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Alexis Ahn planned on visiting multiple colleges before starting her senior year of high school. By the time the pandemic hit, she was only able to tour one.

Like many other high school seniors, Ahn, a senior at Fayetteville-Manlius High School, now relies solely on virtual tours, online resources and social media to gain information about the colleges she’s applying to. That includes Syracuse University, she said.

“How can you decide definitively where you’re going to go if you’ve never even visited the place?” said Ahn.

SU has suspended all campus visits and in-person, student-led tours for prospective students to comply with New York state public health guidelines. Those guidelines have left high school seniors largely reliant on virtual resources to decide whether they will attend SU next fall.

Amina Salahou, a senior at Nottingham High School who is applying to SU, said she and her friends were familiar with the campus from high school programs that allowed them to work with SU students. Nonetheless, they still would have liked to go on a formal tour to get a feel for the university’s campus before applying.

Instead, Salahou has attended Zoom sessions and used virtual tours to learn more about SU. Though she hoped the online tours would involve students walking around the campus, they only included a series of slideshows with pictures of important spots, she said.

“It’s just been really hard not being able to visit because there’s only so much a virtual tour can do,” said Caroline Dougherty, a senior attending Christian Brothers Academy. “You don’t get to really feel what campus is actually like, what the students are like and if they enjoy it.”

For Dougherty, getting a sense of a campus’s vibe is an important part of looking at colleges. Though she’s been able to drive around some campuses without getting out of her car, it doesn’t compare to regular campus tours, she said.

As an alternative to visiting campuses, Dougherty has been watching vlogs on YouTube and looking at students’ Instagram pages to get a look into student life. Kyla Mayberry, a senior at Public Service Leadership Academy at Fowler in Syracuse, said she’s browsed social media posts from students that attend colleges she’s interested in.

One recent TikTok trend, which included students showing off their college campuses, helped Mayberry decide which campuses she liked.

Although virtual tours have their limitations, some high school students said they appreciate the online opportunities universities are offering. Mayberry, who is applying to some colleges in California, said the virtual tours are helpful for looking at schools that are too far away to visit in person.

“It’s admirable that certain students and the admissions offices are trying to bring that tour experience to your home,” Ahn said. Colleges, including SU, have done a good job describing the community and campus traditions in the absence of in-person gatherings, she said.

Salahou said she’s more comfortable asking questions during online information sessions than during an in-person campus tour.

The ability to visit colleges can have a considerable impact on high school seniors’ decision-making process, some students said.

Abdiweli Dahir, a senior at Nottingham High School, was able to visit SU’s campus before the university closed its campus in the spring. His visit helped him understand what it would be like to attend the university and played a role in making him want to apply, he said.

“I was lucky enough to already have visited most of my schools in the fall of my junior year, but now I’m finding I’m second guessing all of my school choices because I haven’t been able to visit them in so long,” said Annie Kilmartin, who also attends Christian Brothers Academy.

Kilmartin said some of her college applications are early decision or early action and she’s worried about committing to a school she hasn’t seen in over a year.

Aneesa Zinkovitch, another senior at Nottingham High School, is concerned about fitting in at the schools she’s applying to. While her older siblings had the opportunity to visit all the campuses they were looking at and get a sense of if they belonged there, she has not.

“When I’m staring at a screen, I can’t tell if I’m meant to be walking in that building or not,” Zinkovitch said.

Published on October 21, 2020 at 9:23 pm

Contact Madison: mntyler@syr.edu