Campus tours nationwide are becoming more prevalent, and many universities are stressing the significance of a strong tour. However, even with more students visiting campuses, some still voice doubts of the importance of these visits.
Elle Njus remembers her first visit to Syracuse University like it was yesterday. Eager to set foot on the New York university’s campus after pouring over SU’s picturesque pamphlets, Njus thought she had found her dream school.
“I thought it would be so cool to live far away from home in a city like New York,” Njus said. “[That was] until my campus-tour visit.”
Njus remembers watching her beautiful mental picture of Syracuse quickly fade away as soon as she saw the bleak reality of the campus’ dark, depressing industrial setting. The campus’ coldness was further reinforced by an impersonal introduction to the school’s facilities, performed in a large auditorium crammed full of participants.
Now a University of Wisconsin sophomore, Njus said UW was actually her last choice when originally choosing universities. However, her reluctance melted away into enthusiasm when she partook in UW’s campus tour.
As UW campus tour guide Kanjana Thepboriruk has seen in the rising number of notes she has received from UW visitors, many visitors’ initial doubts are turned around by a campus visit.
She said that after participating in a tour of UW, many visitors see the campus as beautiful and feel they will fit right in. The interactive tour also gives visitors an opportunity to ask actual UW students questions — something a video tour or pamphlet could not offer.
“Everyplace looks great on a pamphlet, so it’s [neither] safe [nor] wise to make decisions regarding the next four years of your life based on pictures on a glossy paper,” Thepboriruk said.
UW sophomore Kim Barton began her college-campus visits as early as her sophomore year of high school. Barton immediately preferred University of Chicago’s scenic campus tour and engaging tour guide to St. Louis University’s lackluster movie presentation.
“A boring tour reflects on a university because they are the ones that put it together,” Barton said. “If you get an impersonal tour guide, you feel as if the university will be that way as well.”
Barton also added that unlike a video presentation, an on-campus tour cannot be pre-arranged to present the campus in a misleading way.
Abigail Gaeta, assistant coordinator of the visitor information center at Purdue University, noted a steady increase in the number of students requesting a campus tour. She attributed this to the added benefits a campus visit may offer, such as up-close observation of the campus’ size and scenery, face-to-face contact with real students and first-hand stories from tour guides.
“It is extremely important that a tour guide sells, as well as genuinely promotes, all that is good within a university,” Gaeta said.
The professional image of a university is often maintained by a tour guide’s exchange of factual and real-life accounts to the tour group.
However, there are students who think a tour guide should not be the most influential factor in a campus-visit experience.
“I don’t think that your impression (of a university) depends on the tour guide as much as the people and places you see,” Njus said. “In a school of thousands, not everyone will be like your tour guide.”
Others question the importance of a campus tour altogether.
UW junior Jacquie Berg described her first visit to Madison as somewhat unsatisfactory. The sight of unhappy students battling the cold on a freezing afternoon gave her a negative impression.
“It was not the best experience, as I came on one of the coldest and snowiest days of the year,” Berg said. “However, I chose Madison because the positive reputation spread by other attending students held more weight.”
