I guess I'd probably start with Penn, then Princeton, then Yale. Then head back to Boston and do day trips for Brown and Dartmouth.

I personally think it's way too much ground to cover in a week, not sure how meaningful any of the visits will be, they might all run together at some point.

We've eaten in Al Forno every time in Providence (we were very sad after graduation!). They have parking and don't take reservations. Go on the early side, but check first in case policy changed. Everything is delicious, but consider the crostata for dessert. It needs to be ordered up front because it is baked for you while you're eating your dinner.

Enjoy the trip.

wyatt92 makes a very good point. Any schools we visited when my kids were tired or saw too much, they ultimately did not like.

How much time do you have? You are seeing too many schools for one trip. Save Princeton and Penn, maybe Yale for another trip.

Way too many schools in one week and not enough time to actually see what they are like. Have you contacted the schools to find out what programs and tours they have available, when they do them and how long they take. You won't have any time to sit in on classes, get a feeling for the campus area/town they are in (New Haven is a completely different world from Boston).

And the way you describe it - it sounds as if your son is a piece of luggage you are taking along for the ride - rather than that he has a strong interest in any of these schools. Does he know what sort of major he wants? How well will these schools fit with his needs and his interests?

Finally, I know nothing about your son - and perhaps his grades, course work and SAT scores mean that he will be an automatic admission at all of these schools. But - if there is any chance that he doeesn't fall into that category - it would make sense for him to look at some of the many other excellent schools in the area you visiting. (Even though my daughters ended up being admitted to their top choice schools we definitely looked at other options along the way - just to give them some perspctive.)

If it were me I would stick to New England, make real in-depth visits to the schools you visit, and do include a couple of non-ivies.

How about:
Day 1 Harvard, night in Boston or Cambridge.
Day 2 North to Dartmouth; return to Boston.
Day 3 South to Providence, visit Brown; stay in CT near Yale.
Day 4 Visit Yale, another night in CT.
Day 5 Drive approx 3.5 hours to Princeton.
Day 6 South to Philadelphia, visit UPenn.

You are now at least a 6 hour drive from Boston -- how about changing your flight to just fly home from Philly, or maybe getting a commuter flight back to BOS?

I agree, that's too many schools to see in one week. And you know how difficult it is to get into those schools? Are you setting him up for disappointment?

Some people, like our kids, decided to apply for all their dream schools. Then, IF they got in, we visited the schools, and our student would spend the night on campus in a dorm with another student, to get the BEST and truest look into campus life.

Whoa--tough crowd here today. Next time you should just pose the question as the "traveling salesman problem": say "I have to be in Boston, Hanover, Providence, New Haven, Princeton Philadelphia and back to Boston, how can I do this most efficently". Leave out any mention of ivy league schools or a son, or anything else!!

I assume that you are coming from another part of the country and may or may not have the opportunity to come back to the east coast with or without your son anytime soon
Wyatt92's suggestion is what I would choose. If you are equally interested in all the locations and there's no specific date that you have to be at any specific school,get the longest part of the drive done first. What time of the day are you arriving? Can you drive straight to the Philly area? It is as mentioned about a 6 hour drive, so if you're arriving late, just try to get as far as New Jersey. You can always drive the last hour or two in the morning. You decide if you'd rather check in and out of hotels each night, or try to stay between pairs of schools and have to drive a little to both.
Philadelphia and Princeton are about 50 miles apart you can stay in between them.
Next go to New Haven and afterwards drive towards Providence(100 miles). That evening continue driving to stay overnight on the way to Hanover. You won't be that close to Hanover, but sometimes just getting an hour closer to the destination makes all the difference. Next morning drive to Hanover (a couple of hours and then come back towards Boston, possibly staying a second night at the hotel between Providence and Boston. Last day you can go into Boston.

You will have some really busy days, but also some leisure time.

