What came to mind was Vassar, Skidmore, Wesleyan, Bates (I think he will like it better than Colby), Clark Univ, Brandies and in PA look at Mulenberg
He really needs to look at Carleton, I think. My S, who was anti- small town school, was impresses by just about everything there. Whether or not they will be impressed by him is another story! Macalester is great, but in sort of a benign urban setting. There are tree lined streets, but it is by no means out in nature.
The Canadian “big 3”, UBC, McGill, and U of T, all have their charms, but are anything but small.
@ucbalumnus At UofChicago there’s a subtle distinction in the nomenclature of “honors” attached to the diploma. A student whose major is in economics and whose cumulative overall GPA meets the criterion of 3.25+ but who does not write a senior thesis paper, will receive and “AB in Economics with general honors.” A student who majors in economics with an overall college GPA of 3.25+ AND who writes a senior paper will receive an “AB with honors in Economics.” Few people will catch that distinction, FWIW. It does not matter for anything except internal bookkeeping at UofC.
Re @citymama9’s suggestion
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What came to mind was Vassar, Skidmore, Wesleyan, Bates (I think he will like it better than Colby), Clark Univ, Brandies and in PA look at Mulenberg
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We considered all of these for our kid, who had some tastes/interests in common, and in terms of overall vibe they make sense. Academically, though, I concur on Vassar, Wesleyan, Brandeis and Bates but Skidmore may be too artsy/creative and not STEM-y enough. And as much as we liked both Clark and Muhlenberg, the depth of the science/math curriculum – and track record for sending STEM kids on to graduate work – seemed lacking, at least for a kid with your son’s stats/level of advancement.
Out of the LACs, I’m rooting for Carleton and Grinnell, but that’s my midwest bias showing.
Couple more thoughts:
a) It should be kept in mind that son’s interests may ( or rather, are likely to) change once he gets to college.
So while available access to what he now thinks he wants is a very relevant criteria, he should also think more broadly to what would happen if (bordering on “when”) he changes his mind.
b) He could also go the “D2 route” : stay 2-3 semesters at an LAC, thereby gaining the smaller size intro classes, then switch to a university, if still desired, thereby accessing the wider & deeper portfolio of advanced -level options.
That’s not why D2 did it- she did it because of a). Once she changed her mind about her desired major she realized she liked almost nothing else about her school. But it did have that salutory affect.
Of course there are a lot of cautions about this approach; eg many top universities have very low transfer admissions rates; not sure about financial aid offers even if accepted; might not want to leave first school if social life is great, thereby getting stuck with what initial place offers. So best be relatively happy with that at the outset.
I’m always surprised when folks comment on a “lack of offerings” at LACs. There are only so many classes a student can take. For my kids, it has always been a case of have tons of classes they want to take and trying to narrow it down. They’ve never lacked for options. This is especially true when you consider that most majors will have a few prescribed requirements that further limit the time available to pick and choose.
Do not. Repeat. Underline. Do Not apply to a college with the intention of trading up to a better school after 2 or 3 semesters. That just isn’t fair to the person who could have been happy to have that seat, not to mention why on earth anyone would purposely want to go through all of this again?
There are a few cases where a LAC has relatively easy cross registration with a large university to allow expanded course selection. One example is Amherst with the University of Massachusetts - Amherst. Another is Barnard with Columbia, but that is inaccessible for the OP’s son. Such situations may allow doing the route described above without having to transfer schools.
Be careful that some cross registration situations are not as easy, since the schools may not have matching academic calendars, or may be difficult to commute between.
@doschicos I love LACs. I wish I’d gone to one. And I agree completely that people overthink depth/breadth in some areas. You can have 500 channels but only so many hours in the day. But it’s important to be sure that the offerings in a kid’s particular area of interest/advancement are sufficient to last four years in that field of study. Which is not always the case. @ucbalumnus has given some very helpful advice in that regard for evaluating Physics programs over time, and I think also other STEM fields. Shouldn’t be an issue for most top-tier LACs, but when you range into smaller/lower tier schools, you can’t take it for granted.
Re#187, that is a really good point.
From what I’ve read, Swarthmore- Penn, or Haverford-Penn, are really not that convenient or used that much.
But in a pinch, if it’s just a matter of taking one advanced-level course a semester at Penn come senior year,
it might be doable. Certainly worth checking out. I personally had reservations about these particular schools because I thought they were too small for my tastes, but that’s me.
Not all LACs are going to fit for every major but if you do your research, there are plenty of strong science LACs to choose from that could carry a student through to a degree with rigor without issue. Just do your homework.
And, yes, consortiums can be great. Haverford with the Quaker consortium is a big plus for the school. Bryn Mawr/Haverford cross registration is easy because of the distant. No shortage of kids taking classes at Swarthmore. Penn is less. A lot of it is because it really isn’t needed for most so why go through any extra hassle? College students don’t like hassle. 
But, it’s there if needed/wanted.
Transferring, if a student is relying on any FA or merit aid, isn’t really an option.
