To give you a recent admissions perspective, I’m introducing a new guest post series from current college students, starting with my sister Anna Shuster: a junior at Emory.

Hi, current college student here!

I remember watching the emails roll into the inbox. Carefully sorting your “Thank You for Your Interest” and “Congratulations” packets into mental folders in your mind and being paralyzed by pro-con lists you word-vomit to friends and family. It’s up to you to decide where you’re going to spend the next four years of your life. No pressure though!

My college visits were the make it or break it moments for my college decision TBH. Ask anyone, they all have stories about how they just knew when they stepped foot on their campus. On your visit, it’s also pretty clear if you hate a college. One of my friends hated the campus of what used to be her first choice so much she left in the middle of a tour to spend the afternoon at a fast food joint instead (not the most respectful move, but a common one). 

This is to say, a college feels very different in person than it does on paper.

When I ended up visiting my school, I almost cried because I felt something in my gut that this was it and that terrified me. This all-consuming decision was suddenly incredibly clear and all that was left was to put down that deposit.

But I also didn’t visit schools until AFTER I got in. Even then, it was a huge luxury. Depending on where you’re applying, buying a plane ticket, finding the time to fly, and having a parent take time off to go with you is super expensive. And this was all before COVID health precautions became an additional barrier to touring campus.

Hopefully, you’ve already visited a few schools pre-Covid or attended a virtual tour because it is so helpful when it comes to individualizing your supplemental essay for each college. It also makes it easier to show admissions officers that you really care and know about the school (heads up: they hate thinking you used the same supplement for every school).

So if you’re in the process of trying to make your decision and can’t make it to campus in person, here are five things I did to get to know a school from the comfort of my iPhone:

1. Live on Social Media Tags

The location filter on Instagram, Facebook, and even Twitter is one of the first places I checked to get a feel for the college.

Look at the tagged photos of your college. Check the hashtag for your college on every social media, even Tik Tok. Find popular club Instagram and Facebook pages. They exist on public pages so it’s not creepy (or at least that’s what I told myself lol).

This is more authentic content posted by real students without anything to lose. I was asking myself, “How are the students interacting with each other in the comments? What events are they promoting on the story?” I knew when I was making my decision that I love studying outdoors and seeing photos of students studying on the campus quad helped me figure out if I could see myself there. 

Many professors nowadays are also very active on Twitter. They promote their research and involvement with their students often, in addition to their personal take on current events. If you know what department you’re interested in majoring in, find some notable professors’ Twitter pages. I remember going down a rabbit hole on this one ethnobotanist’s account whose class I ended up enrolling in freshman year! These profiles don’t give a comprehensive understanding of the college, but it adds to the whole picture. 

2. Click on Snapchat Maps’ Hotspots 

Snapchat Maps is useful beyond its function to see if your best friend is with that ex she promised she ended things with.

Snapchat Maps can contain live snaps of the everyday life on campus that you may not even get on a college tour. Just google your college to be able to guesstimate where it is on the little map and click on the red spots that indicate active public stories. Doing this allowed me to see student antics in study rooms and how they crammed for finals (whether it was group studying or desperate studying in the Stacks, it felt good to know what it looked like). I was able to vibe with the energy of students who captured their lunchtime break in between classes or recorded a fun moment from a get-together.

You can also take a look at stories pinned at locations surrounding campus to give you an idea of the larger location of the college. Being off-campus is such a fun adventure, especially when you’re an underclassman getting to know the town. These stories can let foodies figure out what they can order off UberEats and give coffee addicts the full scoop on the cafes on and off-campus.

3. Join College Meme Pages

Nearly every college has its own meme page (mostly Facebook but lately it’s becoming more popular on Instagram). These meme pages are going to be the most honest review of the college, with all the good and bad, from the students. Just search the name of your college on a social media’s platform’s search engine and it should pop up.

Ask to join if it’s private and get that insider info (but take the jokes with a grain of salt! Some of the jokes are just plain stupid and even the students can’t explain why it’s funny). For example, one popular meme on my campus is that our college ranking hasn’t changed in like forever so we make a lot of “Forever 21” jokes. You’ll learn the real grievances students have with the administration whether it’s student government spending or scandals involving the dean (because if we’re being real there will always be something). Just take note of it and keep track of the pros and cons.

4. Devour Google Headlines

Might be a no-brainer, but scour those Google results.

What part of your college ended up in the local news and why? Get to know the reputation based on how it’s described in the articles. I’m a total human health nerd and seeing innovative research happening across departments at my college made me excited for future extracurricular opportunities that I genuinely wanted to pursue.

It can also just be fun to uncover campus traditions this way! My college regularly records and uploads our midnight breakfast festivities during finals.

5. Watch Youtube Videos

Odds are that a student at the college has a Youtube account. It doesn’t matter what the content actually is, though. I just searched the name of my college and watched videos by students and alumni purely because it was not curated by the admissions office so I knew it was legit. My favorite kind was The Day In the Life of a [x] Student. 

I watched videos of students just vlogging their day on campus and was relieved to find that I could see myself in their shoes. Get a feel for the way they talk and interact with those around them to get a better picture of what the student body is like (but make sure you don’t make a mass judgment off of one person!).

Now go forth, and fire up those finstas!