Maybe look at Marlboro college too, though. Marlboro is also offering full scholarships called Renaissance. And Wells College.
Stats are too low for Swat, Vassar, and Smith maybe even for Mt. Holyoke and Bard.
The kids I saw on my tour at Clark looked pretty “quirky” in a blue hair and studded boots way.
The Colleges the Change Lives consortium has plenty of options for quirky, north east colleges. I would look at that list.
it is funny, when I think of quirky, I guess I have a different view on what that means…lol. everyone is coming from their own mindsets, so perhaps, we need to explain what we mean in simple words? I look at my oldest as quirky and also, intellectual, blue hair is not part of the equation-I might see that as “artsy”. So interesting though seeing what it means to different people.
She may want to check out SUNY Purchase as well as New Paltz.
Well I had to look up what manga and cosplay were from the OP – and I have teenagers myself. So I think that would be quirky. To me quirky is good though – I like quirky although my children are pretty mainstream. I always tell them they could use a little “edge” and they just roll their eyes.
here was a quirky school list I started when S2 was looking, not limited to the northeast but many northeast schools are mentioned:
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1687953-quirky-school-list-p1.html
Run the NPC’s, my S is looking at similar schools with similar stats (and post medication junior year grades lol) but we found that Bennington, Bard, Skidmore, Oberlin and many others, while offering some merit just weren’t enough to make them stay on our list as having a chance at being affordable (we are full pay).
Ones that have made the cut and seem to have a better chance of decent offers are: Goucher, Ursinus, Ithaca.
intparent, what else did you think of St. Mary’s (besides feeling like summer camp?) I haven’t actually been there…just repeating what my friend said…I am actually interested in learning more about it for future reference. If it’s not too quirky it might be great fro my daughter in a few years …
I am in the Clark is quirky camp. So is Goucher. I would say there are a fair few quirky students at Bates, but it isn’t known for that. Agree with Skidmore. SUNY New Paltz is more hippie and outdoorsy, IMO.
An advantage of the SUNYs is that they are more affordable for OOS students than most state schools.
BTW, there are some other quirky NE schools out there, like Green Mountain College and College of the Atlantic, but their focus is on environmental science, which I gather is not your D’s area of interest.
I forgot to mention Emerson in Boston. That might be a possibility.
@twoinanddone said:
“St Mary’s of Maryland in not part of the university of Maryland system (College Park, UM@ Baltimore for the professional schools, UM Eastern Shore, UMBC, and Univ. College). These campuses may have honors colleges of their own. St Mary’s is a smaller school, more of an LAC.”
This is incorrect. St.Mary’s College of Maryland is “The public honors college” of the Maryland public university system. It is indeed a small LAC, but it is a public college. All those other universities also have their own honors colleges within their large univiersity.
My daughter is a happy student at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. Do not confuse SMCM with the private Mount St.Mary’s University, which is in Emmitsburg Maryland.
I also don’t think of SMCM as “quirky”, though I guess that depends on your definition of the word.
It is literally on the water, beautiful, and pretty isolated. Students need a car to go anywhere off campus. Many students have cars, so this isn’t really an issue. Most students live on campus all four years. It has a highly ranked DI sailing team, and other D3 sports teams. The docks are open to all students. There are kayaks, stand up paddle boards and sailboats all students can use (have to pass a swim test, etc. first) There are no sororities or fraternities. There is a vibrant social life on campus. The kids we know who have gone to SMCM (my daughter, and several friends of my older sons) have unanimously loved the college. Classes are small. Professors are accessible and friendly, the food is excellent. The majority of students do a semester or summer abroad. It looks like a beautiful summer camp when you drive in the main entrance.
It is a great school for the right kid, but it is not for everyone. Definitely visit, and do an overnight if possible.
It’s not part of the University of Maryland system. The five U of Maryland schools (UMCP, UMES, etc) were run by one Board and President, and each had a Chancellor. In the late 1980s, it merged with the State College system (schools like U of Baltimore, Towson, Salisbury, and Frostburg. St. Mary’s opted out just after the two systems merged, and it was never part of the original 5 schools known as the University of Maryland.
Another vote for Bennington.
@twoinanddone sorry, you are correct in what you are saying. SMCM is not part of the university system, but it is state supported, in terms of instate and out of state tuition. Not sure what difference that makes to most people…
SMCM is public (gets state funding) and is called a public honors college. There is in-state & out-of-state tuition. Not sure why the distinction beyond that would matter to anyone. It is a solid LAC-like school in very pretty, fairly remote setting. I think it would have been a good fit for my D1 (who thrived at Dickinson, to give you an idea). We didn’t know about until we visited for D2, though. D2 liked the class she sat in on (bio) and thought there was some really interesting bio research going on. But D2 is quirky for sure – and I think SCMC came across as a little too preppy & “normal” to her. But for many kids, I think it could be a great fit.
They had a rough patch a couple years ago (new admissions director who burned some bridges in an ill-advised attempt to revamp their approach to admissions, and they had a couple years of low yield). I think they have come through that for the most part, though.
Bard, Marlboro, Hampshire, Bennington
Are there any college students associated with the cosplay the OP’s child does? Where do they go?
Because when I read your first post, it said St. Mary’s is the honors college of U of Maryland, like instead of going to College Park, you’d go to St. Mary’s if you wanted to be in honors, and that’s not correct. The UM has its own honors college(s) at each campus. St. Mary’s is the Honors College of Maryland, not of the U. of Maryland. The diploma will not say U of Maryland.
Before the merger of the two systems (University and State College), only the five UM schools were run by the same president and board of regents. They had the same policies, same days off, same employment system, and to some extent you could easily transfer your credits around if you needed to. I worked for a while in the president’s office, and while College Park was the king of the hill, the other schools got a lot of benefits of being in the same system. Some students at the law school (UM@Baltimore) were also enrolled at the business school (UMCP). If you were in University College, which was mostly overseas at the time since Al Gore was working on the internet, you could transfer those credits when you came back to Maryland to one of the other campuses. Students at U of M Law couldn’t easily take a course at U of Baltimore Law even though the two schools are just a few blocks apart because they weren’t in the same system. It was a hassle if you wanted to do that and I think you had to actually register at the other school and pay those fees to the State Colleges system. UMBC was a pretty small school at the time, but one of the benefits of enrolling there was that the students could take any classes not offered at the Baltimore or CP campuses.
So it matters if you want to do any of those things.
I think that horse is dead…