Ist day/night: arrive in Boston, drive to Central NJ Between Princeton and Philly)
2nd day Drive to Penn, Leisure time in Philly and back to another night at same NJ hotel
3rd Day. Drive to Princeton U, visit and then drive toward New Haven for overnight.
4th day Visit Yale, then drive to Providence and visit Brown. After visits, drive toward southern NH to get somewhat closer to Hanover.
5th day Visit Dartmouth, see some of the area (NH amd VT), and return back to same hotel OR go straight to Boston Hotel
(long day if driving all the way back to Boston)
6th day after staying in same hotel in southern NH (or starting out in Boston already), drive to Harvard. Still have some leisure time in Boston . Also, you have the shortest drive to the airport at the end. That will sound good after an exhausting week!

Visit Harvard by subway. There is nowhere to park.

Don't pick up the car until you are ready to leave Boston for Dartmouth, though you can take a bus quite easily and not have to rent a car at all.

Providence, New Haven, Princeton, and Philadelphia are all best reached by train. Amtrak stops within a few blocks of all the campuses you want to visit except for Princeton, where you change to a shuttle train into town ("Princeton Junction, change for Princeton" is the eternal call of the conductor).

With some planning, you could take the bus to Dartmouth and get a train from White River Junction to New Haven and on from there south.

Why public transportation: (1) this is an exhausting trip with heavy traffic on all but the Hanover legs and much city driving. On the train, you can relax, nap and see the countryside. (2) none of these institutions permit freshmen and perhaps any undergrads to have cars, so this is how your son is going to be getting around if he becomes a student. Is this acceptable to you or him?

I wouldn't be discouraged by the comments on the difficulty of getting in to these schools. They are essentially impossible to get into by any rational standard, but I have known people who got into Harvard and Yale, certainly, who did not get into their safety schools. These schools get so many applications that every freshman could be her/his high school valedictorian.

Aneccdotally but never quite denied, if admission were based on grades alone, every single freshman at Harvard and MIT would be Asian American. They don't want that. They are looking for a mix of backgrounds, skills, talent and racial and economic diversity.

Good grades and test scores won't get you in, but less than perfect grades and scores won't keep you out if you have the ability to profit from their programs. It is a complete tossup as to whether anyone gets in -- unless the parents are alums who can donate a building or an endowed professorship! So go for it!

Depending on how you feel about driving, you could do the southern part of the trip by train. After arrival in Boston, take a train to New Haven and taxi to Yale. Train to Philadelphia (Amtrak.com for both), rent a car there and see Penn and Princeton. This should take half the trip.

Then train back to Boston. Brown is a nice day trip. You could do Dartmouth as a day trip by car - it is about a 2 1/2 hour drive from Boston, but staying overnight might be a bit more reasonable. I would highly advise against trying to do Dartmouth by public transportation - we have family in that area who do not drive and public transit options are not that great. Harvard is a subway ride from Boston. When we did college trips, where to eat was not even a thought - a lot of time we were so exhausted that someplace quick near hotel was what we did.

You can certainly do this is a week. Be aware "leaving in a few weeks" - it will matter exactly when. Traffic over Easter/Passover weekend could be heavy. The Boston Marathon/Patriots Day is M 4/16 and traffic, hotels, etc will be a challenge that weekend - and somewhat the following week as it is public school vacation week in MA and ME.

As a parent who made our last tuition payment for Kid #2 three months ago, I know that each family/each kid shops for colleges in their own way. And as an alumni interviewer for one of the mentioned colleges, I can guarantee that Ackislander is incorrect about GPAs and ethnicity is incorrect. You obviously know that all these colleges are elite and deny admission to many qualified students each year - including many high school valedictorians. But congratulations on having a kid who can consider admission to these schools and good luck on the process.

"...if admissions were based on grades alone, every single freshman at Harvard and MIT would be Asian-American." I'd call that a quite a bit of hyperbole, among other things!

"Good grades and test scores won't get you in..." Perhaps so, at least not automatically, but without them, your chances are kind of slim.

I don't see Cornell or Columbia on the list. Do you or your son have some problem with universities with names that begin in "C"?

