Drake Decker ’22

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College applications and deciding where to spend the next four years of your life can be stressful, even overwhelming. But, touring college campuses and doing other research to look for your key requirements for a school can give you information to ease the pressure. 

I got this information last month touring two Texas colleges.

General information from the admissions offices, tour guides, and being on the campuses taught me some valuable about differences between the University of Texas at Austin and Texas Christian University. 

First about UT I learned that Austin is a main point. UT has an unmistakable big city feel, which I like. It also has a big campus feel that shines down on you as you walk around the “40 Acres,” which combined with the rest of the campus is around 400 acres. However, the big campus and the big undergraduate student body of 40,000 still don’t feel overwhelming. 

Meanwhile at TCU, Fort Worth felt more old-school Texan than Austin does with UT. TCU only has 9,704 students, and I could tell. At UT, the campus is bigger and more crowded, to the point where I just blended in , but at TCU the number of students is fewer, so I felt that I stood out more as a visitor.

If someone cannot tour colleges I would recommend doing research online for the colleges they’re looking at. Then if any questions are still unanswered, you can set up a zoom meeting with an admissions representative or a online virtual tour. But if none of those is a viable option, you can always call the admissions office and ask about anything, 

The best advice I could give is to feel out each college and go where you want to go. You know yourself the best. This is a decision where you’re going to be for the next upcoming years, and you want to make the best of the opportunity.