Road Trip – Ivy League Edition

5 Universities, 4 States, 3 Friend Events, 2 Grad parties, 1 Amazing Road Trip

I have posted these photos on my Instagram and have made these travel journal pages over the course of a year, but I am finally here writing this. It’s right in time for the end of application season for high school seniors. So here is how to do a self-guided walking tour of any college, the links are provided.

*Full disclaimer, I did this tour amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, now schools are offering tours again. However, if you were not able to schedule a tour or want to move at your own pace, this article is for you!

Self-Guided Tours

I was lucky enough to get accepted into a couple of Ivy League Summer Programs (University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton the Future of the Business World, Harvard University Summer School, Yale Yong Global Scholars) in late 2019, and I was supposed to dorm on campus in the summer of 2020, but… well you know what happened.

So, when I had the opportunity to go visit the campuses I was supposed to stay at, I knew I had to. Plus, at the time I knew I was going to apply to most of these schools and I wanted to tour them anyway.

Unfortunately, due to the pandemic it was really hard for my family and I to get an official tour of these universities, but we do not give up easily. So, we scored the web, and eventually we found a walkable tour for the five Universities we visited. All the tours were pretty simple and gave me a good feel of the campus.

I linked the tours below and shared some of my favorite spots or memories from each.

Columbia University – My favorite stop on this tour was Athena’s Alma Mater Statue; it gives you one of the best views on campus and I participated in a freshmen rumor. They say the first freshman to find the owl hidden in her robe will become the valedictorian of their year. I learned of this rumor when admiring the statue and a professor came up to my brother and I because he thought we were searching for it. Good luck to all the first-year Lion’s I hope you can find it faster than my brother and I did.

New York University – (not an Ivy but T25) – NYU doesn’t have a traditional campus, so it was fun to see how it was integrated into the city. My favorite spot on the tour was definitely Washington Square Park. We were there for probably an hour and saw so many different types of people and activities, and that is one of my favorite things about New York, how you will meet someone interesting and new every day. I have to give an honorable mention to the Washington Mews though, the cobble stone road was so antique, and the doorknobs were really cool (I know that’s a weird detail but… well, you can check the gallery).

Yale University – Even if you have zero interest in attending Yale, you need to visit this campus. It was absolutely gorgeous. The only word to describe it is grand, every building was huge and intricate, and it is impossible to walk campus and not feel inspired. My favorite building was the law school because of the intricate carvings they have on the entrance, but even the gym was gorgeous. Special shoutout to my parents for spontaneously traveling to Yale and getting back to New Jersey in time for dinner.

University of Pennsylvania – UPenn was so much fun to visit, because it has so many types of buildings. If you are a fan of the Addams family or Netflix’s new Wednesday show, you must visit College Hall. The creator of the Addams family used that building as inspiration for their house. My favorite stop was the Kelly Family Gates, it is a bunch of hands with art supplies, and I thought that was really funky.

I obviously took a photo with the iconic broken button. The thing that really stood out about this campus was their Discover Penn cell phone service. There are signs around campus and if you dial the phone number there is a pre-recording professor or alumni talking about that landmark.

Princeton University – Princeton is one of my favorite towns in New Jersey, so it was so lovely to come back home. I would describe Princeton as sprawling, it was beautiful, but I definitely got lost. The ivy crawling up the walls made me feel like I was walking through someone’s dark academia Pinterest board. My favorite building was Blair Hall; the arch way was just everything. Also, I saw the cutest fox when on campus and he was just playing in the grass.

*Please reach out to me if you are interested in applying to any of the Ivy League Summer Programs I mentioned earlier. I learned so much, and honestly grew from the experiences at each one of them. Alright… we are done with school now… let’s get on to the social aspect.

Friends and Family

I got to hang out with so many friends and family during this road trip. I am so grateful that everyone that hosted me or came out to see me. No matter how far I’ll go I will always be a Jersey Girl at heart, and you guys are all a part of that story.