<p>My D visited Hamilton for an overnight and initially she loved it. She clicked with the people and even claimed to “miss it”. But after visiting a more mid-sized school she realized that she didn’t really want a small LAC after all. Soon after she had an overnight visit to Colgate - which again she found to be beautiful - but again not for her.</p>
<p>Lemoyne College has been flooding my daughter with full color mailings - in March of her senior year. I think one of their telemarketers lied and said she was interested in the college, because each mailing thanks her for her saying she was interested.</p>
<p>My son had Johns Hopkins as his top school since 10yrs old. After visiting, the school had the worst campus tour, admissions presentation rep was not informative. My group had people from the West Coast and were not happy as well. It seems that the school made no effort to get potential students to attend. Big disappointment.</p>
<p>Amherst – tour only walked around the outside of buildings, so no idea who or what was inside and made absolutely no attempt to give you a real feel for the college. Admissions director was snobby and off-putting during info session, said we shouldn’t be asking what the college can do for our kids but what our kids might bring to their college if they’re lucky enough to be considered for admission. Told my kid to take SATs again because 2380 might not be high enough for consideration. The whole attitude was “of course you want to be here because we’re the best. We don’t have to show you why.”</p>
<p>Dear S had this same view of Amherst. I thought he was being overly harsh, but he didn’t even like the plush red carpet of leather swivel chairs of the room which held the admissions pitch. He fell in love with Williams the same day. The admissions pitch was in the Jewish Studies center – wooden floor and folding chairs. Not pretentious in his opinion.</p>
<p>To be fair, I have known kids who felt the opposite way about the two schools so this post isn’t against Amherst – just a 17 year-olds random observations about it.</p>
<p>Amherst (poor presenter and tour compared to Williams, which he lovedl)
Colby (looked like a movie set, students not diverse; he loved Bates & Bowdoin)
Dartmouth (the tour [and tour guide] killed it for him)
Duke (campus and student body too big–tour waaaaaaay too long)</p>
<p>Middlebury seemed a bit too slick but stayed on the list. The funny thing is that we, his parents, got the same impressions!</p>
<p>Did you all realize the OP’s child may be graduating soon from college by now? We did an east coast visit and saw colleges son wouldn’t (MIT visit he refused Harvard hour with his dad- if I had been along we would have gone) while son was in college. So, parents, go ahead and make your empty nest college tour plans- probably more fun, anyhow.</p>
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<p>Just shows how timeless this thread is!</p>
<p>I am laughing at Tally46’s post 3885. It describes our Amherst visit experience in 2005. I guess they haven’t changed much since then.</p>
<p>While I agree that Middlebury’s a great school and students and families should be careful about rejecting schools based on a quick snapshot, I should point out that Middlebury does not have an unusually large percentage of graduates marrying other graduates. The whole “60 percent” thing is a myth. Approximately 13 percent of Middlebury grads marry other M grads. There are many other LACs with higher intermarriage rates.</p>
<p>Minute 12 has stats from some peer schools.
[60%</a> on Vimeo](<a href=“http://vimeo.com/10793019]60%”>60% on Vimeo)</p>
<p>Drexel and Penn state</p>
<p>Sent from my DROID BIONIC using CC</p>
<p>^^ There are many from our school who think they are going to like Drexel, then rule it out after a visit. It seems to really take an urban lover (or someone who can overlook that) more than most schools. George Washington and Case Western also fall into that, but not nearly as much.</p>
<p>After our second visit to OSU, our daughter crossed it off the list because she didn’t like the dorms. In her defense, the dorms at all of the other schools she was accepted to were “nicer”, but it was still disappointing that she wouldn’t consider Ohio State.</p>
<p>Harvard. It was abundantly clear from the outset that they didn’t care whether you were there or not and hold tours and information sessions only because it is expected. Three tour guides were assigned to split up a peak week group of about 500 people with the predictable result that two-thirds of the tour could hear absolutely nothing their guides said. If anything, the information session was worse, and I nearly walked out after hearing how condescending the associate dean of admissions was to some poor kid from a rural public high school in the Midwest. </p>
<p>My kid hadn’t wanted to tour there in the first place, but doing so solidified his decision not to even bother “entering the lottery” (as the admissions guy put it).</p>
<p>Vanderbilt - DS is interested in mechanical engineering. Scheduled info session and general tour, but also made appointment with engineering professor. Prior to attending I had understood that Vandy was strong in medicine, all the way down to engineering (prosthetic limbs, robots to work with autism, etc.). </p>
<p>We asked the professor what would be their strengths in mechanical engineering (expecting to hear the topics above). His response - “we teach mechanical engineering, no specialty.” </p>
<p>We asked about the internship opportunities. His response had to do with students finding their own jobs over the summer, some may be summer camp counselors. (My impression - no help from Vandy engineering or career services to land a good engineering internship!) </p>
<p>DS commented that we had toured the engineering labs at some of the other universities that we had visited. His comment was that he didn’t have the time to show DS around, nor did he have students available. He did give us permission to wander around the building on our own. 
