I am gonna be in the usa in may .And i am applying to transfer to some pretty known schools.Bard College, Boston University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, George Washington University, University of Chicago, University of Miami, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Notre Dame
University of Pennsylvania, University of Rochester, University of Virginia, Vanderbilt University .
I want to visit a few of them perhaps .Whats the best way to visit some of the better ones on my list using flights and trains and buses.

how long will you be here? ...how many days to visit?....how many hours will a visit take?

list the schools w/best #1 2nd best #2 etc....you left out u of louisville in kentucky which is best!...[guess where i went?]

i would rent a car.....probably much cheaper and much more efficient...plus you can get *a mi....

Having no idea how long you'll be here or anything, I'd say the best thing to do would be to hop between DC, PHL and BOS using Acela or Amtrak Regional depending on your budget.

Then in each city you can use rail or rent a car to hop between the close schools.

Penn is walking distance from the station in PHL so that's one you can definitely hit. GW is a short walk from a Metro station in DC so that's easy too.

If you want to be adventurous you can drive to Ithaca to visit Cornell. It's about 4 hours from either Philadelphia or NYC. If you want to visit a school in NYC then you can hop on the Campus To Campus bus from NYC to Ithaca. I wouldn't take any other bus to Ithaca. I did Greyhound once and really don't want to ever again. Otherwise for about the same price you could rent a car in PHL after visiting Penn and drive up to Ithaca. It's a really easy drive.

May is an odd time to be visiting schools. Most graduation ceremonies take place during May so hotels and travel to these schools might be much more expensive than normal. Keep that in mind. Having gone to Cornell I know that prices skyrocket around big events on campus. They're already overcharging for most hotels around the area in my opinion, so during events it can get ridiculous.

They're ALL "better ones," but your list is too long. Try clumping them by region or deleting the ones that are less accessible. You can categorize them three ways:

Schools that are easy to reach via plane to major cities, taxi from airport:

Boston University (Boston)
Columbia University (NYC)
George Washington University (Washington DC)
Vanderbilt University (Nashville)
University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia)
University of Chicago (Chicago)
University of Miami (Miami)
UNC Chapel Hill (Raleigh-Durham)

Schools that are a little more difficult to reach and require flying to a smaller, more expensive airport OR a long car ride:

University of Notre Dame (fly to South Bend, IN -- or Chicago, then drive)
University of Rochester (fly to Rochester -- or Buffalo, then drive
University of Virginia (fly to Charlottesville -- or Richmond, then drive)

Schools that are difficult to reach and require hiring a car and driving, or a long bus ride:

Dartmouth College (Hanover NH)
Cornell University (Ithaca NY)
Bard (Red Hook, NY)

The less accessible, the more time it takes to visit them. The last three will require a couple of days each. I recommend you stick to the east coast. Fly into BOS and go:

Boston University

(train to NYC)

Columbia University)

(train to Philadelphia)

University of Pennsylvania

(train to Washington DC)

George Washington University

(bus to Charlottesville)

University of Virginia

(bus to Richmond, train / bus / plane to Raleigh)

UNC Chapel Hill

(fly to Miami)

University of Miami

end trip.

That would take you about 10 days and cover 7 schools. I agree with the previous poster who said May is a funny time to be doing school visits. The campus is getting ready for graduation ceremonies and not paying much attention to admissions. Some won't even offer guided tours in this period.

Clumping is a valid strategy, but I don't find your clumps to be geographically sound. How is flying to Richmond and driving an hour to UVa different from flying to Syracuse and driving an hour to Cornell? Why is flying to Chicago and driving 2� hours to South Bend easier than flying to Boston and driving 2� hours to Dartmouth? Red Hook is taxicab distance from Rhinebeck, which has a dozen Amtrak trains from New York every weekday.

I would try to pick a set of fewer but more diverse institutions, based on criteria you want to test. As different as Penn and Columbia are, for example, they are both big universities in urban environments in the Northeast, and the student experience will be much more similar compared as opposed to a Miami or Dartmouth (in the same way that as much as Boston and New York or Los Angeles and San Francisco have a rivalry, they are much more similar to each other than they are to Albany or Fresno).

These alternative clumps might be

• Northeast, South, Midwest, (no Western schools?)
• Metropolis, city, small town
• Urban campus, suburban campus, rural campus
• Big school, small school

I think you need to first develop a shorter realistic list. These institutions are all over the place in things like size, religious affiliation, urban/rural, etc. More importantly, they are of highly varied quality. Start by assessing whether you can be admitted to a highly competitive school and whether that is what you want. Also, what you plan to study makes a difference here.

Bard College, Boston University, George Washington University, University of Chicago(high high reach), University of Miami, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, , University of Rochester, University of Virginia, Vanderbilt University

These are the schools i will must likely get into .I also applied for 4 suny state schools which makes this even more difficult.My issue is i am in spain right now and i have hardly any vacation time even if i could afford the money to go to the usa.I dont know why but the people on this forum are way more helpful and friendly then other forums i know.My only option is to stay in the usa after my cheap flight...
Problem is some schools make a decision around may first and i would have around 3 weeks to accept...
what does everyone else think? also would it be really horrible if i would have to decide without going to the schools?
p.s
my college gpa is a 3.76(59 credits) with decent ecs if anyone is into college admissions and such

For ex
Boston Univ, Columbia and U of Chicago are all urban schools , not traditional leafy college campuses.
Chapel Hill is lovely, very southern
Notre Dame is Catholic

etc etc - you get my drift.

If you were going to try to visit I'd focus on the intersection of schools that
you have the best chance of getting in
PLUS
you know the least about and want to know more

No, but you have to decide whether you want an urban or more isolated campus. All but a couple of the schools on your short list above are in the middie of big cities. The outliers are Bard, Rochester (small city) and UVA. Vanderbilt and UNC / Chapel Hill are nice traditional campuses with good-sized cities close by.

It would not be efficient to visit schools where you're not yet accepted, so why not wait until you know which will take you, then only visit them if you're not sure you'll like the physical campus setup?

Your a genius bear X however

For the major cities like Boston, New York, Philly, Washington, etc consider the cheap bus service between them. It can be as low as a dollar with advance purchase, but will probably be in the fifteen to twenty dollar range. Check sites like megabus and boltbus to see where they go.

Not sure where you call home but consider one thing about all the schools you are looking at, the weather is significantly different from location to location. Winter at Cornell will be significantly different than winter in Miami if that matters. One can have over ten feet of snow, one never sees snow.

Well i really hate when its cold the worst i agree with is maybe dc weather.
Also i really gwu however the financial aid while really good is not as good as the other schools on my list .For instance uva and vanderbilt promise 100% need based in fact i don't have income at the moment so those schools will be free for me and they would give me money to even get housing and buy foo.While gwu at best can offer up to the tution(still amazing but comparing to my other selections...)

If you hate the cold, you can eliminate quite a few schools from your list. Are you a US resident or citizen? If not, are you sure you will be offered any need-based aid?

This obviously won't help you learn as much about the schools you're applying to, but be aware that many of the schools that require an interview for admission will conduct the interview via Skype.

Yes i am a resident in addition all of the schools don't require interviews i think perhaps except one or two.I don't want to remove schools just because of the weather.If its an excellent school and i get in i might go even if the weather doesn't agree with me.