Campus Visit

[matcha]

I am currently planning on visiting my two top-choice universities. I'm a little nervous about making sure I see and do all the things that would be the most helpful in making my final decisions.

What things did/will you do on your campus visits? What questions should I be sure to ask? What should I wear?

[BelleOfKilronen]

Congrats on your admits!

I have to confess, one of the first questions I asked my professors about my admitted student visits was "what on earth do I wear?" They basically told me to look respectable and be comfortable. The schools have already accepted you, so it's not the same kind of pressure as a pre-admit interview.

As for the visit, try to talk to as many current students as possible, and try to do so when faculty aren't around if you can. Ask them why they decided to go there, what the best parts of the program are, and what parts they wish they had known about before they accepted. Ask them about how well and how often the faculty members in the department interact. I'm not super-familiar with how MPP programs are set up, but if there's an independent capstone/thesis type project at the end, talk to students who are currently working on theirs to see what sort of support they're getting from faculty.

Also, see if you can meet one-on-one with a few of the faculty members you most want to work with, and ask them about what they're current interests are. In talking to faculty members, I sometimes found that they had moved beyond the work I thought they were still doing, and it was good to get a sense of the ideas they were presently exploring. You can also get a great sense of how the faculty work together during these conversations--if they refer to each other's work (and refer you to each other!), that's a good sign that the department's environment will be collegial.

Most of all, try to remember that, at this point in the game, you are the one choosing them. Have fun, and good luck!

[BKMD]

The dress depends a lot on your field and the schools. My field is usually very informal and most people showed up in jeans and sneakers (including a lot of professors). The safest thing is to just ask them before you arrive - either the grad coordinator, or a student.

One thing that I found to be especially helpful is to ask the students there what other schools they had offers from, and why they ended up choosing this school over the others. If you can find students who had the same offers as you, it's interesting to see why they chose one over the other. This is especially useful because you'll get impressions of the school from the "other" perspective - you're not going to get as honest of feedback when you ask people about their own school.

Also, try to get a sense of how students do research there, how often they interact with other students/faculty compared to how often they work independently. And of course it's important to have individual meetings with faculty you're interested in, if that's possible. It will give you a sense of how they think and what they might be like to work with, in addition to their current research interests/directions.

[origin415]

I don't see why it should matter at all what you wear, you are accepted. Wear what you will wear when you are going to school there. Granted, this is coming from a math student, we aren't a formal bunch.

Spend time just going around the town on your own. Find out, either through the city guide here or asking grad students or whatever where the best areas to live are and visit those. Just get a general feel for the area.

Tour the entire campus, check out the main library, read the school newspaper.

Talk to grad students and ask them about classes/profs/student life. Go to classes with them. Talk to profs about their research. Depending on the school, they may have stuff lined up for you to do.

The schools I visited were in larger cities, so there was plenty of touristy stuff to keep me busy, and I'm also into photography, so I got to do that in my spare time. I also went to a comic convention in Seattle that I found out about like the day before.

[Babbling Dweeb]

Lots of good feedback here already, I'll add mine and repeat a few I did that were helpful for me:

- Walk around campus, get a feel for the place

- Ask students about the program, what they like/dislike

- Ask about other programs they applied to and what brought them to that school

- If you can, talk to faculty (try to check out their research areas first so you can strike up a conversation a little easier)

- If you haven't taken the formal tour of campus yet, try to sign up for one

- Dress comfortably. Whatever that means to you...be comfortable so that way you can be "you" while you are at the school. If you don't feel like you fit in dressed as you, you still wouldn't feel comfortable being dressed like a clone. I'd say you are better off just wearing what makes you the most comfortable around people to avoid any additional anxiety that you might have.

Good luck and congrats on your acceptances!