with my dd during her junior year. It was a huge mistake to postpone college visits for my boys. Huge. We waited until summer of junior year to visit colleges with the boys. We had planned to see a number of colleges on the east coast in August, but the trip fell through because of car problems. We did see colleges in the Pacific Northwest in late August, and then Lawrence, Univ. of Chicago, and Hillsdale in October, and the CA colleges in November.

I had thought we would wait to see what, if any, other colleges they were admitted to on the east coast and then visit those this spring. I could kick myself....

1)  Time is extremely limited in the fall of senior year, with all the college application writing & interviewing. Time is even more limited in the four weeks between the time all admission decisions are out (April 1) and the deadline for accepting (May 1).  April is the time for follow-up visits to one's top two or three colleges, if one is still deciding at that point, NOT for leisurely, first-time visits!

2) Seeing colleges in session _before_ filling out applications makes way more sense. There were two colleges that my sons originally planned to apply to that they crossed off the list after visiting. Saved time and fees not to apply to colleges they knew they wouldn't want to attend. Knowing what they didn't like helped articulate what they did want.

3) Seeing colleges in session and being able to sit in on classes was much more informative than the simple campus building tours. We were mostly interested in LACs. We visited two LACs in the same region that I would have thought would be fairly similar. After my kids sat in classes at both and after I'd hung out in various student areas (cafeteria, library, campus coffee shop, bookstore,...) bec. parents couldn't sit in on classes, we were struck by how different the student vibe was between the two colleges. At one, students were really engaged in classes--participating in discussions, asking questions--and we saw students all over campus reading books, talking in small groups, working together.... At the other, my kids said only one or two students said anything in the classes they visited. In the classrooms we passed while on the tour, kids looked pretty uninterested. We didn't see anywhere near the level of student interest/engagement that we'd seen at the other college. Sure, it was only a snapshot of both colleges, but those irl snapshots might be more useful than simply reading a snapshot written by some random person with their own preferences and biases.

4) "Demonstrated interest" seems like a much bigger factor in admission than I'd realized. Nothing "demonstrates interest" better than visiting colleges in person, talking to the admissions officer, & talking to department/program people who might support your student's application. And "demonstrated interest" only matters BEFORE the colleges read the student's application. That means BEFORE Jan. 1 of senior year, at the latest.

5) Applying Early Decision can increase one's chances of admission at some colleges. If a student decides early on that X college is his/her first choice, and the family knows that it is financially feasible, the student can apply ED and have a decision way before April 1, saving all that time and angst of multiple college apps.  Seeing colleges in session during junior year might enable the student to do this.

 

So, yes, I absolutely think that visiting during the junior year is preferable to waiting till summer of junior year or, even worse, fall of senior year.

 

[daijobu]

We just returned from some college visits, during what for many is spring break.  It was pretty rough sometimes, mainly because of bad weather (It's hard to focus during the tours if it's raining with a cold wind.)  Also the CROWDS!  Some schools don't schedule additional guides during this busy time.  Remember to ask for a list of courses that are open to visitors, so you can see how engaged the students are.  (I've seen students shopping on Amazon, applying for a drivers license, and checking on a visa application.  Also PM-ing friends.)

[Joyful]

8 hours ago, regentrude said:

I think the best time to visit colleges is spring of senior year, after acceptances are in and when the student has to decide which of the schools to attend.

It means that you don't have to waste time visiting all the schools the student didn't get in, or which are financially impossible (assuming they have sent out the fin aid offer yet). The student is also in a better position to ask specific questions and get information beyond what is posted online anyway

Thanks, regentrude for offering a different perspective. DH was wondering whether it would be of use to visit a school if one might not be accepted. He is leaning towards choosing which schools to apply for based on reputation and information that we can find online. I think that is more based on his own experience decades ago (applying based on reputation, cause there was no web yet).

