W&L has an increasing and wonderful Jewish life from all accounts and for OP - if they don’t win the Johnson, they’ll likely be under consideration for the Weinstein.
Their Hillel appears to be very active.
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I also want to add that I think your daughter might consider doing more thinking and more research. For a few reasons.
–Her list is kind of all over the place. Washington & Lee attracts a way different type of student than Oberlin and Connecticut College. Really investigate the vibe at the colleges. I’m sure she knows all the websites for that info.
–As someone else above said, you don’t need to be near a hospital to get into medical school. Cornell, Colgate, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Bates are all rural colleges not near teaching hospitals, all of which have brilliant medical school-accepted students. They get their patient contact hours in the summer.
–The path to medical school is a long, long grind with very specific requirements. It’s important that she gets a solid handle on that now.
–If cost is going to be a limiting factor, then that has to be the first filter. Then Jewish life on campus. Then premed advising (that’s the easiest of your three criteria to find).
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That’s good to know. But in general, the Oberlin student does not overlap with the W&L student.
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Your comment said - I wouldn’t categorize Washington & Lee as a place for students looking for Jewish life.
I’m simply disagreeing. We all have opinions 
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My daughter had a higher gpa with 99% test scores, and when we looked at Muhlenberg I recall walking out of there wondering if she would get merit. I wasn’t sure, nothing was definite…and so the school became a reach. Academically it appeared to be a safety, financially it was a reach. Maybe Muhlenberg has changed its scholarship policy…who knows (she didn’t apply and it was over 5 years ago). I feel as though the schools on this student’s list may or may not be affordable.
There are lots of brilliant, accomplished HS students out there…all over the country.
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When you talk about brilliance - I was just reading an article on test optional and it was talking about how kids all apply to the ‘popular’ and it was saying where kids are erring is 50%+ of kids have a 4.0 GPA weighted - that there’s so much grade inflation that kids all have a false sense of achievement.
I see this at my kid’s top HS.
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This comment made me laugh because my D had both Oberlin and W&L on her list early on in her process. 
And someone on CC said exactly what you did.
She ended up at W&L and is happy and very involved. I agree with @tsbna44 about W&L being a good fit for Jewish life. The Hillel is very active. Many non-Jewish kids (including my D) participate in Hillel events too.
In other words I can understand why the OP has it on the list.
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Thank you so much for the updated information, especially your D’s love list.
I need to read back through this thread! I know I replied a while ago since we were also looking for LAC with merit for my pre-med kiddo so had some overlap with your list (Rhodes, W&L, Davidson, Case). I’ll post my D’s notes from our visit to Rhodes since you haven’t had the chance to visit yet.
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I know you have your D’s school list set and don’t want to add more and I totally respect that. As the father of a child who went through this 2 years ago and who has helped a few others on this search, I respectfully ask that you add 2-5 more schools to the list. There are literally dozens and dozens of schools within your preferred radius that are extremely similar to the ones already on your list.
I don’t necessarily agree with the idea that a safety HAS to be a school that is your child is enthusiastic about today or that you (the parent) 100% feels is optimal. When searching for FinAid and trying to guesstimate an academic/social fit, it’s not always as simple as we’d like it to be. The reason I recommend a small number of additional schools is just to provide the element of choice after all the decisions and FinAid packages have been received.
It’s easy to say today, “We will definitely not consider SchoolX.” The reality is, if April 1, 2023 rolls around and UMD is the only affordable acceptance, your daughter may decide at that point (April 1, 2023) that she’d like to consider a smaller-enrollment smaller-class-size option, but at that point there will be no other affordable options. Our kids are teenagers and we all know teens are infamous for changing their minds for reasons we can’t fathom. In the end, of the 6 schools on my S20’s final list of affordable options (after acceptances and FinAid packages) 4 were not on his list 12 months earlier. These were two in-state publics and four OOS privates. He’s a sophomore now and very much enjoys the University he attends.
