You should visit a nearby college or two as early as possible in your freshman or sophomore year to get first hand knowledge what to expect on a college visit. You should arrange college tours preferably during spring break, long holiday weekends, or summer vacation prior to your senior year. The earlier you start this process, the better. Early visits will allow you to focus your college search, learn of any special admissions requirements, and allow you to establish contacts with coaches and faculty who may be helpful in helping you in the application process. Of course, you may have to visit or re-visit some of the colleges during your senior year but you should try to keep these to a minimum.

You should try to schedule your campus visits preferably while the college is in session and students are attending classes. Make sure that you do not visit the week of midterms or final exams. Such visits will give you best opportunity to get a "feel" for the campus and a chance of meet coaches, faculty and students that you may know attending this college. However, timing your college visits to avoid arriving while the college is on vacation takes planning because college vacations are in the same time frame as your high school vacations. The good news is that college vacations vary by several weeks from each other so with careful planning you may be able to schedule your visits when the classes are in progress.

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If you are visiting a number of colleges, you need to ensure that you will remember that college. It sounds silly and at the time you visit, you may be convinced that everything see you and hear will remain fresh in your mind. But as soon as you visit another college or two or as time passes, you may forget some important aspect about that college or confuse aspects of various colleges. To help remember a college you should take notes either while on campus or as soon as you leave the college. You may also want to take pictures or videos of the campus. Make sure the first picture is of the college name on a sign or building to jog your memory where the pictures from that college begin. You will also obtain materials from each college that you visit. Keep these materials in folders with the names of each college. As you narrow down your choices, simply throw away the folders for the colleges you are no longer interested in.

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Practically all competitive colleges offer campus tours i.e., walking tours of the campus guided by a college student. The guide usually gives a brief description of the college and its history, the student body, student activities, campus life, student housing and the layout of the campus. Guides are usually eager to answer questions. The tours generally take 30 to 60 minutes and often start and end at the admissions office.

A campus tour will give you a general sense of the college, but you should keep in mind that your guide is only one of hundreds or thousands of students on that campus. In addition, the students giving tours tend to be happy with their college choice and may not always give an objective opinion. Take individual biases into account and try to observe and talk to other students as well.

Planning is the key to being able to go on a college tour without endless waiting. Most colleges have a limited number of tours during the week and often fewer tours on the weekend. If you do not plan in advance, you may find when you arrive on campus early in the morning that the next tour is not until early afternoon. You may have a difficult choice of skipping the tour or hanging around the campus for longer than you had anticipated and possibly missing visiting another college in the afternoon. It is also important to confirm the time of the tours a day or two before you plan to arrive. Many colleges have a habit of changing the times of the tours without posting the changes on the web or in college brochures.

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In addition to campus tours, most colleges also offer information sessions. These sessions provide different information from that which you get on a campus tour. They are generally conducted by an admission officer of the college and held in a room at the admission office or at an auditorium. The sessions often include audio visual presentations and focus on how the admission decisions are made, the statistics of students who are admitted, information about the faculty, admission requirements and criteria, the deadlines in the application process. These sessions generally last 30 to 60 minutes and allow time for asking questions.

Since you will probably have an admissions officer at your disposal, prepare some questions to ask of these 'experts' who have first-hand experience with the admissions process. Please see the expandable section entitled "Questions to Ask While on Campus" listed below to view a list of questions you may want to ask while on campus.

Again, planning is the key to making sure that you can participate in an information session and in a campus tour without spending most of the day or two days on campus. The reason for this is that most colleges do not seem to coordinate the times of information sessions with the campus tours. You may find that in order to efficiently participate in both the information session and the campus tour, you may need to take the in different order or that you may need to leave an information session early in order to catch the next campus tour. Make sure that you confirm the times and dates of the information sessions that you plan to attend a few days before your scheduled date of arrival. It is not unusual for a college to modify time and dates of the information sessions without posting the change on its web site or indicating a different schedule in the brochure. These schedule changes are often made during the college vacations and finals weeks, which may be when you will be visiting.

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One of the best ways to meet students on campus is to plan an overnight stay. Most admissions offices will arrange overnight stays if you call in advance. Staying overnight allows you to see the college for what it is. The tours set up by the admissions office are somewhat 'staged.' They are designed to show you the nicest parts of campus and paint the college in its best light. On the other hand, staying overnight allows you to go where the students go, see how they interact, and see what a typical day is like. You have your host student and his or her friends to answer your questions. When you ask them what they like best about the school, be sure to ask them what they like least, as that information can be even more valuable.

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Many competitive colleges require or strongly suggest that applicants interview either at the admissions office on-campus or with an alumni interviewer in the applicant's hometown or at his high school. If you are visiting a college, it is a good idea to take advantage of the opportunity of being on campus by scheduling an interview. You will need to contact the admissions office in advance of your visit to arrange an appointment. Even if you are not sure whether you will be applying to that college, you should still schedule an interview if you are remotely interested in the college as you may not have another opportunity to interview on campus. However, if you do interview at a college, be sure to have researched the college thoroughly before your interview, so you will be able to articulate what it is about that college that interests you and ask pertinent questions. In addition, you may want to schedule your interview after you go on the campus tour, so you will have a better sense of the college.

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If you are considering playing a varsity sport, you should schedule a meeting with a college coach. Such meetings can be invaluable in your getting a picture of where you would fit into the program, what materials and statistics you need to submit to be considered for a place on the team. For example, most Division I, II and III college volleyball coaches like to see videotapes of high school or club play and skill drills. A discussion with a coach can help in finding out what the coach is looking for in the tapes. Many coaches like to see their prospect play in a high school game or in a club tournament. This requires significant planning, particularly for winter and spring sports, whose seasons are late in the application process for seniors. Make sure that you start the college selection process early so that you can be in contact with coaches of the colleges that you are interesting in early.

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If you have the time, colleges offer most visitors the opportunity to attend a class or two of their choosing. Visiting a class will allow you to see the students and faculty "in action." Of course, one class or professor is not indicative of the entire experience at a college. If you have an opportunity to sit in on more than one class, select courses in different areas of study or ones with different course types (i.e. lecture, seminar, lab). Observe the students in the class. Are they engaged in the class? Is the professor enthusiastic? How does he interact with the students? If you attend a seminar, listen to what the students' perspectives. These bits of information hold subtle clues about a college that may be useful in forming your opinion about a college.

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Asking questions is the best way to get the information that is important to you. Ask a few different people the same questions and see if their responses vary. Talk to students, professors, admissions officers, tour guides, campus security officers, and the librarians. Don't be shy. If they have time, people are usually eager to offer their opinions. Listed below are some questions to get you started:

• What is the procedure for selecting a roommate?
  

• Are incoming students guaranteed housing? For all four years?
  

• What are the college's policies for moving off campus?
  

• How are faculty advisors assigned to students? What is their role?
  

• How do you select classes? Are you guaranteed to get the classes you want or need to take?
  

• Are students taught by full-time faculty members, graduate assistants, or both?
  

• Are on-campus and off-campus job available?
  

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Most colleges have hotels or motels near campus. The admissions office should be able to provide you with a list of accommodations nearby or the college may have the information posted on their web site. In addition, we have a list of accommodations near certain colleges - click here to view a list of hotels near the colleges. Many of the hotels we have listed are convenient for visiting more than one college and we indicate nearby colleges in the descriptions.

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