<p>Scratched off: Wake Forest and Wofford </p>
<p>Loved: Duke, Furman, Davidson and UNC</p>
<p>My daughter was at Kenyon in the summer. There was a lot of corn. A LOT of corn.</p>
<p>I think sheâs going to turn up her nose at Amherst, tooâsheâs already declined to visit Williams or Bowdoinâtoo remote.</p>
<p>Sounds like we hit lots of the same schools at Gluckie, but just to show how personal the experience is:
Loved: Wake Forest, Duke
Liked: Davidson
Scratched off: UNC (really disliked it!), Elon</p>
<p>Paying4: My daughter is very academically inclined and not into the arts at allâŠI think thatâs why WFU was crossed off the list. The info session and tour guide both emphasized the arts there. Also, when we went, the places they showed us looked old and run downâŠnot what youâd expect for that kind of money. All of the tour guides were either PoliSci majors or Art majorsâŠneither of which interests my D. She asked ?'s about the bio program there and she got the impression it was not a strong suit for that particular college. I had no idea what to expect at Davidson. We thought it was really nice and liked the whole âhonor codeâ they live by, as well as the fact that laundry and printing was included in the tuition. They also said that bio was one of their strongest majors offered at Davidson. WFU gives you a certain amount of prints per semester and then you pay for any overages. Thatâs what our decisions were based on. How did your visits go? We are going to visit Emory soon. Havenât been to Elon yet.</p>
<p>gluckie, not to be mean but⊠youâre picking colleges based on the tour guideâs major, free laundry and how many pages youâre allowed to print?</p>
<p>Donât knock the free laundry - if nothing else it ensures our Davidson freshmen wears clean clothes 
In all seriousness, our son had several schools to choose from that were academically excellent and similar in many respects, so sometimes it is the little intangible things that add up in the final selection.</p>
<p>Curious if you visited Carleton during the first 2 weeks of March - thatâs finals week.</p>
<p>S gets âfreeâ laundry and unlimited printing. He also got a free t-shirt at orientation. His college costs $49k (including room & board).</p>
<p>D has to pay for laundry and has limits on her printing, and she had to pay $6 for an orientation t-shirt. Her college cost $34k. </p>
<p>For $15k I can buy a LOT of laundry and printing and t-shirts. :p</p>
<p>^lol! No doubt!</p>
<p>(Still, free laundry is pretty awesome â for its convenience, if nothing else. No coins or card re-loading required!)</p>
<p>lafalum84-you are so funny!!!</p>
<p>Gluckie: Interesting how kids with similar criteria get a different vibe from a school. My daughter is also very academically inclined. She wishes she were artistically talented, but knows that isnât her area of greatest strength. She seemed to judge each of the schools by whether the students gave off an âintellectual airâ and whether the facilities at the school seemed well maintained. She thought the buildings at Wake were ânew and nice looking.â UNC lost points for being âdirty, too big, and crowdedâ â she really wasnât even interested in the tour after walking across the campus from the parking lot. She loved the campus at Elon but thought that the students we met, including particularly our tour guide, didnât seem academically engaged. Davidson scored big points for intellectual vibe and pretty campus, but the laundry was actually a turn off. She didnât like the idea that her laundry would be commingled with the laundry of hundreds of other people. (The admissions officerâs comment about needing to put a number in everything so that it wouldnât get lost confirmed her worst fears about the joint laundry situation.) All this goes to show that students can be on pretty much the same tours, have the same priorities and still end up with completely different opinions. It is going to be a wild ride!</p>
<p>on the laundry thing, I also lol at Laf. Since my kids have been at private school since 6th grade, we call this âincludedâ not âfreeâ For example the yearbook is included for all students.</p>
<p>But I understand gluckieâs point. Our very first tour with my older D was Dartmouth and I had a very negative feeling about it at the time, they mentioned many things which were not âincludedâ and it just had the whole nickel and diming feel to me. And we know this isnât a 34k school. The next school was Middlebury where many of the same items were included and I just felt a lot more welcomed. D does not attend either of these. The school she does attend does not include Sat night dinner on the meal plan, I would happily pay a bit more for this meal to be part of the plan.</p>
<p>My son got a $55K laptop for free! 
;)</p>
<p>My d went to sleepaway camp for 9 summers and got a jacket for free! And the jacket had her name AND the campâs name. Now, beat that!</p>
<p>DougBetsy and Vitrac- you crack me up!</p>
<p>My law partner and I go to a free breakfast CLE (continuing legal ed) once a month at a law firm. We talk for days in advance about the great breakfast burrito (really is good) we are going to have. You would think we never got fed except by the law firm! Free is good! :)</p>
<p>âMy d went to sleepaway camp for 9 summers and got a jacket for free! And the jacket had her name AND the campâs name. Now, beat that!â</p>
<p>My S got two. One after 5 years and one after 8!</p>
<p>^^^^ Clearly these institutions understand the appeal of getting something for free!</p>
<p>D scratched off about half the schools we visited. Most notably (Harvard, Yale and Duke) Iâm sure theyâre heartbroken, LOL.</p>
<p>EmilybeeâI didnât want to hog the thread and make everyone else envious so I didnât tell the whole truth. The truth is d got a t shirt, a throw blanket and a jacket after 3, 5 and 9 years. And they were all free! And yes, fendrock, I think Wharton teaches an upper level class called âFreebies for Idiots.â</p>