Chicago College Trip
 

Any advice on where to stay while looking at various Chicago colleges this week. Plan on starting at Lake Forest, NW, onto Loyola, and ending at U of C.
I am unfamiliar with the city and would appreciate any help. We're hoping to do some sightseeing and shopping as well.
Thanks.

Any hotel in the greater downtown area would be your best bet. You will be in the center of all the locations and it will be very easy to use public transportation to get to all the above mentioned locations. Your hotel concierge or front desk can provide you with the best option on getting to the college of the day. All the subway lines meet in the downtown area and you can connect to suburban buses if necessary. It's very painless and cheap. Even if you have a car and plan on using it downtown is still your best bet. It's pretty much in the center, but be prepared to pay high parking fees.

Good luck with your college trip! :-)

We can be more helpful if we have an idea of:
how you are getting here
whether you will have a car
how much time you have
what your budget is

My recommendation would be to stay in Evanston or downtown, maybe a night in each

We are traveling by car-arriving Thursday late morning, leaving on Sunday. I'm thinking I'll pay high fees to park my car (if we stay in the city) and take the public transportation to all of these campuses if possible. I'd like to stay in a safe area w/convenient travel options. I'm not looking for a nice middle of the road option when it comes to price. Thanks

OK, two more questions:
What direction are you coming from?
Which school is your child's favorite at this point?

We're coming from St. Louis (yes, I hear your groans)! At this point, she's totally undecided. Getting her to decide even this much has been like pulling teeth! (She plans on a Liberal Arts degree....)

You have two half days, and two full days to tour four schools, correct? None of the schools has a Sunday tour, so you'll have to decide how important that is.

My personal recommendation would be to start at Lake Forest on Thursday, then drive to Evanston Thursday evening (takes about 45 minutes) and stay at the Hilton Garden Inn or the Hotel Orrington. You can walk around Evanston and see some of Northwestern that evening; check out their theatre and dance offerings. Then grab the first tour Friday morning and drive to Loyola (20 minutes) for their Friday afternoon tour. Eat in the Rogers Park neighborhood - it's pretty funky and not as upscale as Evanston. If money is not an issue, drive downtown after dinner and stay in the Loop (figure 30-40 minutes to drive). (If you wanted to save some money, take the El train from Evanston to Loyola and back, staying in Evanston a second night.)

Saturday sounds like it should be a well-deserved break. Stay downtown if you can, and enjoy the parks, shopping and museums. There are many good hotels in the Loop, River North or Michigan Avenue area. Here is a map of many (but not all) downtown hotels and tourist stops.
www.chicagotraveler.com/chicago-hotel-map.htm

This will give you most of Sunday to visit Hyde Park (U of Chicago) which is really beautiful and kind of stands on its own. I know I said there are no official tours on Sundays, but it is less hectic to drive there on the weekend,(about 20 minutes from the Loop) and I suspect you could catch a student to give you some of the particulars. And, after a late lunch or early dinner, you are a short drive from I-55 back to St. Louis.

Be sure to ask about university discount rates when booking a hotel room. The visitor's page on each college's website will give you more information on hotels. BTW, some schools like a reservation for tours, others do not care.

Having visited at least 8 colleges in the past few months with our son (not counting the one my daughter goes to and the consortium colleges associated with it), I've learned a little bit about tours, info sessions, etc.!

If you're really interested in tours, info sessions and the like, rather than just walking around the campuses, make sure you check their web sites. We did a tour of Syracuse University this past week. We were the only ones on the tour! And there were no info sessions being held this month. September is really not the best month for visiting colleges because they're involved in getting the current students in and settled.

Being the only ones on the S.U. tour was certainly not a bad thing. We wound up with a personally taylored tour! But we would really have liked to be able to attend one of the info sessions as that's where you really learn about admissions standards, finanacial aid, etc.

In July, we had the opposite experience with Indiana University. We tried to book a tour a couple weeks ahead of time and were told that all the tours for the two days we'd be there were full. They did tell us to come in and check for cancellations when we got there. When we checked in, they told us that, although there were already 89 people signed up for the tour, they would be glad to add us. And that there was an information session an hour and a half before the tour that we were welcome to attend. We did go to the info session and found it so helpful that we decided not to take what was undoubtedly going to be a very crowded
tour.

In our experience, some schools definitely want reservations and limit the size of their tours. Others don't. But you need to check ahead of time.

We've also found that sometimes, if your child is only mildly interested, just walking around the campus can tell you all you really need to know.

Good luck!

We've used Priceline for our college trips and that has worked out well.

Thanks so much for all of the help you have given us. We're ready to head out tomorrow!

Sounds like I may have missed opportunity by now, but if not, we stayed at the Staybridge suites in Oakwood Terrace and it was a nice area, very safe feeling, drive into town not bad, but we also took commuter train one day to avoid parking fees. Plenty of restaurants nearby, including a Giordano's pizzeria. Nice room, has a kitchen (good for breakfast and leftovers) and under $100 a night.

bethmac, do you by any chance mean Oak<b>brook</b> Terrace?

Keep in mind that NU and the U of C are on the quarter system. There may be no-one on campus student-wise with the exception of the fraternities and sororities preparing for rush.

It looks like the U of C may have move-in for Freshmen starting this Sunday (9/16) which means things will be nuts, and you probably won't get any attention from anyone official.

Perhaps you might wait until fall quarter is underway.

HTH, Racy

Oakbrook Terrace?

not very convenient for what the OP needs.....

Not that the OP will see this, but according to my NU alumni calendar classes start Tuesday, so there should be plenty of students around right now. NU has delayed rush, so that doesn't start until January.