St. John’s College in Santa Fe and/or Annapolis. The school has two campuses and a very interesting liberal arts curriculum.
William & Mary, Kenyon and Colorado College are definitely NOT safeties.
Consider Earlham, Beloit, Lawrence University in Wisconsin
Many of these colleges do not promise to meet full need. So don’t rely on the federal efc but instead run their net price calculators.
Rhodes (TN), Earlham (IN), Puget Sound (WA)
Safeties: Denison, Ohio Wesleyan, College of Wooster. Wooster is probably the most “liberal” of the three. With your stats, you’d have decent changes for merit money.
Kenyon has gotten much more selective in the past couple of years but might be worth a look as a possible match.
Clark University in Mass is very liberal and has a similar feel to many of the schools you listed. While technically a University it has a strong LAC feel, is one of the “colleges that change lives” and is obsessively environmentally aware. It is a selective school with a lot of smart people and would, in my opinion, be an excellent safety school.
Below are 14 colleges that ranked among the top 50 LACs for alumni PhDs earned in the biological sciences from 2008-2012, that have average 25th percentile SAT scores < 1800, and that have average 75th percentile scores <= 2100.
(Carleton was #1 with 93 alumni PhDs;
Reed, Oberlin, and Smith were #2-#4;
Grinnell and Pomona were tied for #5 with 67 alumni biological science PhDs … but these schools all have SAT scores above my “safety” limit)
Rank … Number of Earned PhDs … College … 25th-75th Percentile SATs
7 , 63 , St Olaf College , 1770 - 2100
9 , 58 , Allegheny College , 1650 - 1950
21 , 41 , Ohio Wesleyan University , 1560 - 1980
23 , 40 , Ursinus College , 1700 - 2010
28 , 35 , College of Wooster , 1620 - 1970
29 , 35 , Juniata College , 1650 - 1965
30 , 35 , Kalamazoo College , 1680 - 2046
40 , 30 , Luther College , 1520 - 1950
41 , 29 , Earlham College , 1640 - 1990
42 , 29 , Hope College , 1590 - 1995
43 , 29 , University of Puget Sound , 1680 - 2003
44 , 28 , Eckerd College , 1520 - 1855
47 , 28 , St Mary’s College of Maryland , 1720 - 2020
48 , 27 , Furman University , 1760 - 2050
Sources:
https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/webcaspar/ (for PhD data)
http://www.satscores.us/sat_scores_liberalarts.asp?Start_Record=0 (for SAT scores)
Some schools mentioned in posts above are not among the top 50 (e.g. Denison, Beloit, Rhodes, Bennington);
other schools mentioned in posts above have SAT scores above my ceiling (Kenyon, Colorado College);
for still others, webcaspar does not seem to have data (New College of Florida), or else has them in a different Carnegie Classification than Baccalaureate/Liberal Arts I.
For the most part, this appears to be a subset of the Colleges That Change Lives members.
All are probably good options. None are guaranteed safeties for someone who can only afford $10K/year (basically room and board).
Franklin and Marshall and Ursinus in PA are both excellent schools, F and M meets 100% need and Ursinus is generous with merit and need too.
Lafayette, Dickinson, Gettysburg and Bucknell too if you will consider PA.
Kenyon vs. Oberlin, both are very good liberal arts colleges. Oberlin is certainly more liberal than Kenyon. Oberlin has a conservatory if you are muiscally inclined. With a 2100 SAT Kenyon is probably not a safety school for you they have gotten quite a bit more selective in the last few years. As noted above demonstrated interest is going to be important for many LAC’s
University of Richmond, in VA. My 2 daughters love it there, majoring in biochemistry.
A representative from the University of Richmond visited my school today actually! He was very nervous and stuttered a lot but I’ve heard a lot of good things about U of Richmond.
Below are the average net prices paid by low- to middle-income families to attend some of the schools mentioned above, according to College Scorecard.
Avg Net Price for $30,001-$48K Income … for $48,001-$75K … College
$8,727 $16,296 Wesleyan
$9,785 $17,445 Oberlin
$11,641 $17,617 Smith
$11,947 $17,475 Richmond
$13,484 $16,957 St Olaf College
$19,393 $22,012 Allegheny College
$21,931 $21,073 Ohio Wesleyan University
$20,585 $25,254 Ursinus College
$13,250 $16,301 College of Wooster
$16,637 $20,535 Juniata College
$13,903 $18,537 Kalamazoo College
$19,150 $21,614 Luther College
$12,469 $19,151 Earlham College
$17,125 $19,051 Hope College
$28,211 $30,241 University of Puget Sound
$25,372 $27,869 Eckerd College
$11,209 $16,717 St Mary’s College of Maryland
$17,132 $25,867 Furman University
St. Mary’s College of MD is a public university. Average net prices presumably are much higher for OOS students.
If you only can afford $10K/year, then your best admission and financial safety options probably include in-state public schools and schools offering automatic merit scholarships for your stats. However, some of the above schools may be affordable after you account for “self help” aid (student loans and work-study).
New College of Florida offers an automatic $15k scholarship to out-of-state students. I don’t know whether you’d qualify for any additional aid from them, but their price-tag was comparable to our own state’s public flagship. I think you would almost certainly get in, and they meet most, if not all, of your criteria. If you want even safer safeties, consider Eckerd and/or Guilford. I think both have free applications, and they will undoubtedly offer you generous merit packages. They were my son’s two safeties. He applied to many of the same colleges that you are applying to. He is at New College, because their financial package was so much better than other colleges that he got into (e.g. Occidental, Whitman, Willamette, Pitzer, Tulane, et al).
@tk21769 I’m from NJ but I specifically don’t want to stay in-state. Because of my mother’s low income, the net price calculators gave me much lower estimates for both Smith and Wesleyan than what you have listed. If I get accepted into either of these schools, I’m almost certain that my family will be able to afford them.
@woogzmama This is extremely helpful! Your son’s list sounds incredibly similar to mine. I hope he’s having a great college experience in Florida. 
Perhaps Goucher?
And agreed about the need to show interest.
The University of Richmond meets 100% of demonstrated need and offers good merit scholarships for science, community service and the arts, and is a good fit for you academically. The weather is a bit milder than NJ, they do get occasional snow in the winter, usually just a few inches that doesn’t stick around long. My 2 daughters really like their professors and have great mentors. They have both been able to work in a lab since freshman year and have had paid internships each summer. D1, a senior, spent the spring semester at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland through UR’s excellent travel abroad program. It is definitely worth a visit. D1 visited it right about now back in her senior year - it was the last school she visited and it instantly became #1 on her list.
Definitely consider William and Mary. Think you’d like it there.