<p>Michigan is a great public university and it’s so huge that even if everyone from his high school went there, he might never run into them.</p>
<p>But anyway, there are tons of small liberal arts colleges. If he is CMC-level, he could look into Swarthmore, Amherst, Williams (especially good if he’s athletic), Bowdoin, Kenyon, Grinnell, Reed.</p>
<p>Also, I think it actually may be easier to find a niche at a large public school than a small LAC. Small LACs emphasize broad liberal arts education, and encourage study between several fields. You select a major, but you have to take classes in other departments. Public universities require that too, but they usually have more specialized majors and a wider variety. For example, I was thinking today that if I had gone to UGA instead of my small liberal arts school, I might have majored in advertising or public relations, or statistics or risk management, instead of psychology. But I had choice limitations at my LAC.</p>