You don’t need a PhD to teach AP science.
@collegemom3717 her AP chemistry and honor physics teacher are both PhD. She thought she needs PhD for it.
No, it’s not required. However, it’s possible, especially in good school districts.
Also look into Muhlenberg, Allegheny, Dickinson, Rhodes.
If you can look further west, Grinnell, Macalester, St Olaf, Lawrence would be excellent LACs in the Midwest- but not sure they’d be affordable. If she is interested in Greek Life, DePauw. If she’s quirky, Beloit.
Not sure pure merit will bring costs down to your budget but worth looking into, certainly.
Also, if the college “meets need” and you lose your job, they would adapt the financial aid package (something that wouldn’t happen at a public OOS university; for SUNYs it’d only matter if your income dips below 125K/year).
She should also be able to get scholarship money&Honors College admission for her excellent test scores: Temple, USC Columbia, UVermont, Miami Ohio all have good scholarships for stats.
These all have different “vibes”, worth looking into.
If she likes Vanderbilt, she may like UAlabama and UKentucky.
Emory-Oxford may be a possibility, since Oxford Scholars get a full tuition scholarship (there are other scholarships, too). It’s very competitive but worth trying for. Oxford students spend their first 2 years in a LAC setting, then switch to Emory the big campus (or study abroad then move to Atlanta.)
http://oxford.emory.edu/catalog/admission-and-aid/scholarships.html
High school teaching typically needs a bachelor’s degree level knowledge of the subject and an appropriate teaching credential or degree as specified in the state. (Even AP level material is generally not higher level than lower level material in college.)
Those with PhDs sometimes do go to high school teaching because there are not enough research, college academic, or industrial jobs to absorb all of the PhD graduates in most subjects.
you absolutely don’t need a PhD to teach AP science/stem classes. Most high school teachers do not have STEM PhDs. A desirable STEM PhD makes 3-10 times what they are paid in public high schools.
Marist is a possibility, they offer merit.
While engineering and math PhDs are likely to find well paying jobs in industry, science (especially biology and chemistry) PhDs may find that to be harder: https://www.nature.com/news/2011/110420/full/472276a.html