S24 is finalizing his list and has decided that Williams will be his ED1 choice. He is looking for matches/safeties that have excellent merit for academics and possibly music. I see a lot of posts with info about large schools and opportunities for NMSF (we are in NJ and his index was 222 which just missed the cutoff) but less about small and medium sized schools. Current schools in consideration are Binghamton, Geneseo, UVM (honors college), Clark, and Emory. Fordham was on the list but the likely merit still makes the COA not worthwhile compared to the others above. Non merit schools are Brown and lottery merit schools Skidmore and Davidson. We are full pay.
GPA 4.6W, 3.92UW
SAT 1560 (ERBW 790, Math 770)
Heavy music ECs, some volunteering and teaching
Excellent essay, one teacher rec, music teacher rec and counselor rec; other teacher rec a little unclear.
Does not care about location but does not want bigger than 8000 undergrads
Major economics and music
For merit with those interests, check out Union and Denison. Also Dickinson, Oberlin, Gettysburg, Wooster, Kalamazoo. Maybe Connecticut College.
Very different range of vibes, but all offer merit.
I would add Kenyon to the list. It has both academic merit and music scholarships, although I’m not sure if they stack. Good music department, lots of options. Great, very rigorous school overall.
Adding Wheaton Mass, U Dayton, U Rochester, CWRU, Muhlenberg, Elon, U Denver, Butler. All very different vibes.
St. Olaf, Lawrence in Appleton, WI
Connecticut College, Macalester, Bard, Oberlin, Kenyon, University of Denver, Lewis and Clark, Cornell College (IA), Dickinson, and Sarah Lawrence all offer pretty good to excellent merit - some of these, I believe, will offer additional scholarships for musicians.
Gettysburg, St. Lawrence and Hobart William Smith all offer merit to a decent number of students and they are all about the right size. Not sure about the music aspect. Is there a budget number you have in mind for schools in this pot (meaning not the super elite where you’d be ok paying full freight)?
In addition to the many great suggestions above, if you are looking at Williams, I would definitely consider Grinnell. Maybe another reach, but possibly a softer reach depending on how competitive you are for Williams. They have a priority deadline of 12/1 for merit consideration but that does not conflict with ED rules:
https://www.grinnell.edu/admission/financial-aid/types-aid/scholarships
Gettysburg was not on our radar but I just looked at it and will have him look this afternoon, Sunderman has amazing music opportunities and may be a great safety with excellent merit, even if he just does a music minor. He would have to ask about music opportunities for non music performance majors but in such a small conservatory I would think that minors would have opportunity.
The other question is harder, my thought is if it isn’t his first choice we would prefer to spend as little as possible. So Binghamton would be a very good deal (he should get merit to bring down to in state tuition) but otherwise would probably depend on the school. For example we took Fordham off the list since it did not seem worth $60k a year, but he is applying for music and general merit at Emory and if that was the same price he would jump at it.
There’s a difference between spending as little as possible and spending a bit more than you’d have to (assuming you have it, which it sounds like you do) to get a terrific academic, social, artistic option.
yes, agreed, this post is about figuring out the schools that will balance his academic options, merit and roi. What options are out there that will cost less that will give him excellent opportunity.
“…does not want bigger than 8,000 undergrads.”
Will major in economics & music.
Although not a small school and does not offer merit scholarships, Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois (outside of Chicago) has about 8,200 undergraduate students (US News reports that Northwestern has 8,659 undergrads). I cannot think of a better school for one who intends to double major in economics & music. Admission to the School of Music is by audition.
On the list for full pay reach. Thanks!
It’s a bit far away, but Southwestern University in Texas is strong in music and Econ and offers large merit scholarships. My D had similar stats and was an Econ/math major there with their top scholarship. She studied abroad twice, had success landing an REU at a top university, landed a fantastic job at graduation, and is currently working on a PhD. Her roommate was a music major.
Susquehanna in Pennsylvania was a wonderful fit for my daughter. They actually offered our oldest a full tuition scholarship but he decided to go elsewhere. They gave my daughter free jazz piano lessons and a small stipend every year, on the condition that she play with the jazz band. Although not a big name school, she got a wonderful education there and four years later is still in contact with a few of her professors. One is willing to support her applications to grad school.
My niece went to Southwestern and loved it. They were a tremendous help in her applications for a Fulbright Scholarship, which she received. She played violin in the orchestra.
This analysis, which is based on faculty scholarship, may help you compare the economics departments of liberal arts colleges: Economics rankings: US Economics Departments at Liberal Arts Colleges | IDEAS/RePEc.
Thanks for that! Susquehanna does pretty well!
Definitely St Olaf
Great resource. Thank you for posting.
However, how does one know if the professors whose publication has been cited are still at that school ? (This issue was raised by the sudden, unexpected departure of 4 econ profs from a small LAC within the past 2 years. Among the 4 departing profs was the head of the economics department.)
Consider exploring schools on the CTCL.org list.