<p>I have fallen in love with Wake Forest University, but I don't have very good chances of actually getting in to the school. I was wondering if there are any schools that are like Wake Forest in the type of University and the kinds of people (driven yet spirited) that attend the school, but is less competitive to get in to. </p>
<p>Are you looking for a LAC with Division I sports in the south? Wofford and Elon come to mind. URichmond but that is maybe about the same entrance difficulty as Wake. </p>
<p>Rhodes? Sewanee? Furman?</p>
<p>Not all are D-1, but they come to mind for the “driven yet spirited” criterion.</p>
<p>what kind of stats are we talking about, OP?</p>
<p>Rhodes, Furman, and Centre are easier to get in for similar quality education with driven and spirited peers.</p>
<p>University of Tulsa if you are in the Midwest. Southern Methodist University in Texas…Need more information about you to really give some honest ideas.</p>
<p>Holy Cross, URichmond.</p>
<p>Are you looking to stay in the South? Butler University in Indy is another school that comes to mind. </p>
<p>Furman is very similar with lower level sports. Smaller but beautiful campus with similar type student make up.</p>
<p>Wake Forest is SAT Optional, I would still apply. If you want a similar vibe , I would check out other schools in the ACC along with Patriot League schools. </p>
<p>Wouldn’t Patriot League schools, in general, be equally difficult to gain admission? (Colgate, Bucknell, Lafayette, Lehigh & Holy Cross). Perhaps a bit easier for newer entries: BU, Loyola, American. Lehigh, American, and Loyola are more similar to Wake (not LAC’s and have D1 sports). </p>
<p>Pardullet,</p>
<p>No, of course not. Each PL member is an independent, accredited and chartered institution. That means that they
have their own standards for admission and financial aid awards. You get your degree ultimately from your college and what you derive from those years of work is whatever you demonstrate in your intellectual growth and distinctive accomplishments in your career and in your own life. </p>
<p>It amazes me that people assume that an athletic league is anything more than that. An athletic league in this discussion offers a common competition schedule and similar rules and practices with athletic administration. </p>
<p>Maybe the popularity of the individual Ivy league schools whose membership includes three of arguably the top 6 or 7 universities in the nation establishes the league as a dream ticket. But it’s not a ticket at all. You apply to each one and receive acceptance or rejection letters following separate reviews. The same applies to PL schools.</p>
<p>May I suggest that you evaluate each PL school as if there was no league. Some are large universities with graduate schools, some are liberal arts colleges, some are primarily LACs with some graduate students and some are military academies. And as you mentioned, certain schools in the PL are much more competitive regarding admissions- just as is the case with the Ivy League.</p>
<p>Good luck with your search!</p>
<p>Markham, really? I know you’re a 'Gate guy, but the schools I mentioned have a lot more in common than being in an athletic conference. My partner and his two kids are 'Gate alums, I have two in other PL schools, one is an athlete.
I see many, many schools every year following the team. I see all of the PL schools - year after year.
You are kidding yourself if you think they are as different as you mention above. Size, location, student body, quality professors, outcome, cost, endowment, D1 sports, etc. All are so very similar when compared to the universe of colleges/unis in the US. Yes, it is an athletic league and yes, they are all different. Some are a bit more selective, some are a bit smaller, all should be considered “as if there is no league.” Apologies if my post didn’t adequately speak to the OP’s general desire for information.
It amazes me that so many people get offended when sorting / grouping similar institutions by what is commonly understood – athletic conferences. Before the addition of BU, American and Loyola, I would say there is no other D1 athletic league that has more similarities than the PL – including IL.(excluding Military Academies)</p>
<p>Pardullet,</p>
<p>This is what you wrote and this is what I responded to:</p>
<p>“Wouldn’t Patriot League schools, in general, be equally difficult to gain admission?”</p>
<p>The question does not make a lot of sense to me and so I made the effort to explain that the schools within the league are very different. Which they are. </p>
<p>But for argument’s sake just how similar do you think American is relative to Bucknell or Lehigh to Loyola or Lafayette to Navy or Colgate to Boston University in terms of admissions, financial aid, campus life. academic programs, size, setting/location, graduate school success, career/job placements and other factors?</p>
<p>You might just as easily find far more commonalities among colleges and universities without even bothering with their athletic league affiliations. That would be straightforward and certainly less forced. One way is rural schools with fewer than 5000 undergraduates or urban schools with large research graduate programs. Another is a set of schools with overlapping applications. Or maybe with median SATs at 2100 of admitted students. The PL schools are very different when you look at them in any of those ways.</p>
<p>I said that the PL is about athletics and that’s all that I think it is- an athletics league with some overlapping goals. And even there the individual schools show big differences between them with Colgate, Army, Holy Cross and BU having D1 ice hockey in 3 different hockey leagues while the other PL members don’t have this expensive sport, full member American without football and men’s lacrosse, Navy and Army without field hockey, and Navy and Army in a different football league. And then there are the associate PL members.</p>
<p>With this as my take on the athletics side of things (we are talking about the PL, right?), and as I said, I think it’s smarter for applicants to look at each school for its own characteristics. You may or may not agree that PL schools are less dissimilar than the hundreds of other colleges and universities out there. Fine. I think that’s a round about way of considering a list of schools that might be of interest to an applicant. No, the PL framework is not particularly useful at all. After all, it’s only a very few graduating seniors from PL schools who will go onto professional sports. Really.</p>
<p>Good luck with your college search!</p>
<p>Wow</p>
<p>I have a sister that attends Elon (she loves it) and that sounds like a good match </p>
<p>Like Wake Forest: National private university, well-kept manicured campus, beautiful brick buildings, some new dorms some, preppy students, not a super diverse student body, affluent, small class sizes, classes taught by professors, not TAs, Greek life, D1 sports, big national sports conference, spirited and driven students. Right? Is that what you are describing? </p>
<p>Lots of schools come to mind with the majority of the qualities that I list above. None of these listed below are quite as academic as WFU:</p>
<p>URichmond
TCU
SMU
UMiami
Tulane </p>
<p>TCU and UMiami are in big sports conferences with a lot of school spirit, but bigger student bodies. URichmond and SMU are more similar in size, but don’t have the big spirit like TCU and UMiami. At Tulane, you’d be giving up sports and the small size, but the campus is filled with driven, spirited students. </p>
<p>Hope this helps. </p>
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<p>I don’t think this aspect of Wake should be underestimated. My son went to a rigorous high school that routinely sends students to the top colleges and universities in this country. He has older friends who are tearing up MIT and Stanford and classmates who are off this year to Harvard, Amherst and the like. So when when my son is impressed with how smart the students and professors are at Wake, it tells me something. </p>