<p>Obviously the best time to visit art schools, or any college, is while classes are in session. But I’m afraid we are too late for this year. Is there any point to visiting in the summer? You can’t see the artwork, I would think. Are campuses depressing when they are empty?</p>
<p>At the same time I don’t want to waste the summer either.</p>
<p>I figure on two trips:
Saratoga Springs (Skidmore) - Utica (Pratt MWP), and Rochester (RIT</p>
<p>then:</p>
<p>Purchase (Purchase College) - New Paltz (SUNY NP and maybe Bard) - NYC (if my D can stand being there to see SVA)</p>
<p>From your list, I’d save Skidmore, Purchase, New Paltz for when school is on.
I did long distance during summer without my kid because that is the only way I could do to at least get some idea where to hit for real.
Schools I went were never entirely students free, did have grad students, summer study/ working bunch, student pre-college care taker etc you can talk to and get feel of. It is actually good time to see how bad certain things could be when it is “off”
up keep of studio equipments, trash left from the past semester, grimy cafe and bathrooms, ACs blasting away in empty buildings while doors windows wide open… etc.
And always you get to see ( or never see people around the school… that could happen and scary) the community with real people in it, store keeper, town bus driver and mail carrier, hospital folks that your kid will going to have contact with if decide to go there. I think Utica and Rochester that’s count more than others.
That is the reason Saratoga Spring or any vacation capital are not good place to go, you’d get mislead.
SUNY Purchase and New Paltz, I feel it is essential to see mass of students body to even start to compere, assuming you are going to see which is better for what.
It is a tedious trip but if you are in tristate area, Purchase usually host NPD that is more roomier than one in the city. It is good occasion to go because usual tour is on and students are all over helping out. Some of the name schools won’t bother to come to Purchase but I did not see it is your issue from your picks.</p>
<p>I am <em>somewhat</em> interested in MICA and Alfred, but they are longer hikes for us (7 hours) so I was thinking maybe I’d wait to see if she gets in before visiting. MICA is a reach, also.</p>
<p>Do many people just put off the visits until the senior year? Until after acceptance?</p>
<p>My D’s first choice is Mass Art, very local for us. All the others are Plan B’s.</p>
<p>It’s never a waste to visit schools, even in summer. One of our favorite tours was of Hamilton, last June, when there were few students around. It was just us and the tour guide and he was great! And there aren’t that many opportunities during senior year to visit schools. For my D’s, senior year was very intense. </p>
<p>What I find the least useful are the big open houses where you shuffle around in such a large, difficult to manage group that you never get studio tours or answers to your questions. The big open houses seem most useful to check out who else is applying and one of my D’s didn’t apply to a school we were visiting because ALL the girls at the open house wore Ugg boots (not an art school, obviously…).</p>
<p>I would try to see Alfred if I were you, it’s more affordable than most of the others. If you’re in upstate NY, you might as well swing by! And if MICA’s a reach, Skidmore will surely be also. My D ended up not applying there because she didn’t like the student work they had hung in the admissions office. Something about a portrait where the hair color was the exact same shade as the shadow on the neck…</p>
<p>Visiting before applying will help you weed out what you don’t like. After we visited 3 U’s, D decided that those weren’t for her. Saved application fees and test score/transcripts fees.</p>
<p>My son is an art student at SUNY New Paltz and he is going to be taking one summer class that meets on 2 weekends. Then he is also taking 2 classes at SVA over the summer as well. If he can answer any questions for you I would be happy to ask him.</p>
<p>Of course it’s better when the students are around. I would make the trip to MICA if your kid is seriously interested in art. We went either in late August or early September last year and it was well worth the trip (two student guides and just my daughter and I on the tour made for a really good tour). She had her portfolio reviewed then and we were surprised to get a letter about a month afterward telling us that her portfolio had been “accepted”. Her admissions counselor worked with her throughout the Fall and Winter critiquing her new work so that she would have a good chance of getting scholarships through the MICA scholarship competition. </p>
<p>We ended up visiting the serious contenders at least twice – I think we went to RISD three times. Don’t forget Syracuse, which has a strong art program as well.</p>
<p>She was accepted at Laguna College of Art and Design, Cleveland Institute of Art, Pratt, Parsons, Syracuse, Purchase, RISD, and MICA. She did not get into Cooper. She did not like SVA at all and did not apply there. I don’t think she really “tried” for Cooper – she always said she wouldn’t get in and I don’t think she really wanted to go there and applied only because we insisted.</p>
<p>We started visits Spring of Sophomore year because her school was out when the pope was in town… so I thought why not get a jump start on this college business. The last few weeks were kind of hectic with trying to fit in the final visits before the big D day.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>I agree with Greenwitch about the open houses. Most useful for seeing other types of kids that may be applying. We went to MICA Spring open house – but we had a much better tour and sense of MICA from our trip late last summer.</p>
<p>Visit the schools and try to tease out the teaching styles of the various schools because they can be radically different. Your kid may need more structure or want a foundation year or more time in studios outside of his/her major. Beyond that meet the admissions rep for your area and find out when they will be traveling to it. Schedule time then for portfolio reviews avoiding the cattle calls of NPD as much as possible. It was about the best thing I did for my D.</p>