For lower cost likely or safety LAC options in rural areas, how about Truman State and University of Minnesota - Morris?
@RayManta Last year, I was trying to decide between applying ED to Williams, Amherst, Dartmouth, Brown, and briefly Middlebury. I’d be happy to privately talk about how I narrowed my choices down to one school.
Re Colgate: It’s very Greek-heavy, wealthy, and preppy. Most New England LACs are rich and preppy to a certain extent, but Colgate nearly embodies those qualities and doesn’t do as well with regards to diversity. That being said, definitely visit it. As a more intellectual student who’s into the arts, I thought I’d hate Colgate, but I actually ended up really liking it despite those qualities. It became one of my favorite schools outside the NESCAC.
It might be a useful thought exercise to sit down with your daughter and brainstorm about the qualities that she most liked about her front runners. From what you say it seems to be Harvard, Bates, Brown at the top and then highly ranked New England LACs close behind. What qualities made the first three bubble up to the top? She may not know at this point other than that gut feeling. However, I have a hunch that she may be very sensitive to place. Maybe she likes being near water or she likes campuses that are coherent yet integrated into the surrounding community. Or she favors a certain kind or architecture. Or maybe there’s a certain “look” in a given student body that feels either comfortable or off-putting. I don’t know. But I suspect that she knows it when she sees it even if she might not be able to fully articulate why.
The broader point is that arriving at that pro/con checklist can then help to refine your list. It can also help to define matches and safeties that correspond more closely to her reaches.
I can’t remember if @Lindagaf has chimed in here but your D’s working list reminds me a bit of hers from three years ago. IIRC, her daughter applied to Brown and to many LACs that you are currently considering or have been suggested up thread. Ended up depositing at Kenyon and then got off the waitlist at Bates and decided to go there. From what Lindagaf has reported, her daughter has had a wonderful experience and has taken advantage of everything the school has to offer.
BTW, I agree with you on Rochester and Case being similar kinds of schools. If your D is outdoorsy at all, Rochester is probably the better bet and you have legacy advantage there as well. Case has become an increasingly challenging admit in the last few years.
Finally, Oberlin: I know of a few unhooked, upper middle-class kids who were accepted RD in the past year or two that did not have stats as high as your daughter does. While nothing is a sure thing these days, I suspect your D’s chances there would be good.
My D19 had some of these schools on her list and similar stats (1560, 102 GPA, lots of ECs, etc.) She only applied RD and was accepted at Colby, Bates and Lafayette (with scholarship) and waitlisted at Amherst, Bowdoin, and Middlebury. It’s very competitive for an ORM female at these schools – although you have an advantage being from the South (we’re NY). She interviewed at Bowdoin, Bates and Lafayette, and visited all at least once. If your D is interested in Bates I’d highly recommend an interview and having some contact with admissions. It makes a difference. But if she does not have a clear favorite I would be hesitant to ED…it is hard to really judge a school based on tours. After acceptances, Bates was my D’s favorite, but she wind up choosing Colby after doing overnights at both. She thought Bates felt too small (the campus) plus she was named a Presidential Scholar at Colby which was too good to pass up. I also don’t think ED would have helped my D at Amherst or Bowdoin – but it probably would have gotten her in at Middlebury. Might be the same for your D. Good luck!
@twoinanddone I’m really sorry about your friend. That must’ve been a really difficult transition for his/her daughter to go away to college so soon afterwards. I agree with your views about different experiences and allowing yourself to grow and change–I think my daughter agrees with you in theory, too; this is the way she describes herself. I think she would enjoy being in a sorority if she found the right group of young women–she isn’t a wallflower and is very at ease with others. Since she is in a magnet school, her friends are spread out miles and miles apart from each other, and she may discover that she becomes more interested in social activities when her friends live down the hall.
@RockySoil Yes–no argument here. The rule of thumb I use is that a school’s 75th percentile test score numbers overall are roughly the 50th percentile of unhooked applicants. So I use that as the baseline. For Oberlin, Richmond (and Bates, to a lesser but similar extent), she not only is at or above the 75th percentile of test scores, but would also seem to stand out based on her GPA, and together those two factors I think would mark her as a strong candidate. Again, though, with the holistic review–who the heck knows. I don’t consider them a slam dunk–if I did, I would just pick Oberlin and be done with it. But I think we can be fairly confident that applying to Oberlin plus Richmond plus one more unchosen similar school should yield at least one acceptance. Unless she messes up her essays.
