Why You Don't Need to Stack Your College Visits to Make a Trip Worthwhile

How many schools should we visit?

It’s a conversation I have with families every year, and a question whose answer depends greatly on the season.

In the spring and summer, college visits can and do often become their own kind of special road trip. You can spend a few days in Boston or New York and see a dozen schools, or build a great state-wide itinerary around California, North Carolina, Chicago, Pennsylvania, and more (we’ve published some great ones on our blog!). Especially for families flying out to the coasts for visits, it often just makes sense to cluster schools together and see as much as you can.

And look, I get why families do this. College visits are expensive, and if you’re taking time off work, booking flights and hotels, and trying to coordinate everyone's schedules, it can feel silly to fly somewhere for just one school.

But then fall arrives, and suddenly the college visit that sounded so easy in July feels a lot harder to pull off. There’s school, sports, homework, activities, and the general chaos that comes with getting back into a routine. Seniors are trying to narrow down their lists, and some are getting serious about whether they have an Early Decision choice. Juniors are starting to think about where they might want to apply and realizing that the college process is suddenly a lot closer than it seemed a few months ago.

If you didn’t get to every campus on your list over the summer, it can start to feel like you might as well wait until winter break or spring to visit at all.

But here’s my pitch: you don’t necessarily need to wait, and you don’t need to see five or six schools for a college trip to be worth it.

Sometimes, one school is worth the whole weekend.

The Experience That Changed Me

I learned this myself when I was applying to college. I was a coastal person through and through and always assumed I would end up either a quick train ride up in New England or across the country at a California institution. The Midwest was not really part of the plan before I got an unexpected invitation to visit Washington University in St. Louis.

At the time, I remember wondering whether it would really be worth it. It was the beginning of my senior year, there was plenty of homework to do, and flying halfway across the country to see one college seemed like a lot of time and effort. But I went, and a school that was initially barely on my list ended up being my first choice.

Part of what made the visit so valuable was that I actually had time to experience the place and the vibrancy of students on campus with the fresh energy of a new academic year. I stayed with a student and slept on her dorm room floor, heard about weird traditions like Midnight Breakfast, and even got to experience a late-night study session at the Central Olin Library. I worked on my senior research proposal while my host tackled her chemistry problem set, and somehow that very ordinary evening told me more about what college might actually feel like than another hour of an official campus tour ever could. I was surprised by how quickly I felt like I was a part of things — a feeling that had escaped me for much of my time in a cliquish suburban high school.

That feeling of deep belonging and connection is the part of college visits that can be hard to replicate when you are racing from campus to campus. Sure, you can learn a lot from an official tour, and I certainly don't think families should skip them, but you also need some time to explore without anyone trying to sell you on the school.

What does the campus feel like on a normal Sunday afternoon? Do students seem like they actually enjoy being there? What happens when you wander a little farther from the main quad? Is the surrounding city somewhere you can picture yourself living?

You don't need to answer all of those questions on one visit. But you have a much better chance of noticing the answers if you aren't checking your watch because you have another campus tour across town in 45 minutes.

Why Fall Might Actually Be The Perfect Time

If you're a junior and want to get ahead of the spring break visit rush, a single-school visit can give you a much clearer sense of what you should be looking for before you build out the rest of your list. Instead of trying to see ten schools and remember which library belonged to which campus, you can spend a weekend really paying attention to one.

And if you're a senior trying to close in on an Early Decision choice, I think a single-school visit can be even more valuable. A follow-up trip during a new season, or a visit to a school that recently came onto your radar can make a huge impact when it comes to nailing down a core strategy for your applications.

If you’re worried about choosing the “right” single visit, try thinking more broadly about the elements that you want to experience on that campus. Pick a place that has several elements you’re curious about and then see how they feel in action. For example, if you choose a medium-sized urban school with an open curriculum, you can plan to rank the importance of each of those elements after your visit.

Maybe you discover that you really love the curriculum but want a bigger city. Maybe you love the campus culture, but want a larger university where you won’t know everyone over the course of four years. Or maybe you love the academic flexibility, but realize that you want a school with a different kind of social environment.

For example, my experience at WashU helped me realize that I loved the combination of a traditional campus and an urban environment, as well as the ability to move between academic interests. If I had decided that St. Louis felt too small, I could have used those preferences to look for something similar in a larger city, like Northwestern or Emory.

That is one of the key reasons I like the idea of a single-school visit. You aren't just visiting a college. You're learning what to look for in the next one.

So if there’s one school that has consistently caught your attention, and you have the means and a few days off of school that work out, go see it. If you’ve been liberal arts curious but only seen medium and large universities, take a leap of faith and see if a more intimate environment could be a good fit. And if you're interested in a school that feels a little farther afield, this might be the year to take the trip. And if you're a coastal student who has never really considered the Midwest or the South, I would especially encourage you to look beyond the familiar college-tour routes.

I've made this pitch before with Chicago, which is one of my favorite examples because you can get an incredible range of colleges and campus environments in one trip. But once again, you don't always need a dozen options to make a region worth visiting.

Final Thoughts

I don't think the mega college trip is a bad idea — quite the opposite! There are times when seeing many schools at once is exactly what a family needs, particularly early in the search when you are trying to understand the range of colleges available to your student.

But I do think we sometimes get so focused on making a college trip efficient that we forget what we're actually trying to accomplish.

You're not collecting campus tours badges and pamphlets, or just trying to keep up with what everyone else at your school seems to be doing — you're trying to figure out where you might be happy for four years.

So as fall approaches, don't assume that you need to wait for the next school vacation because you can't fit five schools into a weekend. Pick one that genuinely interests you, give yourself a little time, and go see it. You might be surprised by what you find.