<p>When I visited Georgetown there was one priceless dad who asked every single question. At one point he asked if there were sprinklers inside the dorms. I seriously wanted to slap him, not only is he detracting from experience of others by asking outlandish questions, everyone knows that by CODE buildings of that size need to have sprinklers. I forget his other questions but he asked some pretty anal questions… I think he also asked about how often the grass was mowed in the quadrangle or something to that extent.</p>
<p>That being said, don’t just be quiet parents OR students (although we always are). If the guide says something unclear ask for clarification.</p>
<p>My son had the best experiences when he was able to be alone with other students. If at all possible find someone you know who goes to the school and work out an hour or two alone for your child.</p>
<p>Once my son sat in on a class. I wanted him to do that at every school so he could compare, but he said “no”. So, obviously, he did not have the same experience as “cheers” son. Wrong class, perhaps, but I think mainly he didn’t like being the only high schooler in the class. Once I signed him up for the special engineering tour instead of the regular tour. That was a bust, because it was very boring. At least on the regular tour they talk about social things and dorm life. I think what surprised me the most about going on the visits was how apathetic the students seemed toward the whole process, including my son. What the other posters have said is true. Most of the students don’t ask questions because they don’t want to call attention to themselves. However, to give them some credit, I think they are using a different process to make a decision, one where questions don’t need to be asked. The only time my son rejected a school, it was for something I didn’t even notice: he thought the desks in the classrooms looked old and shabby. Not a criteria I would use in eliminating a school, but that’s what he used. Also, I thought the campus was the most beautiful one we had seen, but the style of architecture turned him off. Also, he noticed other things I didn’t notice like whether students were gathered in public places to study or whether they were holed up in their rooms.</p>
<p>IMO, most parents ask thoughtful, useful questions. I learned a lot from the questions other parents asked. No one asked about drinking on any of my tours. Parents asked questions like “Can freshman have cars?” and “How much parking is there on campus?” The answers to these questions are different for different schools and most kids don’t bother looking this kind of stuff up on the web site so I think it was informative for my son. I asked a question about over-summer storage of personal belongings which is important when you are flying to school. Only one parent asked an embarrassing question at an info session. She asked a specific question about whether her daughter needed to take a particular class in high school in order to be considered at that college. Daughter was embarrassed because now everyone knew her weakness (you could see her trying to hush her mother).</p>
<p>One thing I did to keep from being overly inquistive on the tours was to bring a camera. I found I was so busy snapping pictures that I was always at the back of the pack trying to catch up with everyone. It kept me busy and out of the way, and I like to think that I caught some shots that aren’t usually put out on the web sites, particularly ones of the inside of dorm rooms (when we were allowed to tour them). Son hasn’t asked to look at them, of course, but it kept me busy.</p>
<p>WashDad, I think we had the same Mudd guide you did! DS thought he was fantastic – he knew about everything, had taken classes at other 5Cs, and was really cool.</p>
<p>Last summer, we visited a couple of CA campuses with varying degrees of success. DS and DH went to the Midwest over a long weekend in January and found a method that worked for them. DS went to sit in on classes and roam hallways in various departments, DH did the tour and asked the occasional question without dread or fear of a humiliated teenage son. They would then meet up to have lunch at one of the campus cafeterias and then walk around some more. They continued this strategy on Spring Break, with great success.</p>
<p>DS contacted profs first, and everywhere he’s done this, folks have been quite welcoming. He was quite pleased to note when a prof noticed he was there – a small sign that the prof paid attention to who was in his/her class.</p>
<p>DS brought the camera – it helped him keep track of various aspects of campuses, dorms, etc. He would shoot me (pun intended) if I brought my camera along like I usually do whenever we travel!</p>
<p>I’m a tour guide at Tufts, and luckily, I haven’t had any real issues, except for this one time where I had a group of about 45 people in the rain and had the flu and this one man who trailed along in the back kept telling me to speak up. As for me, I wish the kids would ask more questions, but I understand how it is.</p>
<p>Duffman… Being a freshman do you believe you are able to connect with the prospies more than guides who are upperclassman? I would think only being there for a year would pose its challenges, and you might not know as many little details but you would be able to relate better with the kids since you were in their same position a year ago.