46 minutes ago, daijobu said:

We just returned from some college visits, during what for many is spring break.  It was pretty rough sometimes, mainly because of bad weather (It's hard to focus during the tours if it's raining with a cold wind.)  Also the CROWDS!  Some schools don't schedule additional guides during this busy time.  Remember to ask for a list of courses that are open to visitors, so you can see how engaged the students are.  (I've seen students shopping on Amazon, applying for a drivers license, and checking on a visa application.  Also PM-ing friends.)

Sorry to hear that your tours met with wet weather! But it sounds like you got valuable information nonetheless.  =) 

I appreciate everyone's sharing your experiences! More data for us to add to our discussion at home.

We were thinking of visiting schools on the East Coast. April is rainy season isn't it? And then we are worried about getting stuck in snow if we plan on traveling in March...  Since one cannot anticipate weather so far in advance, perhaps it would be better for us to visit in the fall of junior year? (which is 2018!!!)

So, if we decide to go, in one stretch of 7-10 days, what is a good number of schools to visit? If we go to a certain city, would visiting 2 schools in one day be too much? At which point will we hit "fatigue" and foggy brains?

[regentrude]

10 hours ago, yvonne said:

2) Seeing colleges in session _before_ filling out applications makes way more sense.

I think that depends on the travel cost. If the college visit involves air travel and hotel accommodations, the application fee plus fee for sending test scores is a lot cheaper.

[catz]

17 hours ago, regentrude said:

I think the best time to visit colleges is spring of senior year, after acceptances are in and when the student has to decide which of the schools to attend.

 

I do think there is real merit to this.  My kid will be applying to schools he has not seen yet.

However, if you are making a visit to the states before applying and have time for visits, I'd pick a geographic area and pick a handful of schools of varying size (large, medium, small), varying location (urban, suburban, rural), type (public, private, LAC, etc) and see what feels right.  Even if you think they might not be the right fit.  Especially if your teen hasn't visited college campuses before.  We started with some schools very local to us I knew probably wouldn't be in the running but they definitely changed my son's thinking and helped his focus and got him more invested in the process.  And it easily eliminated a bunch of schools.  

Most schools have great info out on their website.  Many have YouTube channels and virtual tours.  

The other thing I would recommend if you're applying to schools you are not visiting ahead of time - reach out to admissions.  Ask questions.  Remind them you are overseas and can't wait to visit.  Ask if you can reach out to a professor for specific questions about a department of interest.  Study enough about the school to really personalize your essays on your applications.  Set up Skype interviews.  At some schools, perceived interest is important for acceptance. 

[regentrude]

8 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

The other thing I would recommend if you're applying to schools you are not visiting ahead of time - reach out to admissions.  Ask questions.  Remind them you are overseas and can't wait to visit.  Ask if you can reach out to a professor for specific questions about a department of interest. 

I would recommend contacting the department directly with any major related questions. The department will be more knowledgable than admissions. Contact information will be easily available on the colleges' websites.

[catz]

50 minutes ago, regentrude said:

I would recommend contacting the department directly with any major related questions. The department will be more knowledgable than admissions. Contact information will be easily available on the colleges' websites.

 

The reason I said it like that is if you get the contact info for someone through admissions, it may get marked on your records as a contact/connection to the school.  My son is looking at schools of music and I've intentionally had him send e-mails to admission that are like "I'm interested in setting up a sample lesson in the department of music. could you let me know who I might contact to set that up? (Blah blah blah additional background/questions as needed)"   That way both admissions and the department of music are seeing contact from you.    Yes that is a game, but I have had a couple people recommend staying in touch both with admissions and particular departments especially if you aren't visiting.    Also, it's shocking to me how many departments don't make this kind of stuff clear on their website anyway.  I'd rather filter through admissions than potentially irritate someone by contacting them directly.  At a couple music schools we've looked at anyway, it's clear professors don't want direct e-mails and we had to give tons of background info to even e-mail with an actual music teacher.  Especially those with low admit rates.  

[yvonne]

2 hours ago, regentrude said:

I think that depends on the travel cost. If the college visit involves air travel and hotel accommodations, the application fee plus fee for sending test scores is a lot cheaper.

