While not a LAC, the University of Alaska Fairbanks is a very small public flagship with a great geology program. While it claims to have 10,000 students, a lot of those students are at satellite campuses or part-time. I’d guess that the actual full-time student population at the Fairbanks campus is around 4000.
When I went to UAF there were 3000 students, and the biggest class I ever had was about 60 people for introductory biology.
South Dakota School of Mines & Technology has a geology museum on campus.
Similar to Alaska-Fairbanks, you might want to investigate Western Washington University. It enrolls about 16,000 students, so it’s not a mega-campus. An excellent geology department, especially in volcanology. About 130 miles further down Interstate Highway 5 is Evergreen State College in Olympia. Evergreen’s reputation for excellence extends beyond the borders of Washington. Evergreen is a relatively small (5,500) public college.
Amherst has a pretty cool museum on campus as well. https://www.amherst.edu/museums/naturalhistory?shib_redir=817410335
My D was a geo major at a Keck school and had a great experience including a prestigious summer internship and research opportunities. Several of her fellow interns were also from LACs. Not going to a research uni didn’t hurt her a bit that I see. You might also check out Whitman.
Amherst
Bates
Beloit
Bryn Mawr
Carleton
Earlham
Haverford
Lawrence
Macalester
Pomona
Does Haverford have a geology department?
To answer merc81, Haverford offers a geology major, but the department is based at Bryn Mawr. Through their unique consortium relationship, Haverford and Bryn Mawr share certain some departments. The geology department is at BMC, but any Haverford student can major in any field at BMC, including geology (approx. 5 HC students graduate with a geology major in any given year), and vice versa (e.g., Haverford is home to the music department for both campuses). The academic units of the two schools are very intertwined. Accordingly, it’s very common for students to take classes on both campuses and also common to major in a department that may be based at the other school.
My daughter’s high school has a paleontology museum so a lot of students end up studying geology in college. I though she might look into it at Brown where one of her high school’s founders sons is a professor One recent Pitzer grad is a Doctoral Fellow at USC, should be receiving his PhD this year, and was published in Nature last year, which is a big deal. At Pitzer he had access to all the geology offerings and profs in the Claremont Consortium.
Probably a significant omission from my comments on Hamilton’s program (#9) is that one of their current geosciences professors was recognized as a New York State Professor of the Year.