@Overtheedge -Thanks! Sounds like we should look at Sewanee.
I love the area. Did your D go greek?
@veruca - She did go Greek but their Greek system is not very traditional. All but one of the sororities are local. The houses don’t cut girls during rush and it’s a very relaxed process and system. Nothing like being Greek at a big U. It attracts a wide variety of people.
Thanks!
My son’s best friend is a senior at UNCA, majoring in audio engineering/production. He moved from PA with his mom to NC with his dad so he could go to UNCA and pay instate tuition. He loves it there. He has had two major internships and has a job offer upon graduation. His girlfriend is a math major and insanely smart, she says the math program there is great. One of their other HS friends transferred to UNCA and is also happy there, majoring in biology. My son has visited them a few times and says the campus is awesome and the vibe is cool. Asheville is a very artsy, hippie-ish town.
Asheville is loca-vore paradise. If it’s still there, Early Girl restaurant was incredible.
If you’re headed to Sewanee then I have to add Maryville College. My D2 is there and loving it. It’s in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains and has a small, beautiful campus. MC leans liberal, residential, with very strong programs in the sciences. As with WW, you won’t find it on CC but it’s a gem.
Thanks I have heard of Maryville -but never talked to anyone who went there.
UPDATE: We are back from our tour and really enjoyed ourselves! I think it was a good first college tour experience for my D. Unfortunately we waited too late to book a tour for Boone -so we just walked around campus.
If she decides she is interested we will go back.
I loved Warren Wilson - if I were looking at colleges it would be at the top of my list.
Thanks everyone for your input
I’ll be visiting UNCA (and I hope WW, too) later in the month. I’m looking forward to seeing the area!
I keep looking at UNCA because of what I’ve heard about the beautiful and artsy area, the school’s vibe and some very appealing programs. But it seems to have a very prescriptive curriculum. I was surprised to see that History majors seem to have their coursework all laid out for them – 36 hours’ worth of what seem like basically intro courses – and Creative Writing is a program you can’t know if you’d be admitted into until after freshman year or even sophomore year. New Media and Arts in general looked great, but I don’t see how kids would have the freedom to mix and match between interest areas and still finish on time.
I find it interesting that on UNCA’s website they feel a need to point out prominently that it’s “liberal only in the breadth of ideas and perspectives.” From all I’ve read, it would be a very comfortable place for a liberal kid, but it’s interesting that they feel the need to put that on the website. (Do they need to reassure the state legislature?)
BTW love some of the comments here. If I were looking at colleges, I’d also be all enthused about Warren Wilson. Seems too small and limited in offerings for S, though, although he’d be keen on the creative writing, the farm and the blacksmith forge 
Looking forward to your reports!
@MomOnALaptop while we were at Warren Wilson we walked by the Blacksmith forge and someone was loudly playing “Gangsta’s Paradise” as they hammered.
I too think the academic offerings there are a bit limited -but for the right kid I think it would be a great place. My D was interested in the Bee keeping work crew.
The Freshman Dorms were old and didn’t have AC - I am not sure if my D would enjoy that .
I think she could adapt if she really wanted to.
We didn’t look that closely at the structure of UNCA s programs. This was my D’s first experience looking at schools -just wanted her to see a big and a little a private and a state school
At both UNCA and WW there was a fair amount of piercings and blue hair -but lots of mainstream looking kids too.
My other D goes to GA tech - which is super diverse and bustling. All the NC mountain schools -including App state seemed more caucasian , and less hectic.
No a/c? We basically encounter a/c once a year, when we visit the US. I bet they have 24 hour electricity, though; that’d sound like a 5 star hotel to my kid Would love to be able to visit, but any kind of college tour will have to be planned so far in advance and in such detail that I really appreciate visit details from folks who can actually hop in a car and get places and post your thoughts! The more detail, the better! We have to narrow down the list online and rule out a lot that might otherwise be a “maybe” or a “this’d be fun to check out” … so I tend to look into programs pretty closely, read course descriptions and Gen Ed requirements (and visit reports), etc. We actually have an Excel spreadsheet going, with columns for all the important variables LOL! UNCA and WW have both come off and on
@MomOnALaptop Since you can’t visit anytime soon -I will tell you some other impressions. Feel Free to ignore.
