List of consortia / college towns / partnerships?

College Search & Selection
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I think colleges in a consortium (and its other forms mentioned in the title) have a small but significant edge over other standalone ones. If their resources are shared, students can cross-learn important courses and/or create collaborations that sometimes surpass a single institution’s capacity. On the downside, if the physical distance is too far - let’s set a hard limit of 2 hours for round trips - then the ROI might be too low, and that relationship might exist only on paper.

I know only a few such entities:

  • MIT & Harvard partnership
  • Massachusetts’ 5C consortium
  • California’s Claremonts
  • Ohio’s 5C

Could you add more, especially towns where colleges establish close relationships? And what do you think of them - do they live up to their fancy names in term of practical benefits to students?

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Haverford, Bryn Mawr, and Swarthmore are a consortium- UPenn is part too, but not in the same way.

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There is the Boston area consortium consisting of 20 schools: Amherst College, Babson College, Bentley University, Berklee College of Music, Boston College, Boston University, Brandeis University, Brown University, College of the Holy Cross, Emerson College, Harvard University, Lasell University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Northeastern University, Olin College, Rhode Island School of Design, Suffolk University, Tufts University, Wellesley College, and Wheaton College.

https://www.boston-consortium.org/about/

Some schools in the consortium have a closer relationship than others and consortium perks vary from school to school. You can check individual school websites for more info.

For instance, at BU you can cross register at Boston College, Brandeis University, Tufts University, and also at Hebrew College [outside of the consortium].

https://www.bu.edu/reg/registration/consortia/

If you are studying philosophy at Brandeis, for example, you can cross register at Babson College, Bentley University, Olin College of Engineering and Wellesley College, as well as the undergraduate school of arts and sciences at Boston College, Boston University and Tufts University.

https://www.brandeis.edu/philosophy/courses/consortium.html

Also in the Boston area — there is a Marine Studies Consortium that allows cross-registration (14 member institutions).

https://marinestudiesconsortium.org/institutions.php

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If academic calendars, class times of day, and final exam schedules are not synchronized, then cross registration logistics may be more difficult.

Also, popular classes may be difficult to enroll in by cross registration students if the host college prioritizes its own students in registration.

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On the Haverford page, they say UPenn has suspended the consortium. idk whether that means UPenn is the ‘boss’ of this stuff, and the whole cooperation is put on hold, or just UPenn’s participation in it.

IMO when a consortium has more than 9 members then it’s likely not effective. Too many differences that need compromises between institutions, too much info for a student to make out of the matrix.

Unfortunately, that’d be the case most, if not all of the times.

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The “BOW” consortium in Wellesley, MA brings together Babson College, Olin College of Engineering, and Wellesley College.

There is also a separate Wellesley-MIT Exchange Program which not only allows for cross registration but which also sponsors a double degree program between the 2 colleges. The Exchange provide a shuttle between the 2 colleges 7 days a week, day & night.

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It means that UPenn has suspended their participation in the consortium, outside of people who have 4+1 majors with them and another consortium school. They suspended it when Covid got bad and gave yet to lift the suspension. They were always the least connected of the consortium anyway, by distance and ease of cross registration.

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The Cross College Alliance in the Sarasota, FL area brings together New College d Florida, Ringling College of Art & Design, State College of Florida/Sarasota, and University of South Florida-Sarasota/Manatee.

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Tulane, Loyola, Xavier, and Dillard have a consortium agreement in New Orleans.

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Lehigh Valley Association of Independent Colleges (LVAIC) in PA includes Lafayette, Lehigh, Muhlenberg, Desales, Moravian, and Cedar Crest.

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The Atlanta University Center brings together Morehouse, Spelman, and Clark Atlanta University.

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Brown and RISD were both mentioned earlier as part of the Boston area consortium, but Brown and RISD also have a dual degree program and cross registration benefits of their own.

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Other 2-college partnerships would be Notre Dame & St. Mary’s and St. John’s & St. Benedict’s.

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I know several colleges in Pittsburgh allow cross registration. I’m not sure how well it works in practice. My D at Pitt tried to cross register for a course at CMU for a couple semesters and never could get the schedule to work.

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Case Western has a collaborative program with some other schools in Northeast Ohio. Most notable is the Cleveland Institute of Art.

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There’s a consortium in Atlanta (ARCHE…Atlanta Regional Council for Higher Education) that allows cross registration at member universities, which includes Agnes Scott, Emory, Georgia Tech, Spelman, SCAD-Atlanta, among others.

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Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-Charlotte, UNC-Greensboro, NC Central University, and NC State University have cross-registration arrangements, although the distances between some of these campuses may make in person course attendance during the regular academic year more challenging.

Additionally, Duke and UNC-Chapel Hill have a full scholarship program (Robertson Scholars) where the arrangement is more formalized, with students doing a one semester “campus switch” during their sophomore year. Here: https://robertsonscholars.org/

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@MontyBurns beat me to it, but it is easy for Duke students to take courses at Carolina (and vice versa). A bus runs between the two every 30 minutes, and the trip itself takes roughly 15 minutes. I took about a half dozen classes at Carolina as a Duke student, and one of the professors there co-supervised my senior thesis.

Students at a consortium school also have library privileges at the other universities.

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There’s a consortium in the Washington D.C. area that includes American, Georgetown, GW, George Mason, Howard, and others.

Baltimore Collegetown also has cross-registration available at several of the city’s universities, including Goucher, Johns Hopkins, Loyola Maryland, and Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA).

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Associated Colleges of the Twin Cities (ACTC) include Macalester, Hamline, Augsburg, St. Kate’s and St. Thomas. If you are at Macalester, you can also take classes at Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD.)

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