idk.</p>
<p>Hmm, I feel as though I can of course, probably relate to them better, but obviously I will be a sophomore this fall, so it will be slightly different. As for knowledge, yes, there were probably some minor things, especially in my first few tours that I wasn’t as knowledgeable about, but now I know mostly everything that would really be necessary, as I love my school and take pride in being a tour guide and rattling off a lot of info which isn’t typically in a viewbook or something.</p>
<p>one piece of advice for tour guides-
when you are asked about the availabilty of illegal drugs on campus, I suggest that you don’t do as one guide did a few years ago, at a prestigious former womens college and reply, " that anything you want is available!"
:eek:!</p>
<p>As parents who are facing paying in the many-tens-of-thousands of dollars for the product, I feel we have every right to ask questions. We really have to try to contain ourselves, though. The idea of asking students about the school randomly is a good one. We’ve done that. We’ve run into a few really nice kids and gotten a better idea about the schools that way. One kid took us all around and showed us dorms and everything.</p>
<p>Glad I found this thread. We are going to look at schools next week with D2, a rising senior, who is not into the process at all. When I asked her why she isn’t excited she said that she will be excited when she “gets into” the schools. She is going into her senior year of high school and will be applying this summer. I think I will need to bring a camera and document the tours so that she will have something to reference when she is finally ready to look at colleges. Spring of senior year we may need to revisit.</p>
<p>“one piece of advice for tour guides-
when you are asked about the availabilty of illegal drugs on campus, I suggest that you don’t do as one guide did a few years ago, at a prestigious former womens college and reply, " that anything you want is available!” </p>
<p>Well now that’s really just common sense. That’s how just about any school is going to work. Would you expect the tour guide to lie?</p>
<p>Another rule- if you don’t REALLY want to know the answer, don’t ask it!</p>
<p>I went on college tours about 2 1/2 years ago and again a month ago with my brother and mom (I don’t see my family except once a year because of school/internship, so our spring breaks coincided and he toured Massachusetts schools), and I was shocked what questions and responses people were given. We were at one school and a parent asked about drugs on campus. The tour guide very diplomatically said that while most kids abstained, you will find people with who use drugs and being that the campus was in a city, it’s not hard to obtain them. The parent acted outraged that her precious baby daughter could POSSIBLY be around someone who did drugs. That’s just a fact of college and I think you’d be hard pressed to find a school where there are no drugs on campus. </p>
<p>Also, on almost every college tour I went on with my brother, the parents pushed ahead of the kids (sometimes not even their own!) to stand in front. A few times my brother, who is really shy, would whisper questions to me as I looked like I could be a prospie so I would push through the hover parents to ask! </p>
<p>A last thing, as a student at a top college where there are many groups going through, I have been late to class several times because parents WOULD NOT move out of the way! Do not block halls, exits, or stairways because the school is a functioning university and people have to get through those areas! We, as students, don’t want to seem rude by shoving our way through, but sometimes tour groups leave us no choice! Follow your kid’s examples- most of them go to high schools and know what to do in crowds. I know this is difficult when you’re in a group of 20, 30, or even more, but please stay aware of your surroundings and keep aisles clear.</p>
<p>When my mom took me and a friend to a few schools over winter break, we did the annoymous tours, just walking around. Those were WAY better than the tour guide ones. One school, looked just like a high school, my friend and I pretended not to be with my mom and she was fine with that. Although when my mother started asking kids what they thought of the school, we stayed within ear shot. The freshman kids LOVED the place, then mom quizzed another girl, who said she was a sophmore, was honest with us and said she wasn’t the best to ask because she was transferring. Gave us a tour of her dorm, told us that yeah it was great as a freshman, then the place seemed like an extension of high school, nothing to do on the weekends. So our first impression of it being like a high school was accurate. Asking actual random kids, was my moms idea, and she would just report back to us what they told her.We didnt need to embarrass ourselves. My mom still thinks like a teen.</p>
