I would read the book The Hidden Ivies. All of your schools are in there as well as others you maybe haven’t considered. I think it’s the very best book for its description of student life on campus.
For NEPatsGirl: True, we are making an assumption that she will bring her English SAT score up slightly. Given that she was a month past her 15th birthday, it’s not much of a stretch. Obviously, her math score is fine, as it is at or above the 75th percentile of every one of those schools. Regardless, one of the purposes of starting this thread was to start to collect enough information to shift focus if her score doesn’t improve like we think it will. Let me add, though, this is exactly why I resisted giving any info about her to begin with–I was looking for unbiased info about the schools themselves, without having to defend whether a particular school is appropriate for her.
Your daughter can find great options for mentored research opportunities among her tentative choices: https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/undergrad-research-programs.
I’m only personally familiar with Amherst and Vassar on your list, though we visited a couple of the others. So I don’t have much to add.
Amherst has a pretty awesome new science center, just opened this year. SURF summer research on campus, funded. And many similarities to Brown (open curriculum being the main one). And the presence of 5 colleges, especially the huge one up the road, makes the town much more lively and the cultural and dining/going out options much greater than, say, Williamstown.
I wouldn’t call Poughkeepsie an exciting metropolis but I wouldn’t call Vassar rural either.
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I was a city kid who attended Wesleyan during the seventies. I’ve also spent overnights at Amherst, Dartmouth, Williams and a summer internship at Hamilton. The student bodies differed somewhat although all skewed toward the upper-middle income bracket and because some were football weekends, I tended to interact with a lot of athletes or would-be athletes. Other than that one demographic slice which may or may not have been representative, the thing that I found common to all of them was how quiet the physical surroundings were once night fell. There could be a raging kegger going on just up the block, but, you would never know it because the walls everywhere were so thick and solidly built. And, it being New England, nearly everyone, including the townspeople, were indoors. I loved it so much that I’m actually retiring in Middletown. But, I can also see how the lack of foot traffic at night might creep some city-dwellers out.
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I started my freshman year at Duke as a biology major, but I was rather put off by the large lower-level courses and the indifferent attitude toward undergraduate advising. I wound up switching to earth & ocean sciences, where I could still study marine science but had far smaller classes (<15 students without exception), much better advising, and was able to jump into research right away. Duke has some absolutely amazing resources for biology majors - the medical center, primate center, marine lab, Duke Forest, and so on - but it’s very much a place for people who are willing to be aggressive about seeking out opportunities.
I have always been a huge fan of Davidson, and I’ve worked with Davidson chemistry majors on a few summer research projects. It’s a great school, especially for biology, and is solidly moderate politically. Students are very friendly, and the campus is nice (albeit not as stunning as Rhodes or Sewanee). Nearby Charlotte has really transformed in the last 15-20 years, especially the downtown area, and has a fair amount to offer college kids. An improved bus system and the expansion of the light rail system are making it easier to get around the Charlotte metro area without a car, but it’s still pretty useful to have a friend with a car (or be willing to use Uber/Lyft) if you want to get around town easily.
I think the whole “sporty” or “sports dominated” reputation for some LAC’s is a red herring. Lots of athletic people (especially D-III level) are smart, interesting people whom your daughter might enjoy getting to know. These schools aren’t really big enough have totally separate social spheres, so the athletes being part of everyday life could be something that appeals to your daughter’s desire for a diverse experience.
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Smaller colleges with full sets of sports teams will have a larger percentage of students playing, since the size of teams does not vary like number of students does.
@RayManta, It is true that small liberal arts colleges have distinct personalities and cultures; however, there is a good deal of overlap among schools as well, especially those in the mid-Atlantic and northeast. All are academically excellent with nurturing professors whose sole purpose is to teach undergraduates. All (including Swarthmore) recruit a substantial number of students from prep schools, though the Eastern prep school students themselves are no longer all “preppy,” rich or WASP-y. All aggressively recruit diversity: racial, religious, cultural, sexual, economic etc. and all admit their fair share from super wealthy, privileged families. For the most part (with exceptions like W&L and maybe Colgate) they all lean left politically, though some are more heavily involved in social advocacy and some are more middle-road. They all field from 20 to 25 athletic teams, plus plenty of club sports, though some take winning more seriously than others.