I am not going to get into a flame war, but some of you have very unrealistic ideas about academic admissions. Harvard has admitted at least one convicted murderer, and all these schools will admit someone with 1200 SATs if they see something they want.

When I was involved with Med School admissions, we turned down a candidate with perfect MCAT scores because he was an arrogant jerk. None of us would have allowed him to treat one of our children, and that was our Gold Standard. Did he get in somewhere else? No doubt. Maybe he even grew up.

"Aneccdotally but never quite denied, if admission were based on grades alone, every single freshman at Harvard and MIT would be Asian American." wow

I agree with others that you are trying to see a lot of schools in one week and it might be better to try to narrow down the choices. That way your son can get a better idea of the campuses and towns/cities where the schools are located. If you want to go on tours of the schools these are typically offered once in the morning, once in the afternoon.

Does your son have any sense of whether he wants to be in a big city or smaller city? Ideal size of the school?

i am sure you know that there are very good schools that are not in the Ivy League

For specific places to stay (and without knowing anything about how much you want to spend) I would recommend the Sheraton in University City for Penn and the Charles Hotel in Cambridge for Harvard.

The point is, Ackislander, that the examples you give are hardly the norm. I'll still bet my money on a combination good grades, good SAT scores and some quality intangibles.

Don't let the naysayers get you down. My parents and I did a similar college tour when I was in high school but for schools in Virginia and North Carolina. I had no intention of applying to all of the schools, but we had a great time seeing all those schools we'd always heard about. In fact, we still talk about how much fun we had on the trip, and our impressions of the schools. I knew I wasn't going to get into UVA, but does that mean we all didn't enjoy the campus tour, and seeing those old buildings on the quad that UVA made into "status" apartments for students? Not at all.

And my parents made me plan the whole trip. i'm sure I consulted them when finalizing our schedule, but I mapped out all the schools, figured how long it was between them. Called the schools and found out when they had tours, and made arrangements.

We didn't have hotel rooms for most of the trip, and made reservations in a lot of the towns when we got there. We usually asked the admissions office where we should stay. We also didn't overplan restaurants. Granted this was all pre-internet.

Those schools I was interested in, I did go back and spend a weekend at later.

So go for it!

It's true that all of these schools are difficult to get into - but none of them admit applicants that are not qualified academically. But they do look for other factors. They try to have at least a fair mix of students in a lot of ways - which is why it is easier to get into these schools if you come from somewhere other than the northeast - since they get SO many applicants from the NE yuo can get in with lower grades and scores from other parts of the country. Also realize that "heritge" is given seom weighting in the acceptance process (I don;t man ethnicity - I mean other family members having attended and succeeded there).

I wasn;t trying to be discouraging - or disparage the student - I just think that sometimes people don;t consider enough different choices. And to me, lookin at nothing but ivies, sounds more ike parental aspirations than a realistic look at what the student wants to get out of their education.

Also - if all of these schools - why not Columbia too?

I think you've had some good logistical advice but if I were doing the trip, I'd land in Boston and go right to Dartmouth.

Day three, drive to Penn and day four tour Penn and Princeton. Day five drive to Yale, day six, drive to Brown and then to Boston, and turn in the car. Leave late enough on day seven to tour Harvard, and go over there on night 6 to walk around and become familiar with the area.

You can tweak this schedule depending on which schools where you may want to spend more time.

It's a busy week, and you may want to check on busses and trains, though that would give you less flexibility.

Flying into boston and out of philly sounds good. But if your student isnt starting college this fall, then how about new england this spring and philly in late summer? Or considering the summer temperatures, perhaps the pther way around. It will cost a bit more and i imagine you will want to save money for college, but it may make for more meaningful visits and may be a good investment in the long run. My main advice is to enjoy this time with yor kid...take photos...take your time...have good conversations ...and have fun.