Uhhh… sorry to take up so much of your time! </p>
<p>The Mechanical Engineering building seemed old and small compared to some of the other schools we had toured.</p>
<p>I was definitely disappointed in this school - for my son and his major. I’m sure if you are interested in anything medical, it would be a great option.</p>
<p>Williams College.</p>
<p>I knew going in that this was probably a no-go school as it was probably too small for DD14. And I was right.</p>
<p>Though the area is beautiful, it was too small & too remote for my daughter. </p>
<p>And a cat jumped on the hood of my car when we were pulling out and wouldn’t get off. I think even he wanted to get the heck out of there.</p>
<p>Creekland,</p>
<p>I think it’s because of their tour. You’re crossing three and four lane roads to go from building to building. My bet is most of your classes are in one area and you go to the other areas as needed, but their tour is very intimidating… My opinion from 13 years ago anyway… :)</p>
<p>Sent from my DROID BIONIC using CC</p>
<p>It always saddens me when people base their opinions of a college on the tour guide. Yes, I know, the college picks who they want to represent them and their student body. But in reality, these are 19 year olds. They have good days and bad days.</p>
<p>My S was a tour guide. He isn’t normally an extrovert, but he needed an on-campus job and admissions was the only place hiring. He LOVED his college. But there were times he gave tours when he was tired or stressed, and for two weeks he thought he was battling some minor virus before he finally discovered he had mono. During those two weeks I know that on Junior Visiting Day he gave tours to large groups when his voice wasn’t projecting no matter how hard he tried. (They eventually put him on prednisone because his throat was so swollen). I’m sure for a time he appeared indifferent or bored. He wasn’t either of those things - he was doing his best, but he was sick. And the admissions office needs all hands on deck on these big visiting days, so he went.</p>
<p>So give your tour guide a break. If she’s a theater major and doesn’t know much about the engineering department, remember she’s got a life outside of giving tours, got a lot of work to do, and frankly isn’t being paid very much for this job. If he’s too preppy or too much of a slob for you, well look around at the other students and see how they are dressed - is your tour guide a typical student?</p>
<p>Its been a few years since I’ve been on tours, but I’ll say my bit anyway</p>
<p>First sweep visited Swarthmore, Wesleyan, Yale, Princeton. Wesleyan was dismal as hell that day, and a depressing tiny little town, and then a fairly lackluster experience at swarthmore basically killed the LAC for me. Princeton was beautiful, yale enticing, plus I was a wee student awed by their rep so I kept them on the list.</p>
<p>Second sweep was Boston: Brown, Harvard, MIT, Tufts. MIT was dismal as hell, didn’t even finish the tour, far too much focus on engineering. (I wanted a pure math major) Tufts was just a confusing campus with a long walk to an impersonal info session in a huge auditorium. Walked out halfway through. Harvard was okay. Brown was wonderful, brilliant tour guide and info session leader, but more applied than pure math…</p>
<p>Later sporadic visits included Michigan (where I was told that Harvard, Stanford, Princeton and Chicago were the best math schools). Carnegie Mellon where I again walked out halfway through the info session. Dartmouth which was okay, but my family had me keep it on the list because I had serious legacy. </p>
<p>Now I’m happily embedded at Chicago.</p>
<p>I wish our daughter would cross some off of her list! As of the end of this month, we will have toured 14 schools, and she’s only crossed off Duke, Davidson and Northwestern. We all found Davidson to be too intense and small for her, and Northwestern seemed very homely and dreary to us.(father in law is an alum so we were all excited to see it). On to Brown and BC …to be continued… Very much liked U.Richmond…but the location she wasn’t crazy about.(suburban) Talk about location, LOVED everything about Tulane. My husband boycotted that trip because he thinks NOLA isn’t safe weatherwise, (or otherwise)but we both came back loving the school and will return for a longer visit in the Fall. Kids looked bright, slightly sophisticated and engaged. Even the boys looked bright, which we’re finding to be not always be the case . UVA…nice rah rah vibe if you’re into that but not sure its for her…</p>