At Warren Wilson there were dogs in the Library! I loved it. The Campus was very pretty.
There were 4 places to eat. Two coffee shops inside of dorms that had almost zero waste and fair trade coffee. Then there was a vegan cafe and a regular cafeteria. They use vegetables that they grow there. Several dorms had little gardens beside them.
The campus is about 10-15 minutes from downtown Asheville. The area around campus was very rural. Classes were small. Peace Corp acceptance was 100%
Service is part of the mission of the school. Often the service will coinside with academics -the example they gave was Spanish class writing brochures in Spanish for a women’s shelter.
Everyone works -I guess you know that already. There are loads of different work crews. Freshman sometimes get the not so desirable crews (like cleaning) There was a horse crew, gardening crew, landscape, Bees, Herbs, Food service, admissions, … basically anything that needed to be done at the school had a work crew.
Admissions weren’t very selective -but part of that is because it is self -selecting. Most kids who apply have a special desire for that kind of education. WW does not troll for applications to up the selectivity.
The school used to be Presbyterian - not anymore- but lots of religious organizations on campus.
Housing for Upperclassmen was across the highway from the rest of campus. Almost everyone lives on Campus. There is a catwalk type thing.
The school owns loads of land and there were miles of hiking
UNCA
Seemed more of a typical state directional -aside from the beautiful campus. Classes were small.
According to the admissions person - UNCA is the 3rd most competitive school in NC - Chapel Hill being 1, and NC state being 2nd
They had a really cool Klin if you are into Ceramics. Theatre seemed active.
Campus was just beautiful. Said they get snow a couple of times of year -but not usually really deep snow and it doesn’t last a long time. UNCA kids can ride Asheville city busses for free.
Lots of recycling. Some green buildings.
Dorms were kind of suites -but you still had to share a room. No kitchens in the suites -just a sitting room and a shared bathroom. I think many kids live off campus after Freshman year.
There wasn’t as much remarkable or different there as there was a WW
I hope this is helpful!
YES it’s very helpful, thank you so much!
Thanks! Dogs in the library … love it. Wish we could take the neat things about every school and mix them together.
Great detailed reports, great information. We looked at App but never visited UNC-A because it was too small according to my D. I have never even heard of Warren Wilson, but that sounds really interesting. (Might be good fit for my S, a few years down the line)
The fact that UNC-A said they are most completive NC school behind UNC and State is interesting. UNC-W and App State also say the same 
@ITBgirl I tried to find some kind of list on NC schools showing freshman SATs or GPAs comparing the schools but couldn’t find a good one. If you know of such a list let me know.
I think Warren Wilson is a bit small for my D as well -but for the right kind of kid it seemed an incredible option.
I generally look at acceptance rates, although I understand that that number is flawed, but among my friends this sees to hold pretty true, we can usually guess where a border line student will fall based on these numbers:
UNC-CH 29%
State 51%
App 63%
UNC Wilm 59%
UNC Asheviile 73%
UNC Charlotte 64% (they also claimed to be 3rd in NC on my tour)
As for a list of scores, our HS gave us a list with all that info, (might have it filed away) but I do like collegeboard.org because you can compare 3 schools side by side with scores and size and cost.
Surprisingly AC is probably not as big of a deal in the NC mountains as it would be in other areas in the mid south. The climate is rather moderate. My brother lived in Black Mountain for several years. We live in Ohio. It was always warmer in the winter and cooler and less humid in the summer than we were in Ohio. It can be a bit windier and the mountains attract afternoon storms in the warmer months (no tornadoes) but overall he found it to be one of the nicer places to live weather wise east of the Mississippi.