Stepping off their private plane at remote Auburn-Lewiston Airport in Maine, the 17-year-old boy and his family climb into the waiting Escalade that whisks them to the elite Bates College in less than five minutes.
The group spends the afternoon touring the renowned liberal arts school before jetting off the next day to Pittsfield, Mass., to visit the prestigious Williams College in nearby Williamstown.
Next up, it's a short flight to Waterville, Maine, ahead of an interview at tony Colby College.
While most high school seniors complete the dreaded college circuit in a rental car or their folks' worn-out station wagon, an increasing number of parents are spending tens of thousands of dollars on private jets to ferry their privileged kids to college campuses.
After all, why endure a five-hour drive from Manhattan to Cornell in the far-flung Finger Lakes when you can land in style at Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport in a Gulfstream G200?
Anthony Tivnan
"It's becoming a bigger part of our business," says Anthony Tivnan, president of leading private-jet charter company Magellan Jets, which organized the 12-leg, $150,000 trans-America tour for the son of a California-based financier and his relatives in August 2014.
"Dozens of families are taking advantage of the convenience by visiting colleges this way."
The service is so popular, last month Magellan launched a special package for "budget-minded" college-goers. The National Bank of Mom and Dad can now buy 10 hours of flight time aboard a Magellan jet for a bargain price of $43,500.
The deal includes varsity wear for the entire family emblazoned with the letters and emblems of each college — Princeton hoodies for everyone! — plus matching notebooks, and pointers from an independent admissions advisor.
Magellan even goes so far as to offer introductions to "high-profile alumni," such as athletes and successful businesspeople, either in person or by phone.
"We take care of everything," explains Tivnan. "Many commercial airlines don't have direct flights into airports near the universities, making it difficult to see multiple colleges in one day.
"Fly privately and you can visit as many as five or six colleges in the space of two or three days."
Meanwhile, Jet Edge, a rival of Magellan Jets, reports that a well-heeled client last year checked off six schools in three days — Emerson College, Boston University, NYU, Columbia University, the University of North Carolina and Tulane University.
"It's less about the decadence, more about the timesaving," insists Jet Edge president Bill Papariella, adding that the tour costs the customer around $80,000.
Of course, the types of families who use these services are card-carrying members of the 1 percent. "We have a lot of private individuals, in real estate, investment banking and hedge funds," says Papariella. "It's not so much Fortune 500 CEOs, who live [under the microscope.]"
Apparently, they don't want to risk the negative publicity of traveling by private jet for "this kind of [family] thing."
That's not the case, how-ever, for Magellan clients. Tivnan reveals that Fortune 500 CEOs are among his best customers. (No clients from either jet service would speak on the record to The Post.)
"Being gone [from the office] for 12 days to visit your kid's preferred colleges?" he asks. "That's not going to happen for these people.
"We can make the whole thing possible over a weekend."
Licensed pilot Patricia Reed, the director of flight support for Magellan Jets, heads the five-strong team that coordinates the campus tours. She arranged 18 such trips in 2014 and is working on a fresh set of itineraries as the college-tour season picks up this spring.
"It's always a very exciting time for families, but also quite stressful," says Reed. "We try to personalize the experience as much as possible and make it extra special."
"Special" includes so-called "ramp service" at the airport (where a Lincoln Town Car will meet the jet on the tarmac and take the group directly to the college) plus fancy onboard catering, whether it's a steak from Smith & Wollensky or summer rolls from Nobu.
The swankier aircraft, such as the Challenger 604, might have a flight attendant, but some families prefer to bring their own staff to serve food. "It depends entirely on the individual," says Reed, adding that, on smaller jets, the first officer might be the one pouring the coffee or Champagne.
As for extravagant requests, Reed's go-to bubblies are Veuve Clicquot and Cristal, while a tray of bonbons might be supplied by top Chicago "chocolate lifestyle house" Vosges Haut-Chocolat.
"We aim to turn the cabin into their living room at home," says Reed, who can also put families in touch with college alumni (often fellow clients of Magellan Jets) and even arrange meet-and-greets with top sports people.
"That way, they can talk over the events of the day in a relaxing environment."
During the trip, the family can go over a booklet of tips provided by leading college advisor Top Tier Admissions, based in Concord, Mass., which partners with Magellan Jets. Afterward, the passengers may submit their observations on each college to the flight support team, who will edit them into an easy-to-read format.
Wednesday Martin
"These are people who are pressed for time and have a laserlike focus on the task at hand," says Top Tier Admissions co-founder Mimi Doe.
"When you get there more easily and seamlessly, you can approach each college with a clear head. Expedited travel makes the whole thing less overwhelming."
This growing trend of touring campuses on private jets comes as no surprise to Manhattan-based author and social anthropologist Dr. Wednesday Martin, whose much-anticipated memoir, "Primates of Park Avenue," will be published in June.
"I know many families who do this on a routine basis," she says. But they don't use charter services like Magellan Jets or Jet Edge — they're the 1 percent of the 1 percent who own their own private planes.
Martin somewhat wearily tells The Post that it's another symptom of what she terms "privileged parenting" among wealthy families, and the "luxe-ification of childhood."
"It's cradle-to-college coddling," she says. "That basic reproductive impulse to shield kids from predators, disease and starvation is now rerouted to protect them from discomfort and inconvenience."
She recalls how one Upper East Side mother she interviewed for her book was concerned about the use of the family's private jet to take her teenager to California and the Midwest for two college interviews.
I know many families who do this on a routine basis. It's cradle-to-college coddling. - Wednesday Martin, Manhattan author, on the trend of touring colleges by private jet
"She was coordinating these tours, but the difficulty was that the family also needed their private plane to go to various contemporary art shows like Art Basel," says Martin. "She had to figure out how to use the jet for all these things because she did not want to fly commercial."
Luckily, the mother's staff got involved to resolve the dilemma.
"She was able to get her child to, let's say Stanford, for his interview, and herself to the art shows to buy the pieces she needed," concludes Martin.
As for Reed, who serves as the point person for parents, personal assistants or "family managers" to arrange campus tours, she says the hardest part of her job is keeping the moms calm.
"Their kids are growing up fast, and these tours are bittersweet," she says. "But the most difficult part is further down the road, when they hire a jet to drop them off at college [for good].
"That's when we stock extra boxes of Kleenex."
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