DH and I only visited 2 schools with DD, but she went with friends to a few more. We asked about what degrees they offered, looked at the dorms, went on the school tours. By the time we left each school DD knew if she was interested or not - so it made it pretty easy. If your kids will live on campus, the dorms are a BIG deciding point.

It is alot of work. I helps if your son has an idea of what he wants to get into. That will narrow down the colleges. If he doesn't know, then I would suggest starting at a community college and transferring after some basics and future ideas are more concrete. Some people go by athletic scholarships, some academics, AND if you start preparing your self now with the help of a good college guidance counselor there are soooo many ways to finance college especially if money is somewhat tight and he has gotten really good grades at school. You'll want to prepare you FAFSA next year as soon as you get your 2010 w-2's. FAFSA will tell the colleges your interested in where you stand financially and the colleges will tell you in even more detail, what he is eligible for. Clear as mud?
Get a couple folders. One for scholarship forms another for college info. Start with your schools HS counselor and she/he should be able to give you some good advice and sights to learn from. Get your FAFSA pin number now.

BEWARE some sights are full of bologna. They waste your time and your sanity. If you think its bogus, run away fast. Ask your friends where they found good info on local scholarships. There are outstanding national scholarships but they are pretty exhausting to fill out although worth it if your son has the grades and the school and community service they are looking for .
There is so much info out there it's overwhelming! Good luck.

Kath,

Please take clear and concise notes.

Mine will be going through this soon and I expect you to have it all figured out, sorted, and bound in book form to hand over to me at the appropriate time.

Toni has good points. DD#2 only visited 2 campuses with me, and then when major changed 2 or 3 by herself. The one thing she did that was a BIG MISTAKE, but she wanted to do it, was that she did NOT want to go to a community college more than she had already done (she did her senior year highschool/freshman year college at the same time). She lucked out in a way, that her college of choice had just changed from a 2 year to a 4 year college, so she got an AA then went on to a different school.

NOW, mind you she changed her major again, NDSU was school of choice for Pharmacy, but not for new major (ended up FINALLY being Hospitality), and she wanted to change AGAIN. NOT GOOD, once you have so many credits under your belt, and have transferred schools a few times, EVEN IF YOU HAVE GOOD GRADES, it is hard to change schools again, colleges do not like to take in transferring Juniors. I don't know why, or if it was because of her major, or if it was because this would have been her 4th school (Community college durring high school, Bethany College to complete AA, NDSU, and then this final school).

ALSO, as far as grants go, Neighboring states often offer reciprocity...tuition as if you live in that state. GREAT, but it seems to me that because DD#2 goes to school in ND; and we live in MN, she does not get some grant money because that money is only for MN schools.

I would highly suggest living at home, getting the AA (THey can NEVER take the AA away from you), that gives them time to mature a little more, they have more of a sense of what they "want to be when they grow up" (I wish I knew what I wanted to be when I grow up), and then transfer to the college they want to attend. The money saved is tremendous!!! I don't even know how much in student loans my DD#2 will have when she finally graduates in December (of this year yea!!!)

Vickey-MN

My daughter applied to three schools. One of them is close to us and she was very familiar with it and didn't need to go there. One of them she visited with us, and another one she visited with friends. She ended up going to the one she visited with us.

My son just went to the school close to us. Both kids had always done activities there, so they didn't need to visit the school before accepting.

This is such an exciting time for kids, but it also created a lot of anxiety and nervousness in my kids. Becoming familiar with the campus they will attend really helps.

Not much for me to add here, but it was the best time of our lives along with being some work/worry.

I made two trips with my DS; he was recruited by many colleges and made good choices. He also received many scholarships and kept his grades up to keep those in place.