Saving a few dollars on an app fee was not my point. 

Travel cost and time (having waited till fall of senior year) were the reasons I didn’t push visiting colleges further east.  I figured we’d just wait and see what colleges the boys got into and only visit those. 

For us, that was a mistake. Penny wise, pound foolish. Four years of college is a huge cost. A $300 rt plane ticket is a drop in the bucket in comparison and well worth the investment imo   

Visiting colleges before the application process has many advantages beyond saving a few dollars on an app fee. It can affect whether the student gets admitted to some colleges at all. I think it can affect if/how much merit aid the student gets.  It can shape the list of colleges the student applies to and how much time and energy he puts into his app for certain colleges. 

If one has the option of visiting during junior year, even knowing that the student may not get in, I would surely advise doing so. I wish I had, esp for one of my sons.  

[catz]

The reason we haven't visited some of the schools my son is looking at is because of the process for applying to music schools.  We will need to visit anyway for an audition if my kid gets through the pre-screening process.  And they are all financial reaches and highly competitive.   It would be nice to be in a position to visit after acceptance too if it makes sense.  I do want my kid to be able to apply to a few of his more far flung reaches but honestly, they are financial LONG shots that would require a fair amount of merit aid to resolve.   Music merit is a tricky thing and can be all over the place.

But for someone applying from overseas it does make perfect sense why you might not be able to get to each and every school you'd like to apply to.  I would just make it very clear that is the case in every interaction you have with admissions or faculty.  

[yvonne]

Regentrude,

At what point in the process did your kids first visit the colleges they’re at?

[yvonne]

FuzzyCatz, do you think the amount of music merit aid you’re offered could be affected by how much interest your student shows in the various colleges?  

My boys were offered a ton of merit aid from the colleges we visited and significantly less from those we didn’t. I guess that’s why I wonder if we weren’t penny wise (saved those travel expenses if they didn’t get in!) and pound foolish (didn’t get much/any merit aid from colleges we did not visit.)  I’d heard about the whole “demonstrated interest” thing, but I’m beginnng to think it’s more significant than I’d thought. 

[catz]

1 hour ago, yvonne said:

FuzzyCatz, do you think the amount of music merit aid you’re offered could be affected by how much interest your student shows in the various colleges?  

My boys were offered a ton of merit aid from the colleges we visited and significantly less from those we didn’t. I guess that’s why I wonder if we weren’t penny wise (saved those travel expenses if they didn’t get in!) and pound foolish (didn’t get much/any merit aid from colleges we did not visit.)  I’d heard about the whole “demonstrated interest” thing, but I’m beginnng to think it’s more significant than I’d thought. 

Well, yes and no.  I think really competitive programs are very talent based and also oriented on the needs of the program.   Like oh, 3 flutes are graduating so we need to make sure we have 4-6 strong flute candidates for next year.   Recently we were in a major metro and we tried to hook up with a few teachers at 2 fairly competitive programs and they barely acknowledged my kid's e-mails and I suspect they don't meet with too many prospective students.   We spent days on both those campuses and got a general music tour/info session at one and got to observe a group class at the other.  That's it.  

I  do think kids that can do the summer programs at some of these music schools  and develop a relationship with a particular teacher if they are well trained can be at an advantage.  However, dropping 5K+ for a month long program while we're going into this process also while my kid has loads of advantageous stuff he wants to do in town anyway doesn't have a lot of appeal and we're upper middle class.   I don't suspect single lesson takers are at a HUGE advantage unless they make a unique connection to a teacher.    There was one school where my kid did not click with a teacher AT ALL.  There are 8 other members of faculty in that department and I suspect any other teacher would have been a better fit.  I wonder if an interaction like that puts you at a disadvantage?  That is actually a program I think is fantastic and I'm considering going back to meet with another teacher. 