@Midwestmomofboys Wow–that’s just…wow. You’re right, we should be narrowing down the list instead of growing it. Or replacing some of the upper schools with one or two lower schools. I’m not sure she can do it, though. In this environment, I’d be terrified to apply to just six or eight. I guess the keystone in Bates–among the schools that appear more difficult to get in, if it came down to those two schools, which would she chose? Maybe she removes Washington U, Tufts, Colby, Bowdoin. Maybe Wellesley. Maybe Harvard for strategic reasons. Then she’s got Amherst, Williams (she did visit, loved it), Midd, Bates, Brown, maybe Hamilton, Colgate (?) Rochester, Oberlin, Richmond (?), and one other, let’s say St. Lawrence or Skidmore. Maybe takes off Middlebury, too. That may be too frightening!
@taverngirl I haven’t been back at the U of R campus in a long time–my 30th reunion is coming up this year, in fact–but I understand the campus is much better than it used to be. When I was there, we described the campus as bordered three sides by a polluted river and one by a cemetery. 
@ucbalumnus We checked–we would get one year at the in-state rate, and then she’d be considered out of state thereafter. She wants to leave the south anyway so isn’t crying over it. (We are in FL, but moved here from MD when she was five, so we aren’t native southerners by any stretch).
@ucbalumnus Really trying to stay on the east coast unless there is a good reason not to, such as a school that really grabs her. Hasn’t happened. She’s willing to brave the Maine winters, but not Minnesota or Chicago, lol.
@RayManta My niece attended Union. Now has her PhD in nursing. Lots of smart kids. Average ACT 28 - 32. Strong in engineering and sciences. It’s on the trimester program. Three ten week sessions. Acceptance rate around 36%. Some Greek but not dominant. Big into hockey I think. Nice campus. I’d put it in the same category as Dickinson. Should be a safety/match for your D. It’s a school I don’t see mentioned as often here as some of the others.
@writingpumpkin03 I would be interested–thanks! I/we wouldn’t know how to narrow further before applying.
@mamaedefamilia I have tried to do exactly that, starting with when she has called after each visit and when she has returned home. I’ve tried to get her to compare all the schools she has visited each time she has seen another one. I think there are factors that she can’t articulate. Part is architecture, I think, but moreso the amount of open green space and population density. As mentioned earlier, she really didn’t like Penn and MIT. She told me that she really liked how down-to-earth and friendly all the people she met at Bates were. And the same at William and Mary. I don’t know what attracts her to Brown; if it was mostly due to the open curriculum, then it seems to me that Hamilton would combine the best of everything. It may have been the class. She has sat in on a class each school she has visited (other than Bowdoin and Hopkins, which were on break, unfortunately), and stayed to talk to some of the other students afterwards. I suspect also that visually she likes campuses with lots of trees with leaves that change color in autumn, which we don’t have down here. Your traditional New England/Pennsylvania campus look (which, to me, defines Swat).
@hviewer The advice to interview, especially at Bates, is a great one.
@RayManta I didn’t mean to sound all “tough love!” My view is, that as parents, the college decision process is a really great opportunity to model decision making for our nearly-adult kids. Initially, it’s kind of fun, even exhilarating, to explore these amazing schools and parse the differences between such places as Amherst, Williams and Swat or Bowdoin, Midd, Colby and Bates. And there are differences, for sure, plus, with your student’s portfolio, they are a credible candidate at many many top schools. But I’d try to focus on the essential characteristics, whether it is size, location, greek life or not, super arty or super sporty etc. Once the priorities and preferences are identified, then focus in on a range of safety/match/reaches which share those essential characteristics. I’m a big fan of the approach that there is no “single best, dream school” but lots of excellent candidates. Analogize it to buying a car, or a house (or dating) – at first, its fun to consider all the models, options, etc. but at a certain point, it’s time to recognize the non-negotiable features which limit the list.
