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The Girl finished her sophomore year of high school this week. It ended unceremoniously: she came downstairs and announced that she had turned in her last assignment. The next few days would have been final exams, but those were canceled, so the only remaining bit of sophomore year is dropping by the school next Tuesday to pick up the contents of her locker.
(A shout-out to whoever pulled locker-cleanout duty. Ugh.)
She’s officially a rising junior. That means it’s time to start thinking seriously about colleges.
With The Boy, the fall of the junior year was the kickoff of the college tour. In New Jersey, the public school teachers’ union has an annual conference in Atlantic City every November, during which the public schools close for a couple of days. Those days mark the unofficial start of college tour season. That was when The Boy and I went to Boston to see Northeastern and BU. At the information session at Northeastern, there were probably 100 people in the audience. When the host asked for a show of hands of how many were from New Jersey, it was probably at least 80 percent. She chuckled and said that that week is unofficially known as New Jersey Week.
But that was in the Before Time, when putting 100-plus people in adjoining chairs in a small room, unmasked, was considered unremarkable. Campuses were full of students hanging out in groups. Although I recalled my own college tour as a student, I was struck again by how strongly you can pick up a feel for a place just by walking around it for a while. One that we toured -- I will withhold the name as a professional courtesy -- just came across as Where Fun Goes to Die. It’s helpful to know that before making a decision.
This fall, the whole college touring process may be entirely different. Although TB and TG are only three years apart, the rules of the game have changed dramatically between them.
Some of that was to be expected; they’re different people. It wouldn’t be surprising if her list differed from his. But this goes beyond that.
I don’t know if we’ll even have the option of in-person tours. Virtual tours have their merits, but there’s a palpable feel for a campus that I’ve only been able to pick up by visiting. Assuming that the lockdown will pass at some point and some version of campus life will eventually return, I would hate for her decision to be based only on virtual tours and word of mouth. I want her to be able to see places for herself.
Even if we’re able to visit, the visits themselves could be very different. How does a university best show itself when everyone is wearing masks, social interaction is confined to online and many of the employees are working from home?
These aren’t world-shattering issues, of course, but I really hadn’t expected so much to change between his search and hers.
Admittedly, thinking about these issues is a lot less emotionally jarring than dwelling on the fact that she’s only a couple of years away from the great escape. That’s the real issue, but I’m nowhere near ready to face that yet. For now, I’ll focus on the relatively small and more comfortable issue of the global pandemic.
Has anyone figured out a useful and revealing way to get a feel for a campus when social distancing is in effect?
