Need suggestions for LACs for science-y kid w/musical interests

College Search & Selection
1

Hi - I would love if folks could give me (and my D, a rising senior) any suggestions for schools that she may want to add to her list to consider. She’s low on “safety schools” too. Her are some details:

White “sporty & outdoorsy” MN girl, upper-middle class, liberal/progressive, non-religious, will need extensive merit aid as what we can pay (up to $25K or so) is well below our EFC. (We’ve run net price calculators on all the schools on her “maybe” list and they range wildly – who knows for merit aid??)

Stats from her tiny STEM charter school (doesn’t offer many APs and has no “honors”):
3.7 UW GPA (school doesn’t rank), ACT = 35, 3 APS (two 4’s and one 5), one UMN physics course, senior year full-time at local private university for dual-credit (calc-based physics, Calc 2 and 3, and other stuff)

ECs = captain of XC, nordic ski & track teams, HS robotics sub-team lead, plays french horn & sings (bands, choir, show choir), a couple years volunteering for local horse therapy nonprofit

Her preferences:
Prefers non-competitive “feel” of a school – we’ve heard negative things about a lot of east coast “blue blood” LACs
Prefers no to little Greek influence - she’s not a drinker or “partier”
Will probably major in natural or physical sciences (eg. physics or biology or ??)
Musical opportunities but not as a major
Prefers setting with “a shred of culture” – not nuts about tiny towns & won’'t have a car to get to “culture”
Smaller school preferred (ie. not huge university)
Nothing overly religious
Will probably run XC and track, depending on school/team/coach (has nice stats for her to fit into regional Division III conferences) - would love to ski nordic (sadly, only one on her list so far even has competitive nordic)

Schools she has visited and really liked:

Macalaster (reach? - probably not enough merit aid?)
Colorado College (reach? - probably not enough merit aid?)
Cornell College (really liked school but not the town - adored the running coach - generous merit aid likely)
Lawrence (really liked school & pleasantly surprised by town)

Also visited but did not like CU Boulder (way too big, didn’t like the “frat-boy feel”) and St. Olaf (not crazy about conservative culture & “old-fashioned” educational feel & too many lectures, plus their merit aid in the calculator was lowest of all we ran)

We are considering the LACs below and would love input from anyone:

U MN Morris (good safety? really not interested in living there)
Knox (concerned about a negative vibe on campus re: safety & sex assaults, harder to get to from us)
Beloit (not even on radar until reading about it here on CC)
Willamette (nice merit aid in calculator but still high $$ ?)
U of Puget Sound (nice merit aid in calculator but still high $$ ?)
Lewis & Clark (very little merit aid in their calculator?)
Others in Indiana, Ohio & Pennsylvania like Earlham, Wooster, Allegheny — others??

THANKS IN ADVANCE for any any input you can give on ones we may not have considered and/or comments on those ono our list!

2

Look at Denison in OH. I’m surprised about L&C not showing much merit aid. They used to have 1/2 and full tuition scholarships (competitive but still available). What about St Olaf?

3

Thanks for your reply, Erin’s Dad. She wasn’t too impressed with St. Olaf - too conservative & too “old-fashioned” in educational style (mostly lectures, etc) & also had among the lowest merit aid possibilities in the calculator. We’re visiting Gustavus Adolphus next week (also in MN, tiny tiny town - I’d be surprised if she liked it more than St.Olaf but we’ll see).

We will look into Denison. Any thoughts on any of the other Ohio LACs that could be a good fit?

As far as merit aid on these calculators, I wonder how much they end up aligning with actual offers of merit aid…?? In other words, should she write off schools l like L&C (and others) that came back with relatively low merit aid possibilities in the calculators, or should she just go for it and hope better scholarships are offered? That’s clear with schools with scholarships that you have to apply for separately, but what about most of the schools that DON’T have those separate ones?

Also, what part does recruiting for XC and track play in these DIII schools? I know they don’t give athletic scholarships, but do the coaches have any influence on admission and merit aid decisions in order to lure promising runners?

THANKS :slight_smile:

4

Maybe St. Lawrence?

5

I was surprised I didn’t see Grinnell on your list, its a reach with merit but your description sounds exactly like it.

Look at St. Lawrence University in up-state NY. Its a gem of a school with merit and nordic skiing and merit.

6

Truman State?

7

I’m not sure where this idea is coming from that St. Olaf courses are more lecture centered than courses taught elsewhere. Not that the OP is wrong, but I 'm not aware that this is true and I wonder how this is measured.

8

Skidmore fits a lot of the traits you might like (would need to see if it is science oriented enough for your D), Muhlenberg (offers good merit aid) is a possibility (not sure if they have Greek Life).