Remember to have fun! :)

I'd say the most important thing to do is visit LOTS of colleges. At least half a dozen POSSIBLE choices. Realistic ones--don't go to a bunch of colleges that you wouldn't be able to afford (even with a full scholarship, it can be pricy to go to a college where one needs to dress like the upper class, for example). And be honest with yourself about your son's academic prowess. My niece managed to get into a really good school (after being wait-listed), it's prestigious and offers a really good education, BUT it was just a hair out of her league academically. She worked so hard, and still had trouble maintaining decent grades. She'd have been much better off--and much happier--in a school that was a better fit. And she'd have gotten a good job, even with a 'lower' caliber degree. Thing is, kids are so excited about getting out on their own, that they often don't know how to make good choices about where to go to school. The first one or 2 they look at are always 'perfect'--just because they're away from mom and dad. Remember, their brains are making decisions based on emotion at that age, not logic (they won't be fully capable of logical thinking until their mid-20's) so even though they're (almost?) adults, they still need mom and dad helping them learn to make good decisions. It may fall on your shoulders to insist that he look at enough schools that he has adequate information to truly make a good decision about which school is truly right for him. And whatever else you do, CHECK OUT THE LISTS OF PARTY SCHOOLS (cross those off the list immediately)--the kids all know which ones they are, but they rarely share that with Mom and Dad.

Second most important thing? Be sure the college offers many choices of study, and that their credits are generally accepted at other schools. I used to say, that among DD's friends, only one I knew of finished college with a degree in the field in which she started. Just recently, dd heard me tell someone that, and she corrected me--even the one I THOUGHT hadn't changed her major... had. Few kids know at 17, 18 what they want to do the rest of their lives. Many make extreme changes in their choice of major (DD is a great example there. She started studying Foreign Affairs and Journalism at a university, ended up graduating in optical science (she's an optician) from a community college.

I'd strongly recommend, too, that instead of sending your child away for college, he attend community college for 2 years and then transfer. That way, he can economically get a lot of his basic requirements out of the way while he gets a better handle of what major he want's to pursue, you'll save a bundle of $$$, he'll probably be able to work to help defray the costs (a big part of their education in responsibility, IMO), and his degree from a major college, university will mean just as much as if he spent 4 expensive years there. If I had it to do all over again, with another child that's exactly what I'd do--no way would I send a barely 18 year old off to a university. Most of them simply aren't ready for the full responsibility yet at that age--and boys are even more immature than girls. Also, I've come to the conclusion, it's so foolish to spend tens of thousands of $$$ for class work than can be done for a fraction of that. Especially when most of them will waste a good bit of their first year or 2, because they really don't know where they want their life to go (and they often have very unrealistic views of their 'chosen professions' until they start doing the work). Of course, you have to check to see that your community college is a good one--luckily ours is excellant. You might even have to check a few surrounding counties to find one that's a good fit, but it's worth looking into.

Also, keep in mind the folks who show you around are well-trained publicists. They do NOT generally tell you the truth on everything--one thing we found was greatly distorted when we were being 'sold' on the colleges we looked at was the crime statistics. Interestingly, NONE of the colleges we looked at had ANY crime on campus (they use really creative definitions and security measures to avoid classifying problems as 'crimes'). Try to get away from the guard--excuse me--guide they assign to you and talk to real students about life on campus to make sure you get a balanced picture.

Oh, and remember, if you're likely to want to visit back and forth now and then, DON'T pick a school that's hundreds of miles away, where there is no reliable, reasonably priced public transportation back and forth. DD's university wasn't near an airport, and the train and bus service were iffy at best (not direct, and she wasn't thrilled with the 'characters' she had to share those modes of transportation with when she came home for holidays at times when we weren't able to take off a few days to make the drive).

You're entering a time that's exciting, liberating, and scary all at once. You'll get through it. And you'll all be better for taking the journey, but I won't kid you--there will probably be a few hair-raising moments in the meantime!

Do the American University schools accept all or most of the transfer credits from college programs? Here in Canada they do not. If you have a college diploma and go into that same field in university, you are lucky to get 1-3 of your courses accepted as transfer credits- usually English 101 is accepted, but not much else is.

Our daughter is a HS senior now, will be going off to college this fall. She used the website "collegeboard.com" and found six schools to apply to (four good candidates, one "safety" and one "stretch"). We visited the four most likely schools, signing up for their tours/info sessions like you are doing, except we waited a bit later -- did most of the on-campus visits in Feb/March of her senior year. You're smart to start early.