Not to end with a “freak out moment,” but keep in mind that “official” acceptance rates combine ED and RD rates, with ED rates often being substantially higher than RD and many LACs fill 1/3 to 1/2 the entering class through ED. So the RD acceptance rate is, practically speaking, a lot lower at top 30 LACs than the published rate. That’s where listening to how a school talks about its priorities, and writing an application which affirmatively shows a specific student will contribute to the community, can make a difference in a single student’s outcome.
I’ve skimmed through these posts. First of all, I would say the list is entirely too long. I think you already know this. Each of these apps take a LONG time and the essays will be very important. Especially for the LACs on the list, those schools really need to see a fit. I’m not sure where to go with my advice after that. Let’s see -
(1) So many of the schools on the list are reaches. Period. As someone mentioned above, these schools accept kids in buckets. We did our due diligence with Amherst and Williams and they both have something like 57% in the URM category. After we subtracted that percent and then tried to roughly take out the athletes and legacies in ED, S19’'s chances were so ridiculously small. The only reason he threw his name in the hat for those two was because the coaches both seemed interested in him running for their teams even though he wasn’t quite recruitable. His times were getting better throughout senior year and they gave us some hope and were very responsive whenever S19 reached out with new info. He was rejected at both. (1540 SAT one sitting August of junior year 800M 740EW, XC/track athlete, NMF, all 5s on his AP tests, BC Calc as a junior and multivariable senior year and honors and AP level in all five main subjects including French, Scholastic Art Award-winning artist with drawing and painting portfolio submitted, leadership in local community service, state-wide honors for creative writing)
(2) I may have missed this but has she visited all of these schools? I know it’s so hard to get to them but visiting helps get the list down to a reasonable number. S19 applied to 13 schools. It was a LOT and he spent many hours during the summer writing all of his essays. He was admitted to every school we visited (William and Mary, Carleton, Grinnell, Bowdoin, Kenyon, Davidson) and to two we did not visit (Hamilton, Dickinson). I would say he was able to write these essays with much more detail because we visited and he sat in on classes.
(3) What is your high school’s history with the schools on her list? This info went a long way for us and I correctly predicted his outcomes for every single school. For instance, Dartmouth took two athletes from our school in ED and has only taken one student (always an athlete) for the three years prior so I knew that probably was not going to happen. He wanted to try, though, and we know some local alums who wrote admissions for him. Didn’t work. For the other schools on the list, we had very little info since not many kids apply to LACs from our high school. From the little info we had, I could tell if he would get in. Carleton and Davidson, although nationally seem difficult to get in, always take kids from our school with his scores so I was not surprised he got in. Same with Grinnell and Hamilton and W&M. Bowdoin was the long shot that came through. I think he got in because (a) they did not take a recruited athlete in ED from our high school this year and (b) he was a perfect match in every way. This was confirmed when he re-visited in April and felt very at home both with the students and the campus. Bowdoin says that they take determine acceptances by looking for kids who show 50% heart and 50% academics on their apps and I think the heart part came through in his essays.
It was risky for him to only apply to Dickinson EA. It was his super back up. We never visited. I felt very sure he’d get into Kenyon and Grinnell and Carleton but not 100+ percent so that’s why he applied to Dickinson. In the end, he was between Davidson and Bowdoin.
Things worked out for him but it was a LONG road and very stressful. We are also full pay. It was hard for my husband for S19 to pass up merit at Grinnell and Kenyon but, when he saw him at Bowdoin, he was willing to pay the extra.
We have a D21 and, honestly, I feel like I want her to use ED. One friend of mine put it this way - the kids have to choose at some point, either in Oct for ED or in April once the answers come in for RD. If you’re willing to pay full price and forgo knowing the outcomes for a long list of schools, visit the top contenders and stay the night and go to class. Choose one. A student can only go to one school. It’s great to get a bunch of acceptances but, if you do your research early, there’s really no point in not going ED (if you don’t want to compare merit aid). Looking back, Bowdoin was always one of his favorites, If he could have made that decision in Oct, he would have been accepted ED and we could have been done!
Also, Oberlin? Nothing like Midd but maybe a little like Brown. Very activist. We went to visit and S19 really did not fit with the kids. Not a fit. We did not visit Richmond (but we will for D21). I think of it a little like Colgate - maybe a little more preprofessional and Greek and monied than many of the other schools on the list right now. As for location, Harvard and Brown are totally different than Williams. That’s for sure. Could she be happy in both of those environments? Maybe but you guys need to cull that list and Williams is VERY secluded. S19 would have liked it but he really wanted the rural bubble and didn’t like any urban schools we visited. Even Davidson being suburban ended up not having enough nature for him.