I do hope if he gets through pre-screens and we go audition some of these places, we can go a day or two early, meet a teacher or two.  Take a tour, talk to admissions, talk to students, interview, etc.  Well, if that's not enough, oh well.  My kid does have enough of a unique background plus high stats that I think he might be an appealing and merit worthy candidate at some of these schools.  But if not, that's ok.  We have a couple excellent public options and some closer privates.  We have 6 appealing audition options within about 6 hours of home plus a good private non-audition option as well.  And a couple more I wish he'd consider.  Music students often go on to grad school and I remind him that some of these fancier options could work better for grad school if we have no debt and they are often more generous for grad students doing TA work, etc.  

I did communicate with a parent recently whose student auditioned for a music school on a whim - it was close to home and just another option but not of particular interest.  That was their only visit to campus.  They never met with a teacher.  She was offered half tuition bringing it in range of their state schools.  So I do think it can happen.

[regentrude]

1 hour ago, yvonne said:

Regentrude,

At what point in the process did your kids first visit the colleges they’re at?

My DS visited first for accepted student day, some time in senior year, after having been accepted.

My DD applied to 12 schools. She visited one in Summer before senior year because we were in the area anyway, and visited two in Chicago fall of senior year because it was driving distance. She never visited the other 9 which would have required air travel. It was a coincidence that she got accepted at U Chicago which she had visited (8% acceptance rate). She went back for the accepted student visit in spring of senior year. Because of the difference in financial aid offers, she never visited the other comparable schools to which she was accepted; she made her decision without setting foot on the other campuses.

[regentrude]

2 hours ago, yvonne said:

Visiting colleges before the application process has many advantages beyond saving a few dollars on an app fee. It can affect whether the student gets admitted to some colleges at all. I think it can affect if/how much merit aid the student gets. 

yes, it affects admission, but only for a few, hard to get in, schools that consider "interest" a factor. Most colleges do not care. I think this is important to know for people who are just starting the process. most colleges are happy to take most students, whether they visited or not. And some selective colleges don't care that you visit/call/show interest.

I have never heard of visiting affecting merit aid. Do you have sources for that? The merit aid schemes I have come across were either automatic based on test scores/GPA, or by application, and the criteria were outlined on the schools' websites. (Now, need based aid is a different thing; colleges often do not disclose in detail how they calculate need based aid)

[Joyful]

FuzzyCatz,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and situation. It must be so stressful to go and audition at so many schools! I hope your son gets to study with the faculty of his choice! Best wishes on applications and auditions!

My friend's daughter also wants to study at a music school for college. I'll share your advice with her.  =)

[catz]

Aww thanks Joyful, I felt bad for hijacking!  LOL.  Best of luck to you too - it's fun watching everyone's journeys here.  :)

[Joyful]

No problem. Consider it the natural flow of the conversation.  =)

[Ann.without.an.e]

I haven't read other replies.  I think that visiting tougher schools before you have a ballpark of where your student's scores on testing and gpa will fall might be pointless. I have a friend who spent a ton of time and money visiting super top schools only to find out that her kid couldn't pull more than a 26 on the act, even with lots of prep.  Since this kid wasn't an olympic athlete and hadn't worked for NASA (see my sarcasm here), they had to then reevaluate where to apply and had to visit a whole new list of schools where her kiddo would get merit aid, etc.  There is nothing wrong with not being able to break a 26 on the ACT but it might mean you are applying to different schools, especially if finances are an issue.

For us, seeing  the students on campus, how they interacted, etc was huge so we didn't go in the summer for any visits.  

Start with schools that you feel sure will be safety schools and add to it more difficult schools if the testing and the gpa are coming in line.  Also, make sure you visit those smaller schools that are very yield protective because a visit will be the difference between a yes and a no. I know of several perfect test scores, gpas, etc that were turned away from middle of the line, small liberal arts schools because the student never visited or showed interest and the school assumed that they were just the fallback plan or safety.

 

 

[Bootsie]

I think some depends upon how much your child knows what he or she wants in a college.  There is a big difference in visiting colleges when I student knows that they want to major in engineering and either go to College A or College B (and those plans are reasonable academically and financially) and a student who does not know if he or she wants to attend a large or small school, has no clue of a major, has no clue of the type of campus he wants to attend, etc.   If a student falls in the second category, I think some visits just to get the feel of what different types of campuses are like is helpful--but those can be some close by without major time and resource commitment.