We had questions relating to academics, 'college life', and finances.

Academics - if Alex knows what Major he's interested in, walk thru that department's building and see where most of his classes would be held. One school we visited bragged about their huge brand-new Sciences building, but failed to mention the Geology Dept was warehoused all by itself waaaaaay across campus -- a not-so-good surprise, since daughter was interested in possibly double-majoring. Also find out how many professors are in the Dept -- a small faculty makes it hard to offer a wide range of courses, but on the other hand, they might get to know the undergrad's better.

College life - best resource is the student tour guides themselves. They're eager to share their experiences if you open the door. Ask about average class size, how easy is it to see your professors, what do kids do for fun on weekends, how good is the food, how many kids participate in sports, do most kids have/need cars or not? Do most kids stay on-campus all four years; if not, what's the typical off-campus situation like? Ask them about safety-- do they know of any kids who have actually used the "blue light emergency call" or "late night safe walk home from library" service that so many campuses have now?

Finances -- apart from paying for it, what opportunities are there for students to get a part-time job either on campus or in town.

Hope all that helps. It's an exciting time. Oh, one more website I found useful: collegeconfidential.com. Lots of activity on their forum -- hand-wringing by super-students wanting to get into Ivy Leagues, but also a pretty good amount of info useful to us regular families with normal kids, lol.

Susan, I think most do, depends on the school. I know when I transferred my prerequisites (some very old) from several community colleges to KSU here in KY, they didn't accept a math class I had just taken at a community college in Hazard. But KSU's class was alot easier than that one, even though they claimed it wasn't up to their level. They accepted all my others, including ones I got in my early 20s.

Azzalea, Alex did actually tell me he wasn't going to EKU because it was a party school. He's been talking to his friends who have friends or siblings there. I told him he didn't have to participate just because everyone else was. Too bad it has that reputation because it's not too far from us and it's very reasonably priced.

The one we have scheduled a tour with is about an hour and a half away, but he'll have a car to get back and forth if he needs to. It's Morehead University and has a good reputation from what I've heard from other parents. We'll also go to a couple in Lexington and KSU in Frankfort(where I went to get my nursing degree).

Toni, he's interested in science, math, physics, history, astronomy, French, biology and archeology. About a year ago he had it narrowed down to archeology and physics, now he's not sure. For the first time last night he even mentioned teaching??? But, then said maybe not because he'd have to put up with the rotten kids. LOL!

I'm hoping he can get into a reasonably priced school so we can both work to pay for it out right. There are other really good schools in the area but at $30,000 + a year they are way beyond our means, even if he got scholarship money. We aren't even going to look at those. He is also definately only going to an in state school. Thanks for all the advice and if anyone else has any, I can use all I can get.

Our family is just going through this experience. My youngest granddaughter is a high school senior. She looked for a small liberal arts university, made four selections based on class sizes, credentails of professors, whether most classes were taught by the actual professors or TA's, and range of majors that fit her goals. We visited all four campuses, submittted FAFSA info early and applied for financial aid with all apps. I found her high school guidance counselors to be more helpful than she thought they were (maybe because they are realistic in their views..no pie in the sky) There is alot of angst and emotion involved with these decisions. I am fortunate that I am now working part-time, and can devote more time to the process with her. We have decided on a local private university, with her living on campus for the first year at least. She is now gathering all the $$$'s she can through small local scholarships to supplement the large scholarship offered by the university to help defay expenses. She's a great student, a responsible, hard working kid, but at 17 she still has some unrealistic expectations about school/life. Hoping that staying in a familiar locale will reduce some of the pitfalls. But be prepared. I remember well the freshman year. I was intoxicated by my freedom and nearly lost my scholarships. My daughters changed majors so often I could hardly keep track, and DD#1 is still paying off student loans from her masters degree!
Susan

Kath - Has your son considered community college for the first two years. It is so much cheaper to get your general ed out of the way at a community college rather than starting right off at a university.

