Thanks for the all the advice.
My thoughts on the visit.
Parents were escorted by a female 2nd Lt. who had just graduated last May. She was very genuine and talked with great candor about the academic challenges she faced as a cadet as well as a number of other things.
I couldn't help but notice that everybody knew her and vice versa. As we moved through out the campus she would see a number of people she knew. I noticed that she received more hugs from people than she received salutes and she got a handful of both. They say the Air Force is run like a business, that view is consistent with what I saw.
From the 2 hours I was on tour, I could see that the academy goes the distance to make sure that the freshman cadets know that they are (take your pick) - nothing, dirt, not worthy, pond scum, disease carrying maggots. Message received loud and clear.
I especially like the way freshmen cadets are to run everywhere, but only on the granite accent stones using the most inconvenient routes - message to cadets: do not get in my way you worthless piece of trash. There are more examples, but most of you probably know about them. This does not come as a surprise to me by the way. I guess why I'm making note of it is because the pervasiveness of this message was surprising to me.
My son's escort did a good job. I don't think that he is convinced that he will get a better education than he will at state U back home, sigh!
My opinion of the architecture (believe me I'm no critic) - it's different, except for the Chapel, the buildings are strictly functional boxes that I would guess hail from the late 60s to 1970s. The Chapel, love it or hate it is the only building of distinction on campus. Were it not for the mountains, the central campus (where the dorms and classrooms are) would be rather beige. Brick and mortar it is not. The only bricks on campus that I can remember seeing are the ones you step on.
-FoF