[Joyful]

24 minutes ago, regentrude said:

yes, it affects admission, but only for a few, hard to get in, schools that consider "interest" a factor. Most colleges do not care. I think this is important to know for people who are just starting the process. most colleges are happy to take most students, whether they visited or not. And some selective colleges don't care that you visit/call/show interest.

Thanks for this regentrude.

[yvonne]

33 minutes ago, regentrude said:

yes, it affects admission, but only for a few, hard to get in, schools that consider "interest" a factor. Most colleges do not care. I think this is important to know for people who are just starting the process. most colleges are happy to take most students, whether they visited or not. And some selective colleges don't care that you visit/call/show interest.

I have never heard of visiting affecting merit aid. Do you have sources for that? The merit aid schemes I have come across were either automatic based on test scores/GPA, or by application.

I did not claim to have sources showing a connection between visiting and merit aid; I only provided my experience & thoughts. Similarly, I do not think it is possible to show that most colleges don't care if one has visited, or that only selective colleges care if a student has visited. Regarding merit aid... at the colleges where my sons received merit aid, a range was given, from as low as a couple of thousand dollars to full tuition. That's a big range and there was no clear cut list of exactly how much aid one could expect for exactly which achievements/qualifications. Sure, some schools (Univ of Oklahoma, Alabama, Arizona,...) guarantee a specific, huge amount of merit aid for NMF's, and some schools specifically state that they'll provide x amount of aid for certain test scores, but I don't know if that's the norm or if specific scores/gpa is the basis for most merit aid?  Maybe a wide range of merit aid offered is more typical of smaller LACs?

Bottom line, I've come to think that the college application and admission process is not at all a clear cut process. It's impossible to know what factors might tip the balance for admission in a qualified student's favor. (Perhaps your dd's visit to UChicago tipped the balance a tiny bit for her? Is there any way to know for sure that it didn't?) I also don't know what factors resulted in my sons receiving the highest end of the range of merit aid at the colleges to which they were accepted. 

So, for us, we will do what we can to tip the balance in my dd's favor when it's time for her to apply to colleges.  We will visit colleges in which my dd is interested before the application process. I do believe it made a difference for my sons, but I'll never know for sure. I do know I feel badly for one of my sons who was waitlisted for a college in which he was really interested but which we did not visit bec. we figured we'd visit if he got in. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered if we had visited, but if we had & he'd been waitlisted, at least I'd feel we'd done everything we could. 

[catz]

I do think the perceived interest can be most important if you are applying to middling competitive private schools when you are a high stat kid.  If your ACT is 34 and the middle 50% at a school is 28-32 and you drop a very impersonal application with no visit into one of these schools, they may assume your application is a safety.  I have talked to a few kids this year locally that are ending up at safeties because they put all their love into their reach applications and didn't get in.  It also might make a difference at some of these schools if you're lower stat and you've shown particular interest.  There was some thread on yield protection on the college board not long ago.  This year has been a crazy year for admissions at MANY schools.

I also think some of these private schools sometimes do merit without giving exact qualifiers like other schools might.  A couple of our smaller options say basically "we give out merit at our discretion".  So connecting with someone on campus and indicating you really want to be there probably wouldn't hurt.  

[Joyful]

I read this Op-Ed yesterday in the NYTimes: How to Level the College Playing Field

The writer mentions that colleges are using lack of pre-application visits as a sign of "demonstrated interest" to weed out applicants. So it looks like it is a common enough practice for the writer to consider it something that will disadvantage lower income students.

[yvonne]

9 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

I do think the perceived interest can be most important if you are applying to middling competitive private schools when you are a high stat kid.  If your ACT is 34 and the middle 50% at a school is 28-32 and you drop a very impersonal application with no visit into one of these schools, they may assume your application is a safety.