Angela, don't think he has thought about it, but I have and have told him that may be what we do. We're still going to look around.

In our state, you can check in the community college catalog to see what classes will be accepted by the state universities. Therefore, a student can determine exactly what will transfer and target classes for university credit only. One of our kids chose to start at the CC and the other two started at the university from which they graduated. None of mine changed their majors once they enrolled, but the youngest switched majors the day he was accepted to his first choice.

I don't see the value of an AA degree for a student who plans to earn a BA or graduate degree. Just keep working for the bachelor's degree and don't get side tracked. AA degrees are helpful only for students who will not complete their bachelor's.

It is easier to gain acceptance to a very selective university in this state as a junior transferring from a CC than as an incoming freshman. I think that is true everywhere.

My kids developed interest in their college choices not only from tours of the campus but also from what their friends were also interested in checking out. They may have ended up at separate universities, but that interest was partially peer popularity. Check to see if the university has an online virtual tour of their school as part of your preliminary search.

Some universities are located in areas with few opportunities for a student to get a job. In some of those situations, the university on-campus jobs for students are closely guarded and offered to students with registered financial needs first.

If your student has high grades, athletic or musical talent, or outstanding SATs, some of the pricier private schools will offer great scholarships that will bring the cost down to the level of a state school. It is worth checking out.

My DH and I did not attend a college in our state or even this area of the USA, so our fabulous state system was new to us. With our oldest, we visited in her junior year maybe 5 schools. With the next one, his major was so specialized/limited that he knew where the best schools were to apply. The last one visited campuses with friends and with high school groups.

We encouraged our kids to stay within a few hours of home for the sake of their being able to just come home for the weekend when they wanted to. Two of them found weekends home quite restorative by their senior years in college when the communal living was beginning to wear thin. It was also cheaper by far to get them home for the holidays. The youngest attended graduate school and law school clear across the country, but it was our present to ourselves, as I explained it, to fly him home for holidays. He spent an entire day coming and another returning, which really ate into his study time at finals, but he made it work.

Lastly, I cannot stress enough how important it is for the student to feel at home or to like the campus of his or her choice. This will be home to him or her for at least 4 years, and being happy with one's surroundings can make a potentially stressful situation a much more successful experience.

These are fun and exciting times. Good luck....

For mine, community college would not have been a good fit for her. It took her well into her second year to feel comfortable enough with all the changes that college life brings. I can't image changing schools the third year and starting it all over. But my daughter is very much an introvert.

As far as paying for it, somehow the money just appears. My daughter has received scholarships every year - not a lot but enough to help out. She took out student loans but not so much she won't be able to pay it all back after graduation. She had a summer job at home and a job during the school year working on campus. She found out there's lots of jobs on campus but most people don't want to do them. My daughter works in the laundry for food services. This sounds like a terrible job to most people but for her, she can go to work between classes, get things started, go to class and come back and start folding. She is normally done by 4 in the afternoon. With off campus jobs, they work all hours of the night. Also, on campus jobs work around the students schedules.

As far as visiting colleges, all of the colleges we visited offered tours by actual students. I thought this was helpful. They really didn't hold back. For example, the place she eventually chose, did not have a city or college bus system. It's a small enough school but without a car, it is very hard to get around the town. That may have been a issue for some people. We did find out that the school hires a bus company a few times a year to take the kids shopping usually around Christmas time.

Alex may also be interested in studying abroad programs. You may want to ask about these.

Finally, make sure the chosen school has lots of different programs to offer. The one my daughter is going to now only has around 30 different programs of study. This may be a problem should Alex be undecided about a field. I can say that the school is very well known for their fields of study. They have a very high placement rate.

Lots of things to consider. Enjoy the ride and remember that it is ultimately Alex's decision.

The American schools offer more in the way of transfer credits than Canadian schools do, I guess. That's good (well, not for Canadians..lol).

This is an exciting time Kath. It brings back loads of memories.