@doschicos – Then I think we agree. All I was suggesting was to research the offerings at any LAC under consideration to be sure they offer enough depth and flexibility for the kid and his level of interest/advancement. Many will. Some won’t.
@monydad, the reason why students at Swarthmore don’t take advantage of courses at Penn is that the professors and resources at Swarthmore are as good as anywhere in the country - having one of the largest endowments per student in the country will provide those attributes.
@jhs - I grew up and lived most of my life in Morningside Heights.
Columbia’s main campus is not any higher than the surrounding neighborhood - it is exactly street level - there are no steps up onto campus from Broadway or Amsterdam. That’s clear even from the photo you posted. The Low Library is elevated, but the majority of CU is not.
Columbia’s campus is much more spread out than you suggest here as well, it is certainly not treeless (look at your picture! Trees!) or walled off - your photo again makes that clear. Columbia’s main campus sprawls way beyond the quad, and it has more than one campus - health at 168th-ish and the new Manhattanville campus at and north of 125th.
I don’t care if you find Columbia claustrophobic or don’t like it, of course. But “there couldn’t be more difference” is IMO a vast overstatement. Of course Chicago is not NYC, and Hyde Park is not Morningside Heights. U of C is lovely, the buildings are attractive and the residential streets around it are quite pretty. But it’s not rural by any stretch of the imagination.
These are two urban, prestigious universities best known for having a strong core curriculum. I don’t get the strong attack on comparing them.
On the Quaker consortium issue -BMC/Hford/Swat students can only take courses at U Penn if they are not offered at their home/or one of those 3 institutions. So, one couldn’t just take Art History or Organic Chem at U Penn because one prefers the offering in Philly, it has to be a course not regularly available at the LACs. And, I believe that one cannot take classes at Wharton, regardless (as those would generally not be courses available at BMC/Hford/Swat.
Well, one could take Art History courses because there aren’t really course called “Art History”. It’s pretty easy in the humanities/social science type majors as course descriptions are usually unique to an institution and therefore not “the same”.
And no point in really taking a course like Organic Chem elsewhere when you can walk 3 minutes from your dorm room and find the class. All partner colleges at of the Quaker Consortium are excellent institutions of merit on their own. The consortium should be used to expand the offerings not replace courses available at your chosen institution.
@doschicos - My daughter abandoned the idea of LACs after visiting a couple that did not have enough faculty specializing in the area of study that interests her. If there are only one or two – or no – professors doing work in areas that interest you, you might be stymied in your attempts to get the depth you want. I agree that LACs offer greater opportunities for developing close relationships with faculty and may provide an overall superior education because of those relationships, but my daughter hit some walls looking at LACs in terms of finding enough faculty in her areas of interest to make them viable options.
As for the OP, if merit is a consideration, I’d look at Grinnell, Kenyon, Oberlin, St. Olaf, Macalester, Whitman, Davidson (may not meet cold criterion), and Brandeis.
Carleton, Haverford, Swarthmore, Vassar, Wesleyan, Amherst, Bates, Bowdoin, etc. are all great schools, but they do NOT give merit aid.
What was her area of interest, @LoveTheBard? I do agree that for certain esoteric majors, the options become more limited.
Per Haverford last week, 90%+ of their students take classes at BM, and less than 10% take classes at Penn. Swat is in the middle, but closer to Penn. The BM integration (same registration system for classes) is transparent.
Beyond classes, for an LGBT student the consortium provides a network of social and support activities that would be very hard to replicate elsewhere given the requirements of the OP. Penn is ranked high on all LGBT rankings, and the Quaker foundations of Haverford and Swarthmore have supported openness and acceptance for 150+ years.
Re#192:
Are you saying that if I open up Swarthmore’s Registrar’s list of courses actually offered last semester, and count the courses; and then do the same for University of Pennsylvania’s courses actually offered last semester,
I would find that there were more courses offered at Swarthmore? Particularly at advanced levels? And mixed undergrad/grad level courses that may be open to undergrads with approval, if that’s the case there?
I thought one decent reason might be because it takes a good chunk of time out of one’s day, when you take all the time into account-walk to the train, wait for the train, take the train, walk to the train to/from Penn (which is a ways), get to class, then walk back to the train, wait for the train back,… Plus I dont know that the class schedules or academic calendars are perfectly synched to optimally accommodate this.
But if it’s the case that, because of Swarthmore’s huge endowment it offers more advanced level courses than Penn,
so there’s nothing additional offered at Penn that a Swarthmore student might want to learn, then so be it.
Somebody less lazy than I am should do this exercise and post the # courses offered last semester at each institution.
To reinforce how misled I was.
Failing that, if you’re saying they would offer tutorials for any subject they don’t offer:
Tha’s fine. assuming they can find somebody to give it, in the particular subject. My D1s LAC would probably have done this, but there wasn’t a single faculty member there with interest or knowledge in her particular area of interest. A class that is actually routinely offered is a more reliable bet, IMO.
Even if such was offered, a student may not prefer that. My D1 had a class with 2 students, she said it was weird. YMMV.