Hi, everyone. I’m a high school senior from the Washington, D.C. area who wants to attend a small liberal arts college and is trying to decide where to apply ED1 (and possibly ED2) this fall.
Since I visited last fall, Wesleyan University has stood out to me on the list of my favorite schools (others include Bates, Carleton, Colorado College, Kenyon, and Vassar, which are all contenders for ED2). I am a huge social justice warrior and love the activist vibe on campus, as well as the racial diversity, which is unparalleled by most other LACs (I’m a white female, but a lot of what I’ve put my passion into has been work with my school’s diversity committee, and I’ve made a lot of my friends through this work). However, because of recent admissions decisions received from Wes by students at my school, it is clear that the school is more of a reach for me than I had previously expected.
Recently, I visited Bates College and had a great experience. While it was originally my second choice overall and my #1 choice for ED2, it has become more of an overall top choice in my mind recently because my college counselor told me it is a match for me, so I would have a very good chance of getting in if I applied ED1. I loved the spirit of inclusivity at the school, as well as the outdoorsiness/sportiness, the short term, the GECs, and the senior thesis. I like that Bates seems to be a bit of a mix of the hippie/political vibe of Wes and the outdoorsiness of Middlebury (a school I removed as an ED contender because the student body felt too homogeneous). However, I’ve read that the student body at Bates is socially conscious but not as much activist, and it doesn’t seem as intellectual as Wesleyan.
That being said, I am not set on having an overly intellectual environment at the college I attend. I stayed overnight at UChicago with a friend and had an amazing experience but ultimately decided an environment like that would be too intense for me; the same goes for Swarthmore. I liked Wesleyan because it was seemed very political and very intellectual but also laid-back, and I wanted a place that wasn’t too “out there” like Oberlin or Reed. While I have seen Wesleyan on lists of “most intellectual colleges” along with the aforementioned schools and schools like Grinnell, Macalester, etc., Bates doesn’t seem to be part of that group of small liberal arts colleges.
This has become a long-winded post, but my question is basically whether, as someone who is a huge activist and wants a very intellectual college experience, I would be happy at Bates. As someone who is very outspoken about diversity/equity/social justice, I have felt pretty isolated in my high school, and I want to make sure Bates is very different than that. I not only want people who are accepting but people who also care about similar issues and above all people who I can learn from. As of now, I have Wesleyan and Bates as my two possible ED1 choices, but if I would be happy at Bates then I would feel inclined to apply there instead of taking a risk with Wes. If anyone has any insight it would be greatly appreciated!