My son considered about half of the schools on your daughter’s list. He was accepted ED to Williams and spent a wonderful four years there. He wasn’t and still isn’t much of drinker and wouldn’t agree that drinking is the primary social event on campus. He wasn’t a team athlete, but enjoyed outdoorsy activities like hiking, camping and snow sports. For him, Williams’ insular mountain village environment was a huge plus. The kids who seem to be happiest there are those who chose Williams because of its location, not in spite of it. Environmental activism, where biology and political science intersect, is big.
I would also note that the Berkshires while decidedly rural are not a cultural backwater, and Williamstown – with the Clark and MassMoCa art museums, the Williamstown Theater Festival and nearby Tanglewood Music Center – is a sophisticated destination for the visual and performing arts. The arts facilities and resources are amazing.
If your daughter responded favorably to Williams after visiting, then I would leave it on the list and not be distracted by stereotypes. Williams kids are energetic and intellectually curious (It appears your daughter is too) and it’s common to find a shared commitment to academics, arts and sports or the outdoors.
Very roughly, I would group Williams with Hamilton, Amherst, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Colby and Davidson. I would put Swarthmore, Wesleyan, Vassar, Bates and Haverford at the other end of the spectrum. Because of their heavy focus on Greek systems, I would evaluate Colgate and W&L separately from the others. Having said that Wesleyan was one of my son’s top choices even though the prevailing culture is somewhat different from the others on his short list (Williams, Hamilton and Kenyon).
Despite your daughter’s academic achievements, all of these LACs are very selective and admission can be unpredictable. She should look seriously at the very good midwestern LACs: Grinnell, Carleton, Macalester, Kenyon. Lastly, I would encourage your daughter to keep an open mind on the women’s colleges in the region. Smith, Holyoke and Bryn Mawr especially offer profoundly good academics at much less selective admission rates, plus the advantage of consortium connections to wider populations.
Another thing no one has touched on yet is “the bubble effect”. I read a lot of posts concerning the importance of pinning down the exact “feel” of each LAC - and, I can agree with that to some extent. But, the fact remains that each one, boiled down to its essentials, is still a community of thousands of young people living in a kind of enforced intimacy they might otherwise only experience living under one roof at home. Looking at it from that perspective, I’m not sure if getting the exact ratio of athletes to musicians matters so much after about two weeks of passing each other in bathrobes on their way to the shower; sharing sink space while brushing their teeth and getting over shy kidneys in a typical dormitory bathroom. It becomes an alternate universe. The lack of distractions off-campus mean you learn the faces of most of the people in your class pretty quickly and in most cases, it becomes almost impossible to pry them away from campus. Wesleyan recently had to relocate its bookstore downtown just to entice students to explore a thriving Main Street only three blocks away. The bubble effect.
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Thanks again, folks! This is all very helpful and I’m sure will help others, too, which is the beauty of this site.
@momrath: Is the spectrum you describe based on rural/suburban, social scene, or something else?
Re: our situation, we know that these schools are all super-selective. To a certain extent, it’s too early for my D to devise a final list; she’s still waiting on a couple pieces of data: another semester of grades; another retaking (or two) of the SAT, this time with prep; how much she enjoys and shines in her summer lab job, which could result in a sterling LOR. Our “floor” is our state flagship, which is well-regarded, inexpensive, and she shouldn’t have any trouble getting in. She’d hate it there, though. We’re searching for those elusive schools less selective than the ones on this list but a better match for her than UF. Again, we’re not hung up on the “highest-ranked” school that will admit her, just finding the best fit. As is probably clear from this thread, though, and like it sounds like has been the case for many of your own children, she needs to be at a place where there are other intellectually curious kids whose interests almost seem boundless. Problem is, for the most part, the two are the same: she’s most likely to find that group concentrated at those super-selective schools. There may be some schools in Boston, W&M, Wake Forest, UVa (but she’s OOS, so just as difficult), a few others in that elusive group, but at some point it becomes the same public-vs-private debate every parent struggles with. What happens, happens.
If she would hate it at the state school then it’s not a safety. S19 didn’t apply to any big state schools as safeties although many of the Big Ten schools would have been safe for him. Instead, he found lower ranked LACs and showed tons of interest. Also, he has a couple of mid-sized schools that wouldn’t seem like safe bets but, according to our Naviance, it looks 100% likely he will get in. Fingers crossed. One doesn’t always have to have the state school as the safety.