One thing to note about smaller schools is that recruited athletes will consume a larger percentage of admission places than at larger schools. A given set of sports teams will have roughly similar numbers of athletes at various schools, but those numbers will be a bigger percentage of a 2,000 student school than at a 10,000 student school.
Sorry one more thing!! You could narrow down the matches to two. Maybe W&M and one more. Then choose a safety that’s hopefully EA. And then shoot for the moon with the rest. That would be the other strategy. But it’s a lot of work. And you will not be able to visit all of the schools in April if she gets into more than a handful. As it was, we couldn’t get S19 out to Midd to decide if he should take the waitlist spot offered and he never visited Hamilton. He probably would have liked both…but did he need more when he already wanted to go back and visit Carleton and Davidson and Bowdoin and W&M? We couldn’t even get to all of those. So, it feels good to have a long list because you feel like you’re covering your bases and admission decisions are unknown. But, like I said above, it’s a ton of work and a lot of money to visit and makes the process longer and more complicated.
So, think long and hard about each school on the list.
Regarding spatial attributes, which have been mentioned, LACs fall across a wide range. Bates, for example, though not tiny at 133 acres, might feel different to some students from a spatially luxuriant school such as Amherst (1000 acres).
Yes, but, Amherst does not occupy all 1000 acres of the property it owns. Its main campus would fit quite comfortably on the smallest NESCAC.
Above, you asked about a few specific schools: Bard, Union, Skidmore, Conn Coll, and Franklin and Marshall. Those are peer schools that I would consider “low matches” for your daughter, because they would be safe for her except for the ‘holistic’ aspect of all and the yield protection aspect of some, which makes admission less than certain. The key at all colleges at the level will be to demonstrate lots and lots of interest.
My son looked into all very seriously, and visited all but Bard and Union, which he eliminated for exactly opposite reasons of perceived environment!
One thing I am wondering about is that you said your daughter would make a good sorority member, but then you said she eliminated some colleges as too Greek. So here is the thing about Union— great sciences and lovely campus, but a very high percentage of sorority/frat participants in this college that historically was “the mother of fraternities.” When my son was wondering whether to visit it, we were dissuaded by the comment of my colleague’s kid who was a current student there— that pretty much everyone goes Greek except minority and low-income students because of the high cost of participation. Of course, that is only one person’s comment. Perhaps others can comment on whether this is accurate or not.
Compared to Union, Bard is at almost the opposite extreme of LACdom— a much quirkier, march-to-your-own-drummer type of crowd. It would need to be visited to see if it calls to her or not. But it is definitely is an amazing intellectual environment, and it offers the coolest mix of admissions options— see the website for the crazy range of ways to apply; Instant Decision is my personal favorite— interview and attend a class one day, and find out the admissions decision the next day!
Based on the rest of what you wrote in this thread, I bet she’d like Skidmore. My son liked a lot of the same colleges your daughter does and he was really attracted to Skidmore. He thought he would have been very happy there. Great campus environment- a really friendly place, and fun traditions like Beatlemore Skidmania. They also have some merit scholarships for the top science students, because they are building up their science departments and want to attract the best of the best. But be sure to demonstrate lots of interest.
She might like Connecticut College, too. I wrote a post about it yesterday on the hidden gems thread. I will link to it: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/22295381#Comment_22295381
Franklin and Marshall might be a good fit for her. It was a bit fratty for my kid, but if your daughter would be happy with a low key sorority, it might work for her. And it certainly offers one of the stronger science reputations of the small LAC’s at that level of admissions difficulty. The living-learning dorm situation provides an instant close community for new freshmen.
Lots of luck to her!
If you do get her out to Ohio to look at Oberlin, I suggest you also look at Kenyon and Denison. We resisted the Midwest schools for a long time, but there are some really great options. Kenyon and Denison (I don’t know as much about Oberlin) are similar to the NE schools in many ways but lower key. I also think you shouldn’t disregard the possibility of merit money. We didn’t think too much about that but in the end our S received some wonderful awards, and it is a source of pride for him and a lovely surprise for us.
