There was a great thread on here a few years ago that I found in a search discussing small LAC’s south of the Mason-Dixon line for a student that was in Michigan I think that wanted to go to college in a warmer clime. The discussion was fascinating and very insightful and full of great info. However, the thread petered out some 3-4 years ago and a lot of information may have changed since then. I’d like to revive that discussion to perhaps update some of the great suggestions that were in there.
Personal situation: my daughter is a very good student and wishes to study biology at a LAC with the intention of matriculating to medical school. She’s a rising junior and has a 4.5 GPA in advanced courses (AP Scholar), a 1340 SAT and a 31 ACT both taken at the beginning of her sophomore year. The right school fit is more important than anything, but the closer to home she could be, probably the better for all involved. Home is the FL panhandle. I am proud of my southern heritage, but humbled and almost ashamed at the scarcity of great colleges, both large and small, in the deep south. You can’t throw a rock without hitting a top 100 small LAC in New England, and it’s almost the same in the midwest. In the south…(heavy sigh). Here’s the kicker: my daughter is a competitive swimmer, and a decent one, but not great. Her academics are better than her freestyle but she LOVES her sport and wishes to continue at the next level. She’s definitely looking at D3 which is fine, they overwhelmingly the good, small LAC’s she desires and will probably thrive at. But the top notch academic programs almost always have top notch swim programs too, and even at the D3 level, my girl is looking at a middle of the pack swim team to be a contributing member. She doesn’t want to walk on at a larger or better school and swim, she wants to be a competitor, not a benchwarmer.
We’ve done a lot of research and visited a couple of places, but we’d like to hear input from the rest of y’all. Right now, the best choices seem to be schools in the Southern Athletic Association which includes Rhodes, Berry, Sewanee, Birmingham-Southern, Hendrix, Centre, and Millsaps who will be adding swimming in 2019-20. The swimming fits pretty well, especially at the middle of the league. We’ve visited Sewanee. She liked it a lot but is turned off by how remote it is. We’ve heard a lot of good things about Rhodes, but a lot of bad things about Memphis, and Rhodes seems to be trying to recruit swimmers a little above her level and aren’t that interested. We’re still checking out the rest. We know only what we’ve read about Centre and Hendrix, Millsaps is a mystery because they didn’t have a swim team in the works until 3 weeks ago, so that’s a new one to check out.
We’ve also looked into the SCAC in the southwest and some schools show some promise: I thought we’d found a great fit in Trinity but again, the swim team is just a little beyond her ability and the coach is recruiting above where they are now. Austin College, Southwestern U., and Colorado College all look like they might fit but the rankings vary so wildly from source to source, I’m a little confused and concerned about who and what to believe, especially where the academics are concerned. Some miscellaneous schools that have caught our attention: Grinnell, Swarthmore, Franklin and Marshall, Hamilton, and Carleton, but those are a LONG way from home.
I hope this thread sparks as much interest as the thread mentioned above, so feel free to contribute any pearls of knowledge and/or wisdom you might have.