I thank each of you for your reply. While this is not a college admissions website but rather a travel website, I clearly have asked for advice on travel logistics and not a review on how my child can or cannot be accepted into any of these schools. For a kid who has great grades, test scores, and some great leadership and volunteer gigs, the "Ivys," which are our concentration on this trip, may be a reality for him and touring them will clearly open up the idea of options in a sea of thousands of educational possibilities. Having said that, back to the original proposition of logistics: I have purchased plane tickets for into and out of Boston. I am driving everyday to university arranged college informational sessions and tours. I need practical logistic advice on the following itinerary:

Monday: Arrive Boston noon. Pick up car at airport and drive to Harvard for 2:00 Information session and tour. Hang out a bit. Get back into the car and drive (2 1/2 hours)to Hanover, NH for overnight. Need area accommodation advice perhaps in White River Jct., VT?

Tuesday: Dartmouth info and tour. Leave town to New Haven, CT. Taking Route 91 (about 3 hours). Is this a good route? Overnight in New Haven. Need area accommodation advice.

Wednesday: Yale info and tour. Hang out. Leave town and drive to Princeton, NJ or Philadelphia and need accommodation advice. Please read next step and help me out here. **

Thursday: Princeton info at 10 a.m. and tour at 11:15 a.m. I am assuming tour will last one hour. Need to drive to Philadelphia to Penn info session that starts at 1:00. Will I make it on time? This Penn day ends at 4:30. Will overnight in Philadelphia. **

** Would you advise that I drive from Yale to Princeton and try to make it on time for Penn or just go from Yale to Phily tour Penn and try to to Princeton next day on drive back toward Boston?

Friday: I have to drive from either Philadelphia or Princeton to Boston with a stop at Brown for a self guided tour and no info session. We will be in the Boston area Friday night to spend Saturday just hanging out in Boston. We fly out Sunday morning at 6 a.m.!

Saturday: Boston to play and be tourists. Maybe drive up to Salem?

Sunday: 6:00 a.m. flight

So, another logistical question: Where should we stay Friday night and Saturday night. Is there somewhere in Boston or Cambridge for Friday night that would be a great base for sightseeing on Saturday? Would it be best to stay in the same place Saturday night for our early departure on Sunday or drop car at airport on Saturday night and stay at an airport hotel on Saturday?

Thanks for your logistical advice.

New Haven has a dearth of hotels go figure for a college town. the place to stay is the Omni. Right on the town green.

I have no advice as to whether to stay overnight in New Haven or go onto your next location.

White River Junction VT is not a very charming place to stay. I would try to find something in Hanover or Lebanon. We live too close to the area to have spent time overnight there. There are quite a few places including motels and B &Bs either on the green or within a few miles of the campus.

Going from Hanover to New Haven via I-91 is the only logical route I can think of.

Trying to do the Princeton info session and tour and then make it to Penn for a 1:00 session is not realistic. Our son goes to Penn and we have made the Princeton to Penn campus trip on one of our trips down in our never-ending quest to find a good route from the NYC area to Philadelphia.

If you stay at the Charles Hotel or Inn at Harvard in Cambridge Friday night you would be able to see Harvard Square that evening and would be able to get the T (subway) into Boston easily for sight seeing. There is plenty to see right in Boston (as opposed to going to Salem for the day) and, again, it would give your son more of an idea of what going to Harvard would be like.

With such an early flight Sunday I would stay near the airport

Since you're driving straight from Cambridge to Hanover, you'll need the car. In Cambridge there is parking at the Charles Hotel, under Holyoke Center, and at the Garage. Street parking spaces have strict time limits.

When you return to Boston, I'd return the car right away on Friday night. You don't need it in Boston and paying to park will run you about $35 a night, unless you park in the Boston Common garage on Saturday/Sunday for $11.

Stay in the same hotel for both nights and take a taxi to the airport for your early Sunday morning flight. Any hotel in Back Bay, and the waterfront area is convenient for sightseeing. I would recommend walking the Freedom Trail on Saturday and forget about driving to Salem. Enjoy Boston--and let your son and yourself get to know it a bit more. You may be coming back!