I also think some of these private schools sometimes do merit without giving exact qualifiers like other schools might.  A couple of our smaller options say basically "we give out merit at our discretion".  So connecting with someone on campus and indicating you really want to be there probably wouldn't hurt.  

I think this was the case in our situation.

[Joyful]

20 minutes ago, Attolia said:

I haven't read other replies.  I think that visiting tougher schools before you have a ballpark of where your student's scores on testing and gpa will fall might be pointless. I have a friend who spent a ton of time and money visiting super top schools only to find out that her kid couldn't pull more than a 26 on the act, even with lots of prep.  Since this kid wasn't an olympic athlete and hadn't worked for NASA (see my sarcasm here), they had to then reevaluate where to apply and had to visit a whole new list of schools where her kiddo would get merit aid, etc.  There is nothing wrong with not being able to break a 26 on the ACT but it might mean you are applying to different schools, especially if finances are an issue.

For us, seeing  the students on campus, how they interacted, etc was huge so we didn't go in the summer for any visits.  

Start with schools that you feel sure will be safety schools and add to it more difficult schools if the testing and the gpa are coming in line.  Also, make sure you visit those smaller schools that are very yield protective because a visit will be the difference between a yes and a no. I know of several perfect test scores, gpas, etc that were turned away from middle of the line, small liberal arts schools because the student never visited or showed interest and the school assumed that they were just the fallback plan or safety.

Thanks Attolia for the advice on picking schools to visit!

DS took the PSAT as a sophomore with a tiny bit of prep (took 2 practice PSATs). So can I use that as a base score in our initial list of schools?  (Hopefully the score will go up with more preparation)

[regentrude]

28 minutes ago, yvonne said:

Similarly, I do not think it is possible to show that most colleges don't care if one has visited, or that only selective colleges care if a student has visited.

Don't have time to research the raw data, but found this nice chart:

 

For the colleges that take pretty much all of their applicants, it obviously does not matter whether one visits.  For the "moderately" selective schools, admissions rates are so high that visiting won't be relevant either if the applicant has the right stats, because it's not competetive to get in. Then you have all the colleges with guaranteed admissions by ACT/SAT score+class rank, and they publish these criteria; so visiting won't affect the admissions decision there either.

No, I stand by my statement that visiting affects admissions decisions only at  selective schools. Some of the extremely selective schools state that they do not consider interest (you cannot visit your way to admission at a school that rejects 95% of its applicants)

 

 

[Roadrunner]

A lot of selective schools say they don’t consider expressed interest though. Some state that they do, like Carnegie Mellon. It’s hard to generalize.

[Ann.without.an.e]

3 minutes ago, Joyful said:

Thanks Attolia for the advice on picking schools to visit!

DS took the PSAT as a sophomore with a tiny bit of prep (took 2 practice PSATs). So can I use that as a base score in our initial list of schools?  (Hopefully the score will go up with more preparation)

 

 

I think that is fairly safe really.  Regardless of what her scores may end up, just make sure you visit and are comfortable with a few safety schools (for admissions safety and financial safety) as well (see my PSA post in the high school forum).  You could even focus on those first and branch from there.  If she isn't sure what she is looking for in a school then just try to visit several types of schools, various sizes, etc..  Everyone tried to point my dd toward small schools because she is on the quite side but the more she visited, the more she realized she didn't like the small schools.  She liked the medium sized schools because she liked more variety in people and culture than a tiny school can usually provide.

[regentrude]

33 minutes ago, yvonne said:

Perhaps your dd's visit to UChicago tipped the balance a tiny bit for her? Is there any way to know for sure that it didn't?

According to UChicago Admissions, they do not track demonstrated interest.

https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-chicago/1181310-uchicago-questions-ask-an-admissions-counselor-p185.html

[Ann.without.an.e]

A lot of your super selective schools that are larger and have a long waitlist do not track interest (although some do).  It is the smaller competitive schools that are super big into interest.  Furman, Wake, and Davidson, for instance....huge deal there.  Duke outright says that interest isn't a factor at all and so do many of the ivies.

