Hey y’all,
I’ve been on a bunch of college tours so far–and have liked a handful of schools–but I don’t think I’ve found the right one yet
Some stuff about me:
-Male, Junior,
-SAT: 1480 (720/760),
-GPA: 3.8W at Top 10 High School (Niche),
-Cost is not an issue for my family
-Likely looking to major in either Econ or Finance
-Honor roll, a couple of leadership positions
As far as what I’m looking for in a school:
-Adjacent to/Near a City but with an enclosed/traditional campus
-Undergrad Size 3k-10k (not huge state flagships)
-Not huge class sizes, no TA’s
-Emphasis placed on internship opportunities
-Diversity in political thought (not super left-wing or right-wing schools)
-Not very restrictive course requirements
-Not a huge Greek Life or Party scene
-School spirit (athletics, etc.)
I’m open to literally any suggestions, regardless of reach/safety/likely stuff.
Thanks much,
WJ
The 3000- 10000 undergrad range would rule out most LACs, which is where you are more likely to not have TAs .
If you are willing to go closer to 2000, Denison seems to meet your priorities, at about 25 min from Columbus which is garnering all kinds of recognition as a great smaller city for young professionals. Dickinson might be another option but — as lovely as I found the Dickinson campus, it is not an enclosed campus and has a town street separating parts of campus, and the gym and fine arts buildings require crossing other streets to get to. Dickinson is about 30 min form Harrisburg – the PA capital but not a large city.
Conn Coll is enclosed, but not really close enough to large cities (New London doesn’t count, I assume).
Wake is one of the only (if not the only) national universities with the class sizes of a liberal arts college and terrific school spirit. The business, finance, and accounting programs are all quite good, and Wake is politically moderate. Winston-Salem is admittedly not the most exciting city, but there’s plenty to do in the area.
Virtually every university and even some LACs will have TAs for introductory courses in popular subjects like biology and econ.
I don’t think this is a bad thing if the primary lectures aren’t too large. TAs at selective colleges have mastered the material and are often more in touch with the needs and expectations of undergrads than professors who graduated from college decades ago.
Rice? Not sure about their econ or finance majors but it ticks a lot of your other boxes. It’s a reach for everyone so I’d suggest trying to get your SAT up a bit if you do decide to pursue it.
Wake Forest does meet most of the criteria, except for the one about Greek life. Varies by year, but WFU is usually around 50% Greek and the preppy vibe is very prominent. There are still things to do outside Greek life, but wanted to point that out since it was on your list.
one of these things may have to suffer at the expense of all the others. (in other words, i can’t think of schools that meet every single criterion you’ve listed.) look into uofrochester, wake forest, and denison. colgate and lafayette are worth looking into if you want the liberal arts size (~2,500-3000) with division one sports.
UChicago is another that meets many of your list and is a powerhouse in Economics. But you might need to amp up the test scores a little and make sure you have some awesome EC activities and write killer essays to be competitive. If finances aren’t a barrier, then you’ll want to be ready to apply ED next year, as UChicago tends to fill a large part of their class via ED, with last year’s RD acceptance rate being something really horrific like 2%.
The reason you haven’t found the right college is some of your criteria are contradictory. Colleges with 5000-10000 undergrads will almost all have some TAs teaching. Those with school spirit will likely have prominent athletic teams & parties.
I suggest you not worry about TAs…some of the best classes I ever took we’re taught by by TAs. But if you want to avoid them, you usually just do a little research and don’t enroll in a class with a TA teaching it.
Also, don’t worry about sports, frats, or partying. They are pretty easy to avoid on most campuses: simply don’t go to games, frats, or parties.
Coming back to suggest that the OP consider prioritizing some of those criteria – which are the top 3 or 5 preferences?
For instance, LACs may be a good option for small class sizes (for instance, Grinnell and Denison both generally cap at 25 students – I’m sure there are many others who do something similar) and no TAs (for those LACs which have TAs, they are usually upper class majors who offer extra tutoring generally and are not teaching the class).
Politically diverse and focus on internships and post-grad career can be both large and small schools. Same for enclosed campus near city, good school spirit etc.
As others have noted, party life and school spirit often are connected, as big support for sports tends to overlap with party or greek life scene but, depending on the school, that too can vary.
Not very restrictive gen eds is in the “eye of the beholder.” Everything from a more open curriculum, such as Grinnell, Amherst, Kalamazoo, to typical gen eds. For schools which have traditional gen eds, do they accept AP or IB to exempt out of the requirements? Or are AP/IB just for placement, so you don’t have to take a specific Math class?
The University of Rochester sounds like a great fit for you. You have a lot of the same criteria I had when making selections and although I haven’t made a final decision yet, but I’m leaning heavily toward enrolling at Rochester this fall having been accepted last month. Good luck!
Wake Forest University, Davidson College, Washington & Lee University, Furman University, Elon (not sure about TAs for this one), Notre Dame, Tulane, Vanderbilt
Adjacent to or near a big city with finance - to me that means has an undergraduate business school. If you want to avoid flagships and medium size, consider: Emory (Atlanta) Boston College (Boston), Penn (Philadelphia). Boston College is the school that meets all of your criteria. Emory and its business school might be a bit stronger, but all they have is division 3 sports. BC is Catholic and Emory is more diverse. For Wharton, you might need slightly higher scores and grades. If you can get past the sports thing, as an alumnus, I would encourage Emory. However, if you can’t, you should find a school that’s a better fit.
Look into St. Olaf and Carleton in Northfield, MN. With two colleges in the same town, there are about 5,000 students total. And it’s not too far to the Twin Cities (45 min or so to the main part). And Northfield is really nice.