I have not driven to Philadelphia in years but I do remember it taking what seemed like a long time from the NJ turnpike into the city, so I'd be inclined to advise you to reschedule Princeton and do it on the way back. Others may have up-to-date advice on that.

No recommendations for hotels in those cities but usually the college website lists hotels with distance from campus under visitor information. Good luck with everything. When is your trip? Hotel availability and prices differ week to week depending on what else is going on.

From my experience with Boston, I would not rent the car before heading to Harvard. Two hours from landing to appointment? I've found the car places really slow at Logan, and driving & parking at Harvard may take a lot longer than expected. You might just taKe the MRT or a taxi to Harvard, then get the car afterwards. Of course, then you'll have the luggage, so maybe have son take MRt to Harvard (easy)and you meet him there. That way, at least he'll make the appointment.
And unless you'll be driving outside of the city on Saturday, I'd get rid of the car as soon as I arrived back in Boston. It is one of the least car friendly cities anywhere. Luckily, they have good public transport and lots of cabs.

I do like staying at one of the two airport hotels if I have a really early flight out of Logan. It's one of the rare places I'll use priceline as there are only the two "four star" (??) hotels in the airport section. The last few times I "won" a room for about $109 vs the $200+ rack rate.

On Thursday, I'd do a self tour of Princeton BEFORE the info session -- then head to Penn right after the info session ends.

Re New Haven accommodations - the Omni is the only "big chain" hotel right in town, but The Study is the nicest hotel in town. There's also a Courtyard, but it's a few minutes drive to campus, not walking distance. There are many standard-issue motels about 10-15 minutes from New Haven, in Orange and Milford -- these are your typical Courtyard, Residence Inn, Homewood Suite types. We are staying at the Residence Inn Milford for graduation because the Courtyard New Haven was charging in excess of $500 a night and we simply refuse to pay that for a Courtyard.

As for your schedule, you're doing fine until you get to Thursday's and Friday's plans. I think you're really pushing it to try to do Princeton and Penn on Thursday and then make the long Friday drive with a stop at Brown on Friday.
You won't have enough time on Thursday to make it to Penn by 1 p.m. Is there a later info session at Penn? As for moving one of those to Friday, that won't work. It'll be tough enough having the long drive from either Philadelphia or Princeton to Boston, with a stop at Brown. I don't see how you could possibly fit in an additional Princeton or Penn visit on Friday.

Well, haven't you gotten lots of advice regarding travel! And also about college admissions etc. You need to re read what nytravler says not all this stuff about how to get here and there. Just wwat does this student want? I'm a Yale grad now living near Harvard...and I have at least three questions

1) What do you hope to accomplish with a quick look-see at so many Ivy League schools? To me it seems sensible to visit one school (well maybe two) with thorough tours and interviews. Then take in several more at a later date.

2) Can your student actually be accepted into these Ivy League schools and what exactly are his major areas of interest? I truly believe that this is most important as each university has excellence in certain departments.

3) Is it so important even if you can afford it to go to an Ivy League school while overlooking other institutions located closer? In other words, have you considered the offerings of institutions that aren't Ivy League? Unbelievable the number of excellent colleges just in the Boston area.

Bill in Boston

Bill, the OP specifically asked for info on getting to these schools within a certain time frame.

Whether the son has the potential to get accepted or if the family is considering other universities is really none of our business in this instance, and is truly just raining on their parade..

On the other hand, if Op comes back later and asks what we think of these schools, then we can happily go beyond the logistics of their road trip.

I'm sorry Bill, i shouldn't have directed that at you. I just feel sorry when a poster asks a direct question and can't get a straight answer.

Moo, one restaurant we enjoyed on the way from Hartford to Boston was Rein's deli:

http://www.reinsdeli.com/

It was recommended by someone here the first time we drove between daughters at Columbia and Boston Univ. (BTW, the one who graduated with an engineering degree at Columbia had a high school GPA of only 3.1 and few extracurricular activities, so there is always hope! Of course, she's half Asian, so maybe that was the key....)