<p>D1 actually cut short her Yale tour because of the incessant whining from the other kids. Once they detected her initial negative impression from the information session, they cajoled us into leaving early without even going on the tour. Maybe this is all just as well, but there’s always the possibility that something on that tour might have changed her mind.</p>
<p>They tolerated the first two schools well enough, but after that they were just disruptive.</p>
<p>It was a great convenience for me to take them all, since we had to go half way across the country during a school break, and nobody else would be home to watch the younger kids. But based on our experience, if you have any other option, use it.</p>
<p>There should also be do’s and don’ts for tour guides, as some have noted above, but also for schools in selecting and training tour guides.</p>
<p>For example do Not have freshmen give tours. Why not? Because they really haven’t experienced much, or know much, about the school themselves yet.</p>
<p>D1 had a tour guide at a Northeast LAC who was a freshman, didn’t know anything, didn’t seem to have much training either. This really did the school a disservice.</p>
<p>I didn’t go on many tours with my oldest- Seattle U- because I wanted to see the chapel, even though I knew she wouldn’t apply ( and it gave us practice)
Evergreen, Reed and Western wa, after she was accepted.</p>
<p>Mostly I remember struggling to keep up as with Evergreen and Western we had lots of ground ( wet and soggy too) to cover. quite literally.</p>
<p>But I had to laugh when we toured Portland State- the tour guide didn’t do a great job as a salesman for the school, but IMO he did a great job communicating the “feel” to visitors.
I know, no school is perfect, but I htink it is best to at least have some indication of what the sticky parts are before you apply or attend.</p>
<p>I agree with no having freshmen give tours.
When you are coming from out of state- may have even taken time off work and spent $$ on airfare, hotel etc, you want your tour to be as informative as possible and not wish that you just stayed home and looked at the quicktime movie.</p>
<p>During a tour of the beautiful new rec center at the University of Georgia, the tour guide pointed out the nearby football stadium. Quietly, I asked, “Do you have football here?”</p>
<p>IT WAS MEANT AS A JOKE but he answered, “Yes, ma’am we do” with earnest sincerity.</p>
<p>I believe in helping the tour guide (and the group) by asking questions I think may be of interest to all, that weren’t covered in the canned spiel. It’s true that many HS students just don’t know what to ask or how to compare colleges. (And I don’t mind looking stupid–I figure I’ll never see these people again!)</p>
<p>Keeping mouth shut–when my DD looked at the dorms on her very first college tour, I thought the one they showed us was old and dreary, but she said “This is pretty nice.” She had just come from a summer in Israel where the accomodations were even more spartan! If she didn’t mind a low budget campus, who was I to disagree? She ultimately didn’t go there, of course…</p>
<p>This was 8 years ago-- now all campuses seem to have gone for upgrades to please our kids’ extravagant lifestyles.</p>
<p>I have to agree with the first comment on this board, made by Beatchick. Who is taping my mom and telling the world to not do everything she does!? Lol. I love it - I’ll have to make her read this before my brother comes up behind me for his turn. Meh, she never came on any tours with me, (but by the way she talks you would think she did) so maybe he’ll be as lucky.</p>
<p>If parents don’t ask questions, nobody will ask questions. But I try to keep mine to the allowable one or two. </p>
<p>I hesitate to make generalizations, but it seems that way too many student tour guides are not always prepared to show their universities in the best light. At some places, the tour guides spent half the tours showing us the new fitness centers. (If I want my daughter to climb a rock wall, pal, I’m not paying $50,000 a year for it). At a surprisingly high number of places, they didn’t even take us through the lobby of the library. (“I never go there,” one guide announced with a shrug.) At one mid-sized midwestern university, we made the mistake of arriving the morning after a rare Friday night football game. “Boy, am I hung over,” our student guide immediately announced. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t begin to tell my daughter what to look for as we tour a campus. She gradually has figured it out on her own. As a parent, I enjoy seeing the buildings. They say a lot about the school . . . without having to lay my hand on any walls.</p>
I forget his other questions but he asked some pretty anal questions… I think he also asked about how often the grass was mowed in the quadrangle or something to that extent.</p>
She ultimately didn’t go there, of course…</p>