Wow, thank you all for replying! I didn’t know that there would be so many options for what I was describing.
@juillet Your comment is so helpful :-). Like I said, although I’m giving colleges with humanities/western civ sequences special consideration in my search, I’m not just looking at those colleges, so I may well end up making my own sequence as you described. I don’t think I’m cut out for a college that only has a great books program like St. John’s (I do want to specialize eventually), but a college like Columbia is just what I’m looking for. I think it’s just great that they require students to study the Western canon, from its literature to music. I hadn’t really considered Columbia before because I assumed NYC would be too busy/distracting a place to study in, but since Columbia has an actual campus (as opposed to NYU), it might be okay after all. I’ll definitely try to visit. Thank you so much for that suggestion.
@tk21769 Oooh, UChicago’s the kind of school that probably would be my #1 choice were it not in the very cold Midwest. Their offerings in the humanities are great (I mean, how bad could they be; David Bevington taught there!) and I love the intellectual/nerdy/curious culture that UChicago is known for having.
@PiccoloMom1995 I’ll see if my GC’s office has that guide. While I’m politically a very liberal person, I do believe in a sort of traditional curriculum that they you said they survey in the guide.
@InigoMontoya Thanks for the suggestion about Jesuit and Catholic schools. I know some are more religious than others, so I wanted to ask: are there any schools on that list that an agnostic Jew should steer clear of, or will they all be accepting of people of other religions?
@rayrick Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll look into both schools.