You should also get the radio station numbers for stations that are good for traffic reports every 10 minutes. With times that tight, you may need to reroute around accidents. If you do run into delays on the road, do you have back up plans? May want to make some for peace of mind while driving. Will you be doing all the driving yourself, or can your student help out? Probably just you if it is a rental car. So plan for a bit of time to get over driver fatigue each day in order to keep your and your child safe

On the drive between CT and NJ, get your traffic reports from WCBS, 880 on the AM dial. News and traffic every 10 minutes ``on the 8s'' (08, 18, 28, etc).

We usually take the Merrit Parkway to the Tappan Zee bridge to the Garden State Pkway, unless the traffic report says otherwise.

Apologies to moo...I deserved the comment from lcuy. Only thing wanted was travel advice, not long distant though well intended extraneous ideas.

Hey Capxxx, Do you know the highway numbers for the Merritt Parkway, Tappan Zee bridge and the Garden State Parkway. I was just going to take interstate 95 but this sounds like a better route. Is is less congested than the 95? Thanks so much. And Bill, obviously from all of the comments I have received you are not the first to chip in with an opinion and I do understand everyone's concerns (college selection is a passionate thing that I have already been through with one kid). But again, I am really looking for logistics as I am not from the area and need practical logistics to maneuver our way through this dense area. Can anyone offer road logistics of how to get from Philly to the Back Bay area of Boston (specific highways)and from there to Logan? Thanks

(BTW, the one who graduated with an engineering degree at Columbia had a high school GPA of only 3.1 and few extracurricular activities, so there is always hope! Of course, she's half Asian, so maybe that was the key....)

Columbia does not lack for Asian students. Maybe it was geographical?

I would take the Merritt Parkway, which turns into the Hutchinson Parkway, and then take the Cross County Parkway and follow signs to the George Washington Bridge. Others will have their own routes.

Check these on a map--I think the Wilbur Cross Pkwy. in Conn. turns into the Merritt. The advantage to the parkway system, as opposed to the interestates, is that you don't have trucks.

From Philly you're going to Boston via Providence, correct? So 95, wherever you pick it up, will bring you to Providence. From there take 95 N. to 93 N. to Boston, where you'll actually be going south for a bit, and get off at the Massachusetts Ave. exit, and take Mass. Ave. north to Back Bay. Where are you going?

Alternately, it may be faster and easier to stay on 95 North to the Mass. Pike, I90, and get off at Copley Square.

You should have some good maps or a triptik from AAA, or a GPS.

I-287 is the Cross Westchester parkway, and that's the one that goes across the Tappen Zee.

it is definitely better to avoid i-95 for this trip.

Also, I agree with what cw posted above, about getting from Princeton to Penn. It does take quite a while to get into Philadelphia, and I don't think you can make it in the short time frame you have listed. Plus, my recollection is that parking at Penn is even worse than parking around Harvard. you need time to find a garage, then walk to wherever your info session is.

Actually Audchamp, I think they took her because she looks so cute in a hard hat...

Actually Audchamp, I think they took her because she looks so cute in a hard hat...

I am sure she is but there is so much to learn about the new requirements for college admissions.

Dear Moo

Maybe I can save you some driving.

Harvard is the one that is not Yale and is located in Cambridge on this side of the Atlantic.

Yale is the one that is not Harvard and does not have a coop. (I once asked for a Yale sweatshirt at the Harvard Coop and they called security.) And New Haven claims fame to the first hamburger.

Dartmouth is in the woods.

Princeton has the nicest campus of all and you must root for the football team. (My oldest friend is a coach there.)

Penn is in a terrible neighborhood but if you major in cheesesteaks it will be a worthwhile four years.

Brown is near the water.

(Sorry not to reply sooner, I was ... traveling, natch.) Have your route questions been answered?

The Merritt Parkway does indeed turn into the Wilbur Cross Parkway, going southbound. It is restricted-no big trucks, and very pleasant, except when bad weather or a crash bolloxes things up. (Hence the need for radio alerts).