9

I was thinking of Lawrence when I was reading your post and I think it would be a really good fit for your D. Top merit there now is $22,000 + $2000 for NMF if she qualifies. There are no athletic scholarships but the Coach’s support will help with admittance which shouldn’t be a problem for your D in any case with her stats. Unfortunately that amount of merit aid will only get you close to $30,000/ year, not quite down to your goal of $25,000 and I think that is going to be the hard part of your search to find an LAC that she can get enough merit to get costs down to $25,000. If you have any specific questions about Lawrence please feel free to PM me as my D is starting her Jr. year there and runs xc and track, is a science major and has played in the Orchestra. Good luck!

10

Knox, Earlham, Wooster, Kalamazoo are some of our favorites in the midwest for EA merit. Knox really snuck up on us – among 10+ classes that my son sat in on, during visits (as a recruited athlete), his hands down favorite was a Knox Poli Sci class. The music opportunities excited him, the Jazz prof spent an hour talking with him about opportunities for non-majors etc. While there is greek life, it is not “traditional,” and my son was relieved to find that on a Sat night, there were no roaming bands of drunk kids, which we have seen elsewhere. No info about the question of safety – check the IPEDs info – sometimes, there is a strong culture of reporting, which can mean there are more reports than elsewhere, but not necessarily more incidents. Kalamazoo is also a terrific place, my kid loved the no gen-eds, and there was fabulous school spirit – packed stands for the games in his sport he visited. Earlham, like K, has no greek life, and a very diverse student body, with new and renovated science facilites.

That ACT score is going to thrill some schools who would love to have that in their common data sets. An EA (non-binding) decision from these schools will include the merit award, and you would hear by early to mid Dec (K was just before Christmas, I believe). Wooster’s merit award predictor is actually reviewed by an actual person, and you get a prediction by mail several weeks later. My kid received a few thousand $ more in merit at Wooster than predicted.

St Lawrence – mentioned above – was another one we visited a few times – heaven on earth for the outdoorsy kid, especially a snow sports kid, and very strong athletics generally. It is not easy to get in and out of – 2 hours from Syracuse, and the town is small but charming.

Check in on the Athletics board under Specialty topics in College Admissions – a wealth of info about D3 recruiting there. Short answer – coach support can help with admissions, depending on the sport and the school. Merit awards will be given to students who will make strong contributions to campus – that can include test scores, academic potential, music, art, athletics etc.

In addition to Grinnell, consider Haverford – a collaborative community, no greek life, though athletic recruiting there has gotten a bumpy reputation, specifically in men’s lacrosse.

11

This:

That said consider Oberlin or Bard–both have goon music, science and merit aid

12

My comment that St. Olaf seemed more traditional and lecture-based was just my and my child’s impression from the people we met on campus (including our tour guide and admissions counselor in her interview). That impression may not be totally accurate, I’ll give you. I don’t really know how one would objectively verify that impression besides sitting in on lots of different classes in different disciplines.

The other impression we got was that most of the classes at St. Olaf for 1st and 2nd years tended to be a bit larger than many of the other LACs she’s visited, ie. more like 25 to 40 students (and more like 50 to 65 for some of the intro level math and science classes) versus the 10 to 15 we’ve seen elsewhere. That may not be bad or good - it depends on the kid and the class, I’m sure.

13

Let me add, some of those Midwest LACs I mentioned (Earlham, Knox etc) plus Lawrence and Beloit, have lower full sticker price than others, sometimes as much as $10k a year less, and room and board also run under $10k. So, if total cost is $50k, a merit award of $25k brings cost to about $25k a year. $22-24k merit at those schools likely for OP student, and could go higher for sure, with that ACT score.

14

Re: The suggestion of Haverford, it does not give merit aid.

Colorado College gives out very little merit aid.

15

Sorry about the Haverford suggestion, I’d neglected to factor in the merit aid.

Grinnell – while a dear favorite of ours, is not likely to give enough merit to bring cost of attendance down to $25k, since that would require close to $40k merit. I would guess that even a 35 ACT would not generate $40k a year, but I defer to others with experience of merit at Grinnell.

Denison gives high merit for high achieving kids, and would like that 35 ACT score. There are full-tuition merit awards, but the typical range levels of merit are $16k/$20k/$24k.

16

Take a look at Vassar. Brand new science facility, great music programs and both cross country and track are possibilities.

If you are looking in the Northwest, take a look at Whitman.

17

Grinnell doesn’t quite work with the following requirement:

  • Prefers setting with "a shred of culture" -- not nuts about tiny towns & won''t have a car to get to "culture"

That said, I’d still consider it. They have tremendous resources, and bring a lot of culture TO campus.

18

Vassar doesn’t offer merit aid either.

19

Re: #11 even at LACs, 40 to 65 is quite small for intro Bio and Chem.

20

Your D sounds like a great fit for Washington schools Puget Sound and Whitman (although Walla Walla may seem hard to get to). Less fit at the 2 Oregon schools mentioned, especially Willamette as more pre-professional, and its STEM departments are dwarfed by our two big public universities. I agree with many of the previous suggestions but the GPA may be a problem for some of the more competitive schools like Haverford.