[Joyful]

According to the NYTImes Op Ed above, Princeton and Emory do not track either.  (Of course, they are extremely reach....)

[catz]

It's easy enough to find out this info on a school anyway so you don't need to waste time expressing interest for schools that don't care.  If you google "common data set school name" it will give you all sorts of info about admissions and financial aid.   Below I just cut and pasted a list of things, they may consider from a school we are considering.  It does say for this particular small private that expressed interest is considered.  Actually, for this school the only things on this list that are not considered are religion and state residency.

Academic, Rigor of secondary school record x, Class rank x, Academic GPA, Standardized test scores, Application Essay, Recommendation(s), Nonacademic Interview, Extracurricular activities, Talent/ability, Character/personal qualities, First generation, Alumni/ae relation, Geographical residence, State residency, Religious affiliation/commitment, Racial/ethnic status, Volunteer work, Work experience, Level of applicant’s interest

[Joyful]

21 hours ago, jdahlquist said:

I think some depends upon how much your child knows what he or she wants in a college.  There is a big difference in visiting colleges when I student knows that they want to major in engineering and either go to College A or College B (and those plans are reasonable academically and financially) and a student who does not know if he or she wants to attend a large or small school, has no clue of a major, has no clue of the type of campus he wants to attend, etc.   If a student falls in the second category, I think some visits just to get the feel of what different types of campuses are like is helpful--but those can be some close by without major time and resource commitment.

Yeah, DS falls in the second category. He's strong in STEM. But also enjoys history and Latin.

Actually, I just thought of it. There are a couple of internationally ranked universities in our city where classes are taught in English. Cheaper to attend these schools than US schools even when paying full international student tuition. But it will be unlikely that they will accept homeschoolers, since it is not recognized here. But we can make reservations for campus tours and admission sessions. So I'll give that a go in the coming weeks.  =)

21 hours ago, Attolia said:

I think that is fairly safe really.  Regardless of what her scores may end up, just make sure you visit and are comfortable with a few safety schools (for admissions safety and financial safety) as well (see my PSA post in the high school forum).  You could even focus on those first and branch from there.  If she isn't sure what she is looking for in a school then just try to visit several types of schools, various sizes, etc..  Everyone tried to point my dd toward small schools because she is on the quite side but the more she visited, the more she realized she didn't like the small schools.  She liked the medium sized schools because she liked more variety in people and culture than a tiny school can usually provide.

Thanks! Unfortunately, finding a financial safety will be hard, since we don't exactly have a "state option"

[Ann.without.an.e]

6 minutes ago, Joyful said:

Yeah, DS falls in the second category. He's strong in STEM. But also enjoys history and Latin.

Actually, I just thought of it. There are a couple of internationally ranked universities in our city where classes are taught in English. Cheaper to attend these schools than US schools even when paying full international student tuition. But it will be unlikely that they will accept homeschoolers, since it is not recognized here. But we can make reservations for campus tours and admission sessions. So I'll give that a go in the coming weeks.  =)

Thanks! Unfortunately, finding a financial safety will be hard, since we don't exactly have a "state option" - we recently had to move our permanent US address. But that's a story for another post... maybe.  ;)

 

Unless you can pay full ticket to a private school, look for a few schools that offer good merit aid where your student is far above the average in scores and GPA and show a ton of interest.  If you think that your student can pull off NMS then look at the schools where a full ride is offered for that. 

[Joyful]

1 minute ago, Attolia said:

 

Unless you can pay full ticket to a private school, look for a few schools that offer good merit aid where your student is far above the average in scores and GPA and show a ton of interest.

Got it. Thanks! Will also have him start prepping on the PSAT/SAT.

[Joyful]

FuzzyCatz,

Thanks for directing me to the common data set. I saw that resource somewhere, but didn't know what kind of info would be on it.