On your northbound return, just after crossing the Tappan Zee bridge look for signs saying W. Cross -- they can be hard to find if you don't know what to look for.

Whoops, my bad -- its W. Cross in the eastern part, and Merritt Pkway in the western part, then 278/87 across the bridge. But the signs do tend to say W. Cross, not Wilbur Cross.

Thanks for the logistics info. I actually did a search on AAA and it mapped out exactly what you are describing. Your suggestions was really a lot of help to me.

Did you do the college tour yet? How did it go?

This is funny because I just got an e-mail from a girlfriend: Her daughter got into "Princeton, Yale, Dartmouth, U. of Pennsylvania, Brown, Cornell, Duke, Vanderbilt, U. of Miami, Wellesley, NYU-Stern Business School, and Johns Hopkins.

She was waitlisted at Harvard & Columbia!

Still waiting to hear from Stanford…this Sunday"

I could ask her how their college tour was; what an extensive list of schools! Hope your tour and outcomes are just as good, moo!

ncounty, your friend must indeed have a superdaughter! Far too many choices, far too much "prestige college" ideology in my opinion. Wondering how one would choose. Important point remains what can you or want to afford? Another important matter is what school/faculty is strong in a particular area of study? Some kids want to be closer to home and some want to be far away. But how many decisions are made for other reasons like a pretty campus? Another factor is often where are my friends going?

Auduchamp1...thanks for a chuckle.

Bill in Boston

I'd wonder why any kid would apply to 15 schools. She may be brilliant, but obviously lacks the ability to make decisions..

"Penn is in a terrible neighborhood but if you major in cheesesteaks it will be a worthwhile four years."

Total and complete bullcrap.

I think when you are shooting for schools of that caliber, it is rational to aim for a higher number because the odds are so low of getting into one of them. I think she did refine the list down as much as she could; she did not apply to MIT or Cal Tech, for instance. I assume she is not an engineering type. I don't know what her interests are.

I don't think it is obvious at all that she is unable to make decisions just because she applied to 15 top schools, lcuy. I am very surprised at that comment from you. No one expected she would get into practically all of them. They were probably hoping for 3 and then get to choose from those 3.

I probably shouldn't say anything, but I think what surprises people about this scattergun approach to picking a school is that most of the schools have little in common other than being prestigious. For example, it is hard to imagine the same person enjoying Brown, a liberal, urban school, and Dartmouth, a conservative rural school. Many people decide on location, and here you have two crummy towns, New Haven and Baltimore, some suburban, some larger city, some good for skiing, some for water skiing. There is also the real ringer, a business school alone among the strong liberal arts programs! (Although I know Sterns requires a core studies program, much to the disgust of the Sternies.) Makes the head spin! However, I'm sure the students in question are very talented and hope they make the right choice.

Sorry ncounty. Its just that most students submits 6-8 applications, so I just thought it was funny. Maybe I should have put a smiley...

No problem, lcuy.... a smiley would have helped. I was stunned to read that from you, goes to show the high esteem I hold you in, eh?

I personally only applied to one school so it is not like I have been in the same boat but most of the kids I know of are applying to this same group of schools....and about the same number.

Fra_diavalo- her parents went to a normal school undergrad and a very prestige school for grad school and I think they feel the product they purchased with the prestige school was worth it. Some kids don't really care where the school is, what the architecture is like, or where their friends are going. The thing these schools have in common may be top level academic talent and being amongst a very high level peer group.

Johns Hopkins, for being in Baltimore, is in a lovely part of town near Roland Park. I have a feeling she is holding out for Stanford though.

I wonder about applying first then visiting those that accept her?

That would be less hectic for certain.

Might not be feasible trip with her timeframe but I would consider.

Fra_Diavolo...exactly! Which is why this whole thread about how many colleges and transport from one Ivy League school to another is &$%#@&!

(said with a smile)

I wasn't gonna comment on the non-travel part of the discussion, but really ....

