Of course the list of 40 is not all-inclusive, but I’d love to hear names of other schools that CC members feel meet what seem to be the criteria:
-Small LAC with great academics
-Low faculty to student ratio
-Intimate feel where faculty know students and vice versa
-opportunities to do one-on-one research or projects with faculty
friendly, diverse student body
excellent stats on grad school
admission rates or employment post-graduation
-not insanely selective
I’ve actually tried to find out which schools were formerly on the list but have not been able to. Someone suggested using Amazon’s “look inside” feature to look at the table of contents of an older edition but it nfortunately that didn’t work. Are schools like Kenyon, Haverfod, and others not a nclidee because they are too well known, or too selective? My one gripe with many of the schools on the list are their out of the way locations, at least for my family (metropolitan NY area). For example, Lawrence sounds amazing, but no nonstop flights. Ugh. Not a deal breaker but still.
Anyway, I’d love to hear what schools CC members would add to the CTCL list if they could! And why, of course!
Southern Methodist University - its a nice size - about 5500 in size and very friendly and has similar traits as to what Loren Pope has described. Great school!
My guess is that Kenyon and Haverford are out because they are already well known/highly ranked LACs. Seems to me the CTCL list was intended to highlight lesser known schools – hidden gems, as it were.
It’s intended for hidden gems, yes. My final three choices were all schools on the CTCL list!
I’d vote for Albion College to be added. It’s a solid school academically, not so well known outside of Michigan, and meets many of the standards that Pope looks for.
I just thought of another one… Saint Mary’s College of Notre Dame. It is an all girls school that is literally across the street from ND. 1600 in size and the girls get the best of both worlds. They can attend all the functions and classes at ND too.
I think most LACs where your child meets the academic criteria would fit the bill. I don’t know how the CTCL were chosen and i don’t know if schools pay to remain on the list – but I see it as a marketing thing for a group of LACs more than a full list of LACs that fit a given criteria. I think it is important to look at every college on its individual merits and fit.
There are tons of great LACs out there. For example my D is at Lafayette and is having an amazing experience…great student body, lots of small classes (a few of even 5-6 students), knows many professors very well, involved in multiple research projects (lead student researcher on one of them), involved in extracurricular activities she is passionate about, friends who graduate seem to be doing well in jobs or grad school…etc.
Some other LACs we looked at were Franklin & Marshall, Union, Dickinson, Muhlenberg, Skidmore, and Siena.
Reed and Whitman seem to be the most selective of the CTCLs.
I would think virtually any LAC that is no more selective than Reed and Whitman could be a candidate for the CTCL list. One could constrain the candidates to, say, the USNWR top N national liberal arts colleges that are no more selective than Reed.
What do we mean by “selective”? US News measures selectivity by SAT scores (65%), percentage of students who ranked in their HS top 10% (25%), and admission rates (10%). So, let’s start by sorting just the USNWR top 50 LACs to determine which of them are no more selective than Reed. By my reckoning, using 2013-14 CDS figures and the USNWR selectivity formula, the list below shows about how they would sort out (by “WAR”, which is my calculated “weighted average rank” for admission selectivity).
Most colleges in the second cluster of 25, below, might be candidates for the OP’s “could be” list. A few of the ones near the bottom of the top 25 might be, too. Of course, this is just one way of sizing up the “CTCL” concept. It assumes the CTCLs could include virtually every LAC that is (a) not too selective and (b) meets somebody’s quality criteria. Many LACs ranked lower (maybe much lower) than all these schools might be good candidates as well.
^ Good point. But I think one premise of Pope’s book was that not all students’ lives need “changing” with respect to academics. He did not include colleges that only enroll tip top students. He tried to identify the kinds of colleges that enroll kids who were B/B+ students in HS, yet provide stimulating academic environments with high levels of student-faculty engagement (and post-graduation outcomes to show for it).
Keep in mind CTCL schools are aimed at the B / B+ student and so tend to have acceptance rates around or above 50%. Last year, the lone exception was Reed college because it was on the original list. .
So schools like Kenyon and Skidmore are not CTCL simply because they are a bit too selective and target the A student. Haverford is simply way too selective.
My daughter is an A student right now. Hopefully it will stay that way once she starts the IB diploma program in September! She underperformed in standardized tests though, so that might become an issue. I really don’t know how much of a shot she’ll wind up having at the higher ranked LACs, or if their “vibe” will feel right to her. Are a lot of them competitive and preppy?
CTCL is an organization with member colleges. Personally, I find the associated guidebook to be deceptively titled. The title, to me at least, implies independent editorial assessment.
@merc81 from what I understand the book came first and then the colleges formed a group. No college paid to be included, and the list was developed by Pope based on his insight as an education writer for, I think it was, the NYT. It was only after the publication of the book that the colleges formed a “membership”