<p>I've found only a handful of colleges that fit me in terms of personality:</p>
<ol>
<li>Pomona College (visited)</li>
<li>Claremont McKenna College (visited)</li>
<li>Grinnell (forums make it seem a bit quirky, though)</li>
<li>Hamilton College (seems interesting)</li>
<li>Carleton College (interviewed, went well)</li>
</ol>
<p>For comparisons sake, I think Franklin and Marshall College (Lancaster, PA) is too rich/snobby. Bucknellians drink too much. Rutgers is not as competitive/intellectual as I would like, though the party scene is nice.</p>
<p>Preppy, for me = bad. That said, I don't want a school of hoods.</p>
<p>Pomona is my favorite, though the admit rate is low enough to discourage me. Same goes for CMC. </p>
<p>A bit about me,
I'm not the quirky type. I'm not the rich, socialite type. I'm smart, to a certain extent, and hard-working. I have a 90 QPA at a top-100 public high school in NJ, and a 1960 SAT score. My October scores should be coming in any day now, and will be well over 2000, and with any luck I will get a 2150. I have 500 hours of community service done, mostly at the local hospital. </p>
<p>Which other schools should I look at? Distance is not a problem, but a school with good need-based aid helps a ton!</p>
<p>Need based aid will only help lower income families. If that’s the case it does more than help a ton, it is required. Do you have a safety you are willing to attend and that you can afford yet?</p>
<p>S really liked Pomona and Carleton too, but decided to ED at Grinnell. Others that he considered: Macalester (too urban for him but otherwise a good vibe), Oberlin, Haverford, and Swarthmore.</p>
<p>Swarthmore and Haverford are more both intellectual than and nowhere near as preppy as the NE schools (Bowdoin, Colby, Bates, Middlebury, Amherst). Swarthmore gets compared to U Chicago a lot and there are many cross-applicants because of the similar vibe.</p>
<p>Really? My friends tell me otherwise (Polos and khakis are commonly sighted). Would you consider yourself preppy at all? This whole preppy deal sounds relative…I visted F&M with an upper-class friend of mine, she didn’t see anything weird.</p>
<p>S isn’t into preppy. That’s one reason he preferred Grinnell to Carleton and Pomona - although he liked all three schools. Swarthmore and Haverford are unavoidable more preppy than than the western and midwestern LACs - but not to the same degree as the NE LACs, so it’s all relative.</p>
<p>If you really aren’t into preppy, check out Reed and Oberlin. Both anti-prep.</p>