Thanks again everyone. I had my daughter and wife read this thread, and as a result, they hashed out a revised list of schools this evening while I was out. I personally think she needs a couple more safeties–or “probables,” as I call the schools with some doubt, but this is what she says she is comfortable with:
Schools to apply to: Brown, Amherst, Swat, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Bates, William and Mary, Rochester.
Schools “On the bubble”: Williams, Wellesley, Colby, Colgate, Hamilton, Mt. Holyoke, Oberlin, Richmond, Bryn
Schools eliminated: Harvard, Tufts, Washington U., Johns Hopkins, CMU, Wesleyan, Haverford, UVa.
Schools she hasn’t addressed: Several brought up here, like Union, Skidmore, Connecticut College, etc.
Upon reflection, she noted that she likes the schools that are connected to small towns, close enough to walk to. That realization helped her with the classification, and in fact she is leaning toward moving Williams from the “bubble” to the “eliminated” list. That may also help us make an initial cut on the other schools on the “bubble” list.
I also note that almost all of the schools on the “bubble” list are schools she hasn’t visited, while all the schools on both the first and third lists she HAS visited (other than Wash U). That is an important development and seems to suggest we should plan another multi-school trip in the fall, possibly to hit Hamilton and Oberlin, maybe Skidmore, too.
She also reiterated that she has ZERO interest in Greek life, either in joining a sorority or being at a school where the social scene revolves around parties at fraternities. So maybe that eliminates Colgate and Richmond, and several others not mentioned above like Lehigh, Lafayette, and Bucknell.
Making progress!
@RayManta I like it! Why don’t you just stick with her new “apply to” list and add a safety? She’s still needs one of those. I don’t think there’s one on that list.
@homerdog Thanks for the long post. She has visited many, but not all of these schools, and likes many of them.
We don’t know her high school’s history with the schools on this list. They don’t use Naviance, so we are flying partly blind. We are told that most of the students in the IB program will go to UF, with the next largest group going to FSU or one of the other state schools. Some end up at the Ivies or the top CA schools. I suspect that very few apply to the LACs.
I’d like her to use the ED route if she can choose which one is her #1 pick. She’s now ruminating on it. We are going to be full pay, and have enough money saved to cover the cost of school.
I think she has a good shot at Oberlin, but we haven’t visited. Maybe she will hate it, I don’t know, but other than its reputation of being so extremely progressive and activist, seems to match the qualities she is looking for.
@TheGreyKing Thanks! You were very helpful in the other thread several months ago, too. I’m really, really trying to help find the best safeties/probables for her, but it is a real struggle. This info is very helpful.
@RayManta I had such high hopes for Oberlin too. Very strong in the sciences and we liked campus and the town. It just didn’t fit in other ways. We did spend a whole day. We went to a number of break out sessions with faculty and students, on a tour, and we ate lunch in the cafeteria. We loved the faculty. They were very welcoming and passionate. The kids were very crunchy and outspoken. Our tour guide told the prospective students that they have to have a social justice issue if they plan to fit in. She was pushy about it. Then, S19 went to a breakout just for students and, with ten Oberlin students on the panel, he thought he didn’t match up with any of them. They were all very much like our tour guide. We toured Kenyon, Grinnell, Denison, Davidson, Macalester, Carleton, Bowdoin, Colby, W&M, U Chicago, and Northwestern and Oberlin felt very different than all of them in their social justice push. I will say, if that is something a student is interested in, then they would love it there. The students we met were definitely happy campers. They found a great fit.
Some posters make finding a safety sound so easy. We didn’t find that to be the case so I understand why it’s hard to nail one down. The student first has to understand that she honestly and truly may have to go there. We visited both Kenyon and Grinnell twice. Looked very hard at all of the positives. In fact, we didn’t take him to Williams or Amherst or Dartmouth specifically because I didn’t want him to fall in love with a school with such low acceptance rates. After he identified that he wanted rural bubble with small classes and a good population of student-athletes, we started looking for safe versions of that. So, maybe have your D write out what she wants in a school. I’m sure you’ll find that many of the safer suggestions in this thread will provide those things for her.