Due to a death in my immediate family, I'm just now getting into the swing of visiting schools and seriously considering colleges. I'm a Senior.
My stats are as follows
4.18W/3.87 UW GPA,
1460 SAT I
700 on English and Chem SAT IIs
I'm the President of my schools Drama Club, and a good extracurricular theatre presence is very important to me. I want to go to a reasonably prestigious school with a rigorous intellectual environment. I like the city, but I'm open to going outside of it; that being said, I don't want to be in the middle of nowhere, and I'd like somewhere where I can walk, as opposed to drive, to different stores and such.
I'm also not hoping to go somewhere incredibly affluent and incredibly Republican. I don't think that GTown is alternative enough for me (I had an interview with an alum a few days ago) but NYU was a little too alternative for my tastes (visited there yesterday).
I would also really like a liberal arts education, because I want to pursue Computer Science without being restricted to an Engineering school.
If you're still reading, thank you! Hopefully you can help me out.
I am also National Merit Commended and an AP Scholar with Distinction.
I got a 5 on the APUSH, Lang, and Calc AB tests, and a 4 on Chem and Euro.
This year I am taking AP Physics, AP Lit, AP Comp Sci, AP Calc BC, AP Macroeconomics, and AP French.
Lot’s of quality you have buddy. Carry on!
Look into U Chicago, Macalester, Brandeis, Swarthmore, Haverford; also Barnard and Bryn Mawr if you’re female.
How much can your family afford? What’s your home state?
I am female, and I’m from PA. I’m not too concerned about price, our plan is to deal with that in the spring.
Northwestern
Muhlenberg
Connecticut College
Skidmore
I would strongly suggest you look into any price constraints you have now. Otherwise you could be spending a whole lot of time seeking out colleges that turn out to be unaffordable.
Other than that I would 1) run the supermatch function on the left and 2) try to get your hands on some good college guide books (ex. Fiske, Princeton Review) and start reading up on schools that fit your academic profile 3) consider what you want in a college to try to narrow things down (this can be anything including but not limited to size of school, location of school, and if you want anything like Greek Life, big time sports, religious/secular etc.)
This is an idea fraught with risk. You have the chance of having no schools you can afford. Bad.
Tufts University, University of Rochester and Brandeis University are very strong CS programs in a liberal arts context. Rochester and Brandeis particularly are manageable targets with your stats. You might also consider Cornell University, though it is a reach. It’s fairly rigorous.
I second University of Chicago as well; it’s a prestigious, very rigorous and “alternative” place.
Reed College and Swarthmore are also serious academic schools with good CS that are a bit “alternative”.
Carnegie Mellon is phenomenal for CS and encourages interdisciplinary study (every CS student has to do a minor). CS has its own school and is not part of the engineering school. They have very strong art and drama programs as well.
Harvey Mudd is an engineering focused LAC with very good computer science.
Wellesley and Smith if you are female. They are fantastic LACs that allow cross registration with nearby research universities, MIT and UMASS respectively.
If you want a school with socioeconomic diversity, perhaps you should also consider your state flagship. Since you are from Pennsylvania, Penn State is very good, especially if you get into the honors program. It’s a bit “rah rah” but the education should be fantastic.
Thank you everyone for the recommendations! I’ve been doing a lot of research but it’s super helpful to hear other people’s input.
As far as the price issue, it’s something my parents won’t even talk about. I have extended family offering to help pay (attributed to a heavily traditional Korean family on one side and an extremely feminist Grandmother on the other), and my own financial situation has been so bad I’m sure we’ll get a decent amount of financial aid, but in general my parents don’t want me to think about cost at all while I look. They said they’ll make it work whatever it takes.
Please make sure your parents understand that any school that provides good financial aid is very competitive for admission (because they provide good FA). And unfortunately PA doesn’t provide good in-state pricing or aid for Penn State or U Pitt (though Pitt does have some good merit aid).
lol please don’t spread guesses like ‘good CS that are a bit “alternative”.’
Reed’s CS is … very new … and definitely not state of the art. It is theoretical, the programming experience is … limited … and courses from other schools are strictly scrutinized so that they serve the mission of the math department.
While Reed is a good place to go if you want a holistic/general CS education or want to work in tech in Portland, if you want to go to grad school in CS… go somewhere else.
You have some wonderful stats and will have no problem even if you have to apply under regular admission. I wish you the best and sorry you have had a tough time recently. You still have plenty of time. No stress.