The Weil College Placement Program hit the road again last week to tour five more California colleges. Assistant Placement Director Etienne Emanuel his wife and Residential Director Aliona Emanuel joined Weil Juniors Michael Chen, Peter Huang, David Bogatin, Suraj Mahtani, Madison Wolfe, Nadine Del Carmen, and Senior Roman Ghambhir as we first visited the No. 66 ranked the University of the Pacific. Weil Alum and Pacific Men’s Head Coach Ryan Redondo greeted the group and allowed them to observe the men’s team practice, and watch team member and Weil Alumni Bernardo Oliveira in action. Our Students had a chance to see the Pacific campus, meet with an Admissions Officer and enjoy a great meal at the dining hall. Thank you so much, Coach Ryan!

Our next stop was to the beautiful campus of The University of San Francisco, fellow Weil Junior Anastasiya Redkina joined our group to meet another Weil Alum and USF Head Men’s Coach Pablo Pires De Almeida. Coach Pablo greeted our student-athletes and answered a few questions about the USF tennis program. After a great talk with the USF Admissions, the group went to see USF take on No. 29 ranked University of San Diego. Thank you for a great visit, Coach Pablo!

From there, the visit continued in the Big West to the beautiful campus of the St. Mary’s Gaels. Head Men’s Coach Greg Kennett kindly greeted the group and toured them around the idyllic St Mary’s campus. Thank you for a great tour, Coach Greg!

On our return trip back to Ojai Sunday, we stopped in at the home of the Lady Spartans of San Jose State University to see the campus, as well as made a stop at the stunning campus at Cal Polytechnic State University, where Mustangs Men’s Head Coach Nick Carless granted Weil players an opportunity to enjoy hitting on the Mustangs home courts. Thank you, Coach Nick, for allowing our players to hit on the Cal Poly courts!

Here’s what our players had to say about our trip:

“It was a great trip. I enjoyed seeing each campus and meeting the coaches. I also enjoyed watching the USF vs USD match. I even got to have a little taste of home in Chinatown, San Fransisco!” Michael Chen

“I enjoyed the Martin Luther King Jr Library at San Jose State, and just getting to be on each campus was exciting and made me think of my future. I also loved spending some time in the city of San Francisco.” Madison Wolf

“It was my first time in San Francisco so it was fun to get a chance to see this famous city, but also watching the team compete against such a high ranked opponent inspired me to keep working hard so I can be one of the guys out on the court playing at a top college program. I also liked talking to admissions and learning how much scholarship money I can get from what test scores and grades I have. Scholarship money is good motivation.” David Bogatin

A summation from Coach Etienne: “This was an amazing opportunity for our players to get a feel for some great schools, tennis programs and amazing coaches. We also got to hear from and meet Admissions officers who gave us some very valuable advice regarding college application essays and how to become a more well-rounded applicant. Trips like this help our students gain experience and confidence so that college doesn’t just seem like a mysterious place that they will be at in the future. They can see it, dream it and achieve it. We had a great two weeks of college visits, our juniors visited 12 campuses and met 12 coaches face to face and got to see lots of high level college teams from all three NCAA divisions. Plus, we just had a great time being together, experiencing so many wonderful things on the trip and having some fun. At Weil, we are more committed to helping our students achieve their dreams to study and play in great colleges than any other Academy in the world!”