We used UMaine Farmington as our safety, it is out of state for us, but they match our in state tuition and had the feel that she loved at the private LACs. They were generous with merit, as well. She knows where she wants to go, but I would not let her ED because we had to compare financial packages. Just an option to consider. ?
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@RayManta You haven’t mentioned whether cost is a factor in any of this - some LACs offer merit scholarships, but most of the elite ones are need-based only. Please do make sure you’re running NPCs for the various schools, because a school your daughter can get into but your family cannot afford doesn’t do her much good!
For what it’s worth, my D is a sophomore at Hamilton and one of the things she loves about it (aside from the open curriculum which makes it easy to double major) is how much genuine variety she finds in the student body even though it’s a small school. She’s really gotten a kick out of the fact that regardless of where a fellow student is from or what they look like, she can be pretty well assured that they’re going to be smart and interesting. I’m guessing most of the good LACs are similar in that regard, because the size of a school like that seems to foster community.
My kid is also a junior, and her list is pretty set, so I don’t think it’s necessarily too early. It’s okay to have some schools that are reachy enough that she’ll need higher scores / continued good grades / great LOR for them to be reasonable applications. When you’re looking for safeties, I’d assume that her current scores are it, her grades dip a bit but not much, and her LORs are fine but not outstanding.
Intellectual curiosity is one of my kid’s criteria, and she found plenty of that at less selective schools. The other stuff she cared about differed enough from your daughter’s wants that I don’t think her starting list would be useful to you, but there are safety schools with intellectually curious kids out there.
Yes, I’m curious about that, too. It certainly sounds as if she is trying to sort them according to political activism. The problem with that is, if you google “college protests”, several of the colleges on her short list pop up.
“needs to be at a place where there are other intellectually curious kids whose interests almost seem boundless. Problem is, for the most part, the two are the same: she’s most likely to find that group concentrated at those super-selective schools.”
No, for the most part, they are not the same. There are thousands (and a large percentage) of intellectually curious kids with boundless interests" outside of the super selective schools.
I don’t buy that you aren’t looking at rankings, every school you mentioned and that has been mentioned here with the exception of post #48 are very selective and many are a crapshoot even if your kid gets a 1500/4.0 with IB or better. Please be careful not to set your student up for disappointment – and a state school that she does not want to attend is not a safety. She needs to be looking for a safety that she’d be HAPPY to attend, and that’s not easy to find, I know, we had the same dilemma where my D really didn’t want to attend the state flagship either, although a very good school, but far too large.
No reason not to reach for the sky, and her stats look very promising, but know that many kids with those same stats are surprised by the rejections and waitlists they receive. I have no horse in this race and mean no offense, just dishing out some real facts.
This may have been mentioned, but have you considered the University of Richmond?
Thanks. Cost isn’t a factor, other than that it will be hard psychologically to send her to a mediocre private school without a national reputation when tuition at UF would essentially be free–especially because it would potentially make it easier for her to afford graduate school later, if she chooses to do so.
@graystrong, great point.
Her HS doesn’t use Naviance. 
There’s no question that makes things harder–to a certain extent we feel blind.
Several of you have brought up the idea of not ruling out lower-ranked LACs as safeties. I only know some names, but nothing in depth about them (Union, Bard, Lafayette? Skidmore?). I worry that the lower-ranked LACs aren’t well known, and therefore won’t carry weight when she is looking for jobs or applying to grad school outside that region–at least less well-known as similarly ranked larger universities. Maybe I’m overthinking here.
The other thing is, and this is completely subjective, sitting in on classes at these schools and talking to the students afterward, she gets a feel for whether she belongs or not–especially when there is robust discussion. Where she’d feel self conscious or inferior, for example. That can’t be overstated–each kid should be challenged at the school they choose, but not overwhelmed or afraid to speak up. And intellectually, there’s no question she belongs at the schools discussed here–that’s been clear since she was three years old, and I’m not saying that as a parent, but as unbiased an observer as I can be. Whether she gets in is a different matter, but she has checked all the boxes she would need to at this point in her schooling. At some point things are out of your control.
Even schools like Kenyon, Oberlin, Denison, and even Grinnell can sometimes be safe for a high stat student. All of those names are nationally known.