As someone who is very self-directed and has a wide variety of interests, I would like to go to a college that has a curriculum that is as open as possible. I am looking at Brown–no graduation requirements beyond completing a major–but due to the high selectivity, I don’t think this is a realistic option for me. I got a 1490/1520 on the new PSAT (which puts me in 99th percentile range, according to the college board), but I don’t really have any extra curriculars as of yet (I’m a sophomore, and due to weird policies my school has very limited extra curricular options none of which I happen to enjoy). I am expecting around a 3.8 unweighted GPA at a relatively challenging private high school.
I’ve looked at Vassar, which only has a foreign language requirement but is a little closer to home than I would like; Wesleyan, which seems to have relatively few requirements, but their website is confusing and I can’t quite figure out what they are (anyone know about that?), also it seems like it might be too selective for me; and Pomona, which has extensive but pretty flexible requirements and as a bonus is in California, which isn’t cold.
So, does anyone know any other schools that are more in reach for me than Brown but still have relatively open curricula (i take latin, sorry)? Anything that has very minimal core requirements (three courses or less), very flexible core requirements with a wide variety of classes to fulfill them, or has minimal distribution requirements (six or less spread across different subject areas would be nice).
Forgot to mention: I take honors classes in all the subjects my school offers honors classes for; I expect to have taken 4-6 APs by the end of senior year.
Grinnell, Smith, Hamilton and Amherst would give you additional options, but all, much like Pomona above, are not necessarily less selective than Brown.
The University of Rochester offers “clusters,” which I believe results in the requirement of two flexibly composed three-course sequences in fields not closely related to your major.
Be warned that Pomona has had increasingly competitive admissions cycles and is now one of those selective schools like Brown that make you want to cast a wider net.
I believe Hampshire is pretty open and not extremely selective.
Consider widening your criteria a little. I think there are many colleges that only have a few requirements and often the requirements allow a lot of choice. Self-designed majors seem not uncommon, if that’s part of what you have in mind.
In your college search you will likely have to make some compromises, so consider a slight compromise about requirements and it might help you find the college that is (almost!) perfect for you.
The Wesleyan “requirements” are widely considered to be pretty porous. A sit down with your faculty advisor is usually all that is required to fudge them:
Definitely Grinnell. The requirements such as they are include a freshman seminar (mostly focused on writing) in one of several dozen topics. And you aren’t allowed to take all your credits in one area (STEM, Social Sciences or Humanities). Other than that, you can take what you like. S liked the understated, non-preppy midwestern vibe, the strong sense of community, and the fact that there were no classes larger than 25 students. He got to know the faculty really well since almost everyone lives, works and plays in the town of Grinnell too. But it’s a small college town an hour from Des Moines and Iowa City - you have to be okay with that.
However, Grinnell’s frosh class stats are comparable or slightly higher than Wesleyan’s. Pomona’s frosh class stats are higher than both of the others. Using just admission rate to compare selectivity can be misleading.
Guys, the OP simply wants suggestions for flexible curricula schools that are less selective than Brown. The other schools mentioned in the original post only represent the the OP’s preliminary exploration of his own topic.