My Experience with College Visits

Clemson Tiger Statue: You have to play the part.

One of the most common question for any high schooler, especially a junior or senior, is “Where are you going to college?” or “What college do you want to go to?” No matter the situation, this question always seems to come up when having a conversation. While the repetitive questioning can become annoying, the road to college should not be taken lightly, for it is likely the most important decision in a young adult’s life.

I have never been the type of person to have thoroughly planned my future. As a kid I did not have an idea as to what I wanted to do. When people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I never knew how to respond. Coincidentally, I did not even think about college until the beginning of my second semester of junior year, when my parents literally forced me to select some colleges I wanted to visit. Between then and now, I have visited eight schools (Stanford, Berkeley, USC, UCLA, Vanderbilt, Duke, Clemson, and Texas), and formulated a solid idea as to what colleges I want to apply to.

It isn’t necessary for a high school student to visit schools before they apply, especially all of them, but it is a good idea to. My visits allowed me to figure out the types of schools I like, something I had no idea about in January. If it’s a mid-size to large urban school that has division one sports and a small percentage of in-state students (unless it’s a Texas school of course), I’m going to apply. I didn’t come to this conclusion quickly. Each campus visit allowed me to piece it together along the way.

The first set of campuses I visited were the California schools: Stanford, UC Berkeley University of Southern California, and UCLA. It may have been a mistake to visit Stanford first. One word to describe the whole campus: pristine. I felt like each blade of grass was measured to ¼ inch. Each speech by the admissions counselor and students seemed equally as grand. They constantly brought up the success of their students and it was as if they were looking for the next great entrepreneur to attend their school. The whole visit had the “you want to go here and we already know that” feeling. The whole experience was a little overwhelming, but despite all that I genuinely liked Stanford (who wouldn’t?).

Even though I did visit Stanford first, I found my favorite school after it: USC. Other than fitting in with all my criteria, there was something else about it. I’m not sure how to describe it, but it just felt right. Whether it was the adventure which surrounded it, completely submersed in LA, or the uniformity of the campus, I loved it.

I did not like Berkeley or UCLA as much but those tours were still helpful. At Berkeley I found out that I wanted avoid schools with a high percentage of in-state students. A fun fact about Berkeley : every set of double doors has one of the handles removed because the students kept chaining them shut in protest. There was a convention of clubs lobbying for new members, each set up with a table and information, and the Republicans of Berkeley had two bored-looking members with no interested students at their table. In other words, a typical Texan would not fit in at Berkeley.

UCLA had a similar issue of a large Californian student percentage, but I did not like the campus very much. A good part of the campus was decorated with high-rises and lots of concrete. It felt like I was walking around in the medical center in Houston. It was not like that throughout the entire campus, but these two things turned me off of UCLA.

Needing to expand my horizons, I journeyed out to the Eastern part of the U.S. and looked at Vanderbilt, Duke, and Clemson next. Vanderbilt became my next favorite campus behind USC mainly because of Nashville, which is one of the coolest cities in America. If you ever visit, you have to go down Broadway Street. Words can’t describe the feeling a walk down Broadway on a Friday night but I’ll try. Picture a wide busy street decorated with neon lights and excited people. The buildings alternate between bars, clubs, and every type of store. Oh yeah, and it’s the music capital of the world; every bar has a singer or band preforming whose good enough to get a record deal and that’s supplemented by street performers on every corner who are good enough to sing in bars. The Grand Ole Opry has multiple shows a week and many other venues feature singers of all genres. The city has a life of its own, and there is none other like it.

My love of Nashville and Vanderbilt marked my affinity towards schools near awesome cities. Stanford was right down the street from San Francisco and USC was in the middle of LA. Because of this, I couldn’t like Duke or Clemson. Duke, the Gothic Wonderland, was surrounded by a small suburban town and Clemson, no matter how historic and beautiful, was in the middle of nowhere. The campuses were beautiful but I couldn’t bring myself to like either.

The most recent school I visited was the University of Texas. I knew I would like Texas (even though my dad is an Aggie) because of Austin. Austin isn’t Nashville, but it is slightly reminiscent of it because of the neon lights and many music festivals. The campus of UT is slightly different than the other school’s campuses in that it is less compact. You can’t really see where the campus and the city are divided, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I just prefer a more defined campus. Despite this, I would still be happy to attend UT.

Now applications are released and I have gone on most of my college visits (I still have Texas A&M and Georgia Tech to visit). I’m going to apply to Stanford, USC, Vanderbilt, UT, and probably A&M and Georgia Tech. Yes this list is marked with very selective schools but I am automatically admitted to UT and A&M so I will have somewhere to go. Each campus visit was helpful in my decision of where to apply, even if I did not like the campus.

If I went to any of these schools I would be happy, but there is no way I would have known that without visiting them. I strongly recommend that high school students visit schools that you are looking into applying to. Learn from my experience that campus visits strongly shape your interests and help guide you in the right direction. For a decision that is as important as college, make sure you are as informed as possible about what you’re getting into.