<p>I don't completely understand your logic regarding your school selections...</p>
<p>You said you wouldn't consider anywhere "overly conservative like Texas". Rice and University of Texas - Austin are both much more liberal than Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt is also known for being mostly white rich kids, little diversity, and religious. Have you actually visited Vanderbilt? It is an extremely homogeneous campus; it seemed like when I was there everyone was white and wearing either polos, preppy name brand shirts, or Vandy gear. </p>
<p>I'm not trying to sound like an advertisement for Texas schools or anything, but Rice is significantly more diverse than Vanderbilt and much more liberal. UT is even more liberal than Rice and is known as one of the biggest party schools in the country. </p>
<p>You will likely get into Yale and this will be a moot point, but why Vanderbilt?</p>
<p>Ha, sadly, as I'm sure you are aware, other than your "I don't want to go to school in the midwest" (which I completely understand coming from a native of Chicago), Northwestern would be a pretty outstanding match.</p>
<p>I would also recommend you check out the University of California system (Berkeley and UCLA are reaches for all OOS, but you certainly have competitive stats!) Claremont colleges, Boston University (I'd say a match/safety) Columbia & Brown.</p>
<p>I agree with kaliamom; UC schools like UCLA (Los Angeles obviously lol) and Berkeley (San Francisco) have good locations. Stanford also provides easy access to San Francisco.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the suggestions! Finances aren't really a big deal to me. My parents have saved enough to pay 40,000 per year but the rest is on me, but I hope get 10kish in grants per year in financial or merit aid, so I'll graduate debt free. I actually visited Vandy with a couple friends and I LOVED the atmosphere and everything. There is also a sizable minority population in Vanderbilt that's somewhere between 25-30% (can't remember)</p>
<p>@NeoEpisteme When was the last time you were at Vanderbilt? I've heard they started making alot of changes a couple years ago... </p>
<p>I think I would like to go Berkeley, but it's selectivity can match HYP for OOS students. </p>
<p>Thanks for all your imput! This is my current list: </p>
<p>Reach:
Yale
Dartmouth
Brown
Duke</p>
<p>Match:
Vanderbilt
WUSTL
UMichigan<br>
USC</p>
<p>Safeties:
University of Iowa
Arizona State University</p>
<p>I go to a pretty good prep boarding school and our valedictorian actually chose to go to Vanderbilt (over a bunch of great schools, and not for financial aid!). For some perspective, 3rd place went to Harvard.</p>
<p>I don't know what your major is, but I read some of the people mentioned engineering.</p>
<p>I would definitely look at USC as a match. They will throw thousands and thousands of dollars at you to attend their school simply because of your stats. From what I've heard their engineering isn't too shabby either. May be bigger than you want, but I think it's on par with a school like Vanderbilt. Has a very social life, and opportunities are available if you seek them.</p>
<p>I would also look into the claremont colleges, harvey mudd for engineering, or even Pomona or Claremont McKenna for liberal art/humanities/social science majors. They seem to be an excellent fit, may be smaller than what you expect, but being right next to the other claremont colleges allows you to be in a bigger setting. It's 30-40 mins away from LA. Claremont McKenna is known as the party school of the Claremont schools, although they also WORK hard too. </p>
<p>I think something that you need to provide us with are three possible majors you may consider majoring listing your top #1. Are you dependent on financial aid, or can you afford(without huge loans) the cost of a college education?</p>