<p>Oh, sunny, do consider going and/or sending him if it’s not a hardship to do so. Yes, it’s a lot of fun, and the presentations are helpful if you have questions or if you haven’t crawled all over their Web site already. But one of the best parts is that he’ll meet other admits and students who are already there, which means he’ll have friends (including upperclassmen) when he hits the ground next year – and Facebook friends to get acquainted with between now and August (if he’s not on Facebook already, I’d encourage him to get on it during the summer with his HMC email address).</p>
<p>Is it an outright requirement, no. August Pre-Frosh will supply plenty of wacky fun and get him connected with students who are proctors and sponsors, and some Mudders will probably seek him out and friend him on Facebook if he’s there. So it’s not like he’ll be disadvantaged if he doesn’t attend, but I think there’s value in attending. For ED admits in particular, the wait is looooong for communications from the college and ASW makes it real again. I know it was worth it for my son. I think it’s more valuable for the students than for the parents, so you might consider sending him on his own if the money is tight.</p>
<p>Oh, and he’ll have a gold star on his name tag because he applied ED. ;)</p>