My daughter is now finished with her 2nd year of college at CU Boulder which has been going great for her. My focus lately has been encouraging our 11th grade son to keep his grades up, and we have been taking some college tours this spring to get ready for college applications this summer.
The college tour process has been really fun for us. Josh has a tight group of buddies with similar interests when looking at schools. So we have coordinated looking at schools together and gone as a group to a few schools with the boys and their moms. Rather than blow in and out of a school with a quick tour and onto the next, we have tried to make the trip long enough for the boys to really get a feel for the campus and town. At all of our tours so far, we have been in touch with a current student at the campus that either the boys or the parents know, hoping to get an insider's view on what their experience has been. At a few of the campus' the boys went out with the insider at night to get a feel for the nightlife and meet other students to really picture if they could fit in there. I have a friend who had so many schools to visit with her son last year that they would take cross country red-eye flights, arriving in the early morning to rush to a school tour and head to another school in the afternoon. I don't feel an exhausting trip like that would create a favorable impression of a school.
We have made our trips as economical as possible by sharing the cost on car rentals and scouting for inexpensive hotels and air fare. I have previously posted that before our daughter went away to college, we started putting all of our household purchases on our Marriott Visa to build up those points and use for college related trips to visit her, or now visit schools. Our next visit to TCU in Texas next month will be free accomodations using our Marriott points.
I am hoping that our college tours are helping our son not only narrow down his list but also get him excited and stay motivated that this hard work his junior year will pay off with good options for him. It has also been a fun time to spend with him one on one and at each campus I find myself getting a little teary at moments thinking that before long he will be flying off too.
The college tour process has been really fun for us. Josh has a tight group of buddies with similar interests when looking at schools. So we have coordinated looking at schools together and gone as a group to a few schools with the boys and their moms. Rather than blow in and out of a school with a quick tour and onto the next, we have tried to make the trip long enough for the boys to really get a feel for the campus and town. At all of our tours so far, we have been in touch with a current student at the campus that either the boys or the parents know, hoping to get an insider's view on what their experience has been. At a few of the campus' the boys went out with the insider at night to get a feel for the nightlife and meet other students to really picture if they could fit in there. I have a friend who had so many schools to visit with her son last year that they would take cross country red-eye flights, arriving in the early morning to rush to a school tour and head to another school in the afternoon. I don't feel an exhausting trip like that would create a favorable impression of a school.
We have made our trips as economical as possible by sharing the cost on car rentals and scouting for inexpensive hotels and air fare. I have previously posted that before our daughter went away to college, we started putting all of our household purchases on our Marriott Visa to build up those points and use for college related trips to visit her, or now visit schools. Our next visit to TCU in Texas next month will be free accomodations using our Marriott points.
I am hoping that our college tours are helping our son not only narrow down his list but also get him excited and stay motivated that this hard work his junior year will pay off with good options for him. It has also been a fun time to spend with him one on one and at each campus I find myself getting a little teary at moments thinking that before long he will be flying off too.
At University of Oregon waiting for the campus tour
At CU Boulder getting a fraternity tour by a family friend
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