Reconsider a handful of the schools mentioned in this thread. Given your (and your daughter’s) preferences and requirements, I’ll say I like Christopher Newport U, Rhodes, VCU, Manhattan College, U of Scranton and University of Dayton. My son really liked VCU and CNU but our budget was much less than yours and OOS publics didn’t come close to meeting our need - but these two would probably be within your budget. As I said, my son wasn’t very interested in some of these until presented with the final list of affordable options. Then he/we investigated deeper and he realized he really liked them.
BTW, Ursinus was one of my son’s options and delivered a FinAid package that was affordable to us. Our situation is different than yours, so of course there is no guarantee your FinNeed will be met, but I’m glad to see it as one of your current options.
Again, don’t view the three (or, be still my beating heart, 6) new applications as schools you feel you’re seriously considering now. Just consider them as options for “Break Glass In Case Of Emergency” in case the worst case scenario unfolds a year from now and UMD is the only affordable option that your daughter then decides is not a fit. At that point, a school you haven’t added yet might be the magic miracle you need.
Best of luck to you and I commend you for starting this process so early!
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Thanks. Our friend just visited Rhodes (accepted students day last week) and absolutely loved it (all but distance). If we will be in the same shoes, I am 100% sure DD will chose Rhodes.
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The school is beautiful. The surroundings…not good.
Depends on if you’re ok with that or not.
Hillel is small, shared with U of Memphis.
Isn’t Rhodes $65,000 a year (less than other privates)? With the discount it comes to $45,000 a year.
I guess I am confused as to how she would 100% commit to a school that might come in above budget.
I am confused…. but I hope it works out for this student! Hopefully she gets some merit to bring the cost down (maybe that’s what was meant).
Rhodes is on the list. DD will attend VCU only if she will get to direct admit premed. They will not give OOS Scholarship above 5K. We have a bit ridiculous situation. We need half ride scholarship as a minimum in public or private. OOS without half ride will not be considered. This is a major reason we do not put any public schools on the list except instate. She will not go to Alabama.
If she will not get half ride in any school from the list, she will go to UMD no matter how good or bad it is. That is the deal. UMD is her safety. We can make St. Mary’s as safety of the safety, but she should have no problem to transfer from local CC to UMD with 4.0 GPA.
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Because we have half ride (after taxes) from work. It does not matter what school it is. It is still half ride up to full tuition. So if she will get $40 or $45 for tuition from merit, we will get what is left from work minus taxes. That would cost a family room and board plus taxes. I would say $20-$25K that we can afford. Since most public schools will not give us half ride, we are focusing on private schools.
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I didn’t realize that your daughter wasn’t a senior when you started this thread. So she’s now a junior, still compiling her schools list?
That deal from work, where they’ll pay up to half her expenses, up to full tuition, sounds wonderful! What an amazing benefit! Could you re-post her stats, and your current list? Also, is she currently a junior, or is she a senior who is now deciding which school, based upon her acceptances?
Just curious, wouldn’t College Park U Md still be her best bet? The grant will pay her entire tuition, and she’d just have room and board.
Whew. I just skimmed back through this mega thread. Once again, thank you for the recent recap to get us up to speed.
Apologies if I am being dense about budget… is the below calculation an acceptable budget? I chose Rhodes because it seems to be a favorite at this point.
Total COA $65,000
Less 1/3 of $52k tuition from employer ($17,330)
Remaining before merit $47,670
Less the lowest merit scholarship of ($27,000)
Remaining out of pocket COA $20,670
If I understand, you need the remaining out of pocket COA to be less than in-state UMD. What is that? About $30k?
Note: I used the lowest merit at Rhodes to be conservative. I am not predicting that for your D.
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Wouldn’t it be 1/2 off the tuition, not 1/3?
1/2 tuition was before tax. She said after tax approximately 1/3 tuition would be paid to them to use toward COA.
Thank you for checking my numbers!!
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Thanks!!
Nope we are not trying to beat or match UMD. UMD is just a safety.