I don't understand why so many posters assume that ``I want to visit several Ivy League schools'' implies ``so I can decide which to attend when they all accept me.'' It just doesn't follow from the question that the student has been blinded by prestige and has decided that the Ivy League is the only option.

Maybe OP's offspring has gotten as far as ``maybe some kind of Ivy League school'' in addition to several that don't require a plane flight. Maybe they are already familiar with New England colleges and universities, but not the Ivy League. Maybe this is about finding one or two ``long shot'' schools to apply to, as suggested by many guidance counselors.

It is perfectly reasonable to visit schools during spring of junior year, when the thinking is still pretty scatter-shot. Such visits make it `real' to the student and kick-start the discussion about what kind of campus (big/small, urban/rural, east coast/west coast, etc) would be a good match. To that end, it is useful to visit a variety of schools that have nothing in common.

Also, many schools consider the fact that you have visited the place before applying to be a point in your favor at decision time. It suggests you are not taking a shotgun approach to your applications.

Given that they are traveling from far away, it makes sense to pack in a lot of school visits into one trip.

And the trip itself a good excuse for bonding during those tricky high school years, whether or not any applications result, let alone acceptances.

Scheduling such trips after acceptance letters have arrived but before replies are due, may not be an option for busy seniors.

Still smilin.

I must admit I was surprised since all these schools have in common is prestige. If that's all the student is looking for - that's fine. And this early in the process the kid may not really know if they want big city or small town - or have a clue as to major or even general area of interst. (At least no MIT.)

But every kid is advised to apply to one or two safe schools - and it would seem to make sense to look at one or two schools that can provide an excelent education but aren't Ivy. (There are many of these if the student is serious - I went to a state university at the same time a cousin went to Yale - both history majors - and my education was at least as good as his. Althought I did not make all the same connections. Perhaps that is what the student is looking for.)

It's just that there doesn't seem to be a lot of thought behind the list - and I would be surprised if the student gets a real feel for any of the schools on this schedule. When we took our daughters we spent a full day at each school, including attending class (them - not us) - but did fewer schools for each - only ones they were really interested in based on major, location etc.

"Thursday: Princeton info at 10 a.m. and tour at 11:15 a.m. I am assuming tour will last one hour. Need to drive to Philadelphia to Penn info session that starts at 1:00. Will I make it on time? This Penn day ends at 4:30. Will overnight in Philadelphia. **"

You are not going to be able to learn anything useful by visiting these two schools in a span of 6 hours (including transfer time!). Two hours for Princeton! You might as well stay home and watch videos of campus tours. I hope you will submit a trip report for the edification of future scholars, as this is truly an odd assortment of schools, joined only by playing football together decades ago.

Hello Moo:
On my daily browsing trip I came across this rather amusing and informative thread. Thought I'd toss in my two-cents worth.

I'm sure you are all aware that there are some very "good" opportunities for college studies at some of the smaller and less vaunted institutions. I'm the West Coast emissary for my alma mater...Emerson College, Boston.

This is one of hundreds of answers for the potential attendee who rather likes smaller schools (4,000 students) in a downtown city environment (campus is THE Boston Commons). Some of the "newer" buildings are the grande dame Majestic Theater and the historic old Paramount (my cousin dragged me there when I was 16 to see one of her idols...a skinny kid named Sinatra... perform to the screams of the bobby-sox crowd).

Both my California born granddaughter and her Vermont-born husband are Emersonians ('05 and '04)..so there are three of us in our family. When I returned from an overseas hitch, it was difficult finding a school that had room because of all of us returning G.I.s...(waiting periods were up to two years)that's how I discovered little Emerson...and have been closely connected now for over 60 years. I appear at all "College Days" at Southern California high schools and private prep schools, etc. Look for me...I'm the oldest dude in the gym!

Stuart Tower, L.A. (formerly, Quincy, MA)


http://www.emerson.edu/

Emerson College? That is indeed one of many institutions we've learned about since moving to the Boston area. Yes, it does have a good reputation as do others. Let's hear it for the smaller yet reputable colleges.