[yvonne]

“

   

[yvonne]

2 hours ago, regentrude said:

 

2 hours ago, regentrude said:

(you cannot visit your way to admission at a school that rejects 95% of its applicants)

Saying that one could do so would be an absurd contention. I hope you are not suggesting that that is what I’m saying simply because I disagree that spring of senior year is the best time to visit colleges.  

You did what worked for your family & I agree that it might be the best approach for other families or in other situations. That was not the best choice for mine. I put our experience out there because, for us, it was a mistake to follow the advice to just wait until we got admissions decisions.

[Roadrunner]

I think I am going to take my children to visit some east coast schools in the dead of winter. ? lets just say they are in flip flops all year long out here and have never lived in the area that would require either a hat or a winter jacket. I really need them to spend a week in MA in December to know snow and cold isn’t going to be a deciding factor before shelling out any money on applications or worse, sending them there and then dealing with the transfer back. ? I could see at least one of mine completely panicking at the thought of wearing shoes and gloves. 

[catz]

Ha - I took my kid to visit Chicago colleges in February.  We're from further north, it was 35+, seemed great to us!  We were out and about on the L trains all day and walking miles.  The warm weather folks on our tours were super funny!  They did not stop talking about the weather.  

[Ann.without.an.e]

23 hours ago, regentrude said:

Don't have time to research the raw data, but found this nice chart:

 

For the colleges that take pretty much all of their applicants, it obviously does not matter whether one visits.  For the "moderately" selective schools, admissions rates are so high that visiting won't be relevant either if the applicant has the right stats, because it's not competetive to get in. Then you have all the colleges with guaranteed admissions by ACT/SAT score+class rank, and they publish these criteria; so visiting won't affect the admissions decision there either.

No, I stand by my statement that visiting affects admissions decisions only at  selective schools. Some of the extremely selective schools state that they do not consider interest (you cannot visit your way to admission at a school that rejects 95% of its applicants)

 

 

 

I think the difference here is simply wording - super selective (acceptances in single digits) verses selective.  Those single digit schools have so much to dig through, they could have a waitlist long enough to fill their freshman class again, and they accept so few - they are actually annoyed when you try to contact them too much.  We made very little contact with the schools that dd got into that were single digit acceptance rates, unless we knew that interest was a factor. We focused showing interest in the selective but not super selective schools.  DD interviewed with and/or showed interest in Wake Forest, Davidson, Furman, and Rice.  Davidson and Rice are both single digit admissions schools but interest is a factor.  She didn't put any effort or focus into Duke, Emory, Yale, Carolina, or Brown and they all state that interest is not a factor.  Yale and Brown requested interviews with her and so she completed them.   Most schools will actually flat out tell you if interest is a factor and usually right on their website.  Duke says it isn't.  DD knows at least 3 people in her scholarship group that had never set foot on campus until orientation.

This is just my rambling way of saying - it depends on the school, haha.  Know the school.

[Bootsie]

Talking to some college admissions counselors, this is what I have come away with:  for most students at most schools, "expressed interest" will not be a determining factor in admittance.  For non-selective schools it is unimportant.  For highly selective schools it is not important.  It is the "selective" school category, and those schools in that category that are concerned about their yield statistics that consider it.  Even for those schools, it is not a consideration for many applicants; it will not be a consideration for top applicants (A selective school would never want it advertised that Johnny got into Harvard but not into the selective school) It would be considered if a student is in that category of "we have 500 spots left and 1500 candidates that look about the same--which 500 people do we think are likely to come if we extend an offer."  A student who looks like he has applied to 100 schools, hoping to get into a number of them and then will make a decision based on financial aid, and really has no specific interest in the school will probably not be offered one of those 500 remaining spots.

The other type of student that can benefit from expressing interest is the student who has a unique situation that an admissions counselor knows about and the counselor will campaign for the student to get one of the positions.  This will not just be simply "this kid's parents sent 100 emails to the school" but something like, "I met this student at XYZ college tour and he is very excited about our engineering program--his GPA is a little low because he had mono during his junior year, but he won the state robotics competition using technology that has been promoted by our engineering faculty.  He is very ambitious and excited about studying here."