I’m looking for more colleges that are strong in STEM and are located in a fairly large city, but have the enclosed campus feel. I’ve visited both USC and Northeastern and really loved both campuses and locations. I’m from California, 1540 SAT/35 ACT/4.7 GPA, and would be willing to go anywhere except midwest/deep south. Any suggestions?
Here are a few ideas offhand. If you are willing to look at the Jesuit colleges, a number of them would fit that requirement (ex. Gtown, BC, Fordham). Some other ideas could be Northwestern, UPenn, Columbia, Johns Hopkins, Carnegie Mellon, Pitt, Tufts. If they are not too far south you can consider Emory, Tulane, GATech, and Vandy.
If you haven’t done so yet you should pick up a good college guide book (ex. Fiske, Princeton Review) and read up on different options. These books can often be found in a library or a HS guidance office.
If your extracurricular activities are anything like your scores and grades, you might as well go hard and apply to Harvard, MIT, CalTech, and Columbia. What about McGill? Pitt would be a near-safety for you (although Pittsburgh is quasi-midwestern), and they might show you some financial love. Temple is a definite safety, and you would almost certainly get into their honors program with a hefty scholarship. Berkeley, UCLA, and UCSD are obvious choices for you. A strong student like you should select one or two safeties, preferably ones with non-binding early notification or rolling admissions, that you would be willing to attend, and then go ahead and aim as high as you’d like.
Chicago is a grand city, and the University of Chicago is terrific, if you would consider that exception in the Midwest.
I agree that Tufts might be a good choice for you, also Emory and Georgia Tech in Atlanta and the University of Washington, just a few light rail stops from downtown Seattle. Washington University in St. Louis is an exceptional school with a tremendous campus in a nice suburb of St. Louis with a large park and cultural institutions immediately adjacent. The top choice, though, I think, is Rice University. Rice has a beautiful campus near downtown Houston. Academics there are as strong as anywhere, particularly in STEM. If you like the USC campus, I think you would love Rice.
Case Western Reserve University
Rice is located quite literally across the street from the largest medical complex in the world (the Texas Medical Center, which includes several med schools as well as the esteemed MD Anderson Cancer Center). The campus itself, however, is surrounded by a wall (with a jogging trail), and within that wall Rice seems a world apart from the surrounding hubbub of the fourth biggest city in the nation. The architecture has a Byzantine looks that has affinities with SoCal schools like Scripps and UCLA, but the buildings are surrounded by oak groves that give it a distinctive Gulf Coast feel.
There is a reason the school is rated #1 for Overall Quality of Life and #2 for Happiest Students.
I agree that Wash U in St. Louis would be another good choice.
Purdue University in West Lafayette IN
Thank you all for the suggestions! I will definitely check out some of these schools
University of Denver
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities has a gorgeous campus along the banks of the Mississippi River. The skyline of downtown Minneapolis, across the river, is visible from throughout campus. A light rail train stops right on campus in front of the student center, and you can take that to downtown Minneapolis, or to downtown Saint Paul, or many other places in the metro area.
Trinity College in Hartford, CT. Beautiful, enclosed, traditional-looking campus in the middle of the city. Has strong science and engineering programs.
Purdue is not an urban college.