I also would vote to stay in-state -- out of state tuition is usually 2 times that of in-state. Like going to grad school for 4 years --
Smaller non-state schools usually can put together good finanical aid packages..espeically if they want that student...
But most importantly... check the websites of the schools & check out the school newspapers... or local town papers and look at the 'news' some insight into what really is going on at that town/school..
If they are homebodies -- they probably won't be happy if they are way far away... If they are some kind of performer - music, drama, etc.. an athlete... remember that if they go somewhere at a distance... it's hard for the family to come to watch any event - or at least, expensive..

My oldest granddaughter chose Texas A&M b/c her parents wouldn't let her go to UT Austin b/c it's so HUGE. She wanted a college w/ a good reputation and one where some of her friends were going. Her mother bought a town house there and her roommates' rent makes the payment. My 2nd granddaughter chose Pepperdine in Malibu b/c it's got a good reputation also and she loves that area. She considered 2 other colleges and Pepperdine gave her the most $ in scholarships.

Check out College Confidential for lots of information. They have forums on lots of topics. There is so much information about different schools, and info on how to start a search for college.

I would first ask your son what he wants to study. Then, ask if he wants a large, medium or small school. Does he want a big city, suburban or rural setting? These things all are part of the decision making process. Some kids don't care about any of those things. He has to make that decision.

Yes, a community college can be less expensive, however, it isn't the same as going away to college. Therefore, sit down now and do the figures. You can go to FAFSA to see what an approximate EFC (estimated family contribution) will be. There are some schools that say they will cover the expenses over the EFC, but many don't. I wouldn't encourage taking on much debt, especially for the student.

While generally in-state public schools are less expensive than out of state schools, some private schools can be cheaper than in-state public ones. I would suggest you compare the tuition + room + board costs first. Some schools with lower tuition can be much more expensive with their housing costs. Usually, fees, books, etc are much more uniform.

If he hasn't taken the SAT or ACT, have him do that soon. Get him the 10 real SAT Test book for practice. Have him take it under identical conditions that he will take it. Both SAT and ACT have websites with a practice question for the day. He should go there everyday.

Many schools will allow a prospective student to sit in on a class in his or her major. You would need to contact admissions for that.

My youngest daughter visited 9 schools, applied to 14. She was accepted into 10, waitlisted at 3, and had 1 rejection. She went to a lower ranked school (still in the top 100) because of receiving a full tuition scholarship. She had another full tuition scholarship, a 1/2 tuition scholarship and free tuition in Florida because of Bright Futures. She graduated with no debt, and found a job that she really likes. She graduated from college in 2007.

I just read an article about Berea College in Kentucky. I don't know if you've heard of it, or if it's anywhere near you, but there is no tuition. Each student works 10 hours a week for the school. Maybe an option?

I applied to 5 schools and visited 4 of them. We did a student tour with each one that I liked. Some places you could even spend the night with a student. My eventual school, VA Tech, was HUGE but in a rural setting. That didn't bother me at all, I actually liked the totally different setting and some of my freshman classes had 700 people in it. (By junior year the specialized classes were more like 30) Some kids cannot handle an environment like that where the professor will never know if you skip or not, or where you need to fight for individual help during office hours etc.

At Tech, I declared a Business major, but most start undeclared and you take general courses that would apply to most majors (english, language, science, history etc) I used to take a class during the summer at community college to save money.

Good Luck!

Here is a link that might be useful: Berea College

Yes, Teresa, I've heard of Berea, it's not too far from here either. It's one of the ones we will be looking at.

Londoni said Yes, a community college can be less expensive, however, it isn't the same as going away to college. I just wanted to say that some community colleges have dorms.. my DD is attending (and graduating in 2 weeks) from a community college in our state which had the nicest dorm/apartments out of all the schools we visited. Missouri has a super program called the A+ program which pays for 2 years at a MO community college if the student does well enough in high school, stays out of trouble and doesn't miss too many days of school. DD has kept her grades up while in college, so we got two years of tuition free (some of her friends lost their A+ because their grades fell). We did have to pay for books and dorm rent but DD has gained a lot of independence. It's been really good for her and she's ready to attend a large university in the fall.