Awesome campus visit last week!

beastman
Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:14:42 +0000

Just wanted to drop a line about a great visit that my family had at Iowa last week. It really stood out among visits we’ve made because of the high degree of personalization it showed, which is really unique for a large state school. Unlike other visits comprised of large cattle-car gatherings of dozens of students, every meeting we had that day was one-on-one. Instead of learning the same stuff we could read on the website, we had in-depth conversations with admissions, Honors Program, College of Engineering and dorm lunch date with spontaneous tour of the Men in Engineering floor in Burge Hall. So if you’re trying to decide whether a trip to Iowa City makes sense for you, I really encourage you to go for it because you will never come close to getting this kind of attention at another big school! Even at smaller schools we’ve visited we didn’t get as much. The reason: Iowa built our visit day from the ground up based on the question “what do you want to accomplish here?” We were not forced to choose from a limited menu of opportunities but really created our own opportunity. Now clearly they worked us into a schedule format where possible, but when we asked at the last minute for a special tour of the engineering floor, they pulled it together for us.

This business of “small school approach in a big school setting” really carried through not just the visit but the entire university. The Honors Program, the dorm living/learning communities (of which there are many), the Engineering College ALL make the big school smaller. How? The freshman Honors seminars are classes of 15 kids to get students acquainted immediately. Undergrad research opportunities are bountiful, with advisors in both Honors and the colleges working to hook up kids with faculty. Over 50% of engineering undergrads do some kind of research, and that doesn’t include co-ops and internships! Academic counseling sessions are required every semester (or year); students don’t float for years without contacting the administration.

Anyway, there are 100 other things we liked about Iowa, too specific to mention here. And while our visit was planned with the help of the “Scholar Recruitment” person in admissions, it’s clear from the admissions website that individually planned visits are open to everyone.