I remember this thread. I still can’t understand why she thought commuting to UCD (14k) wouldn’t work financially (she also said she couldn’t be sure to get into UCD and when I explained why she definitely would, her reaction was …unpleasant. I was not talking of TE or discount, just plain regular UC tuition). I’m afraid we talked at cross purpose and am afraid she’s under the impression her tuition will double no matter what 2 years from now. Knowing she has an affordable, high-quality, commutable university that can be considered a safety should ease her concerns and I feel bad for her.
Her brother has other problems that may make the largely hands off UC a poor fit.
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Yes, UCD has writing and other GE requirements but you can take the standard course by end of the first year, you’re ok. There’s a lot of flexibility and again, not intense, good for stem majors, like the OP’s son. Contrast with CTCL places where you immerse yourself in a lot of reading and writing in the first semester, which many of these colleges tout as a reason for attending. Much tougher and more stringent core requirements.
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Serious question: Are there any colleges out there without rigorous writing requirements? Those without any explicit first-year writing requirements, it seems to me, are the ones where either preparation in writing is assumed and thus students are thrown into advanced writing from the very start, or they use a writing in the disciplines curriculum model and so there are effectively FYW courses embedded in major requirements.
I know of precisely zero colleges that don’t actually require course-based demonstrations of facility in writing. (Not to say there aren’t a couple of them, but I wonder about them if they’re there.)
Basically, if you want a college education, you can’t simply go looking for “easy colleges”—aside from diploma mills, you will have to demonstrate ability in a number of different subjects, not just writing.
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Generalizing about LACs or CTCL schools may lead to inaccurate assumptions. For example, The Evergreen State College is a (public) LAC listed in CTCL, but it has no general education requirements (including writing course requirements).
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Everyone might require a freshman comp or writing class, but they’re not all going to be the same. My kids have taken four freshman comp classes between them and they varied in expectations from 5-10 pages a semester to 5-10 pages a week.
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Assuming you mean “without rigorous writing requirements for a bachelor’s degree”, how about
My D was able to use her AP language credit to place out of the writing requirement for her engineering major. That said, her engineering design class had a high emphasis on technical writing (biggest part of any grade was the design book), and she had to take oral communication. Her mandatory honors seminar also had a heavy writing component. So in her experience, while she technically didn’t have a writing class, it was emphasized in other courses. IMO, being able to communicate well, both in writing and verbally, is a necessary life skill for any career.
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Not that it applies to @UCDProf 's kid, but there are plenty of colleges where a certain score on AP Lang or Lit exempts you from the writing requirement. There are also plenty of colleges where there are no exemptions based on AP.
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My daughter did have a requirement for an English course with writing for her ABET civil engineering degree, but she could have met that with an AP test score (I think a 4) or a DE course.
We really wish she’d taken the DE option instead of the AP option in high school. She would have gotten an A on the DE option but the AP option didn’t work for her. She’s not a good test taker but was a good student and always got A’s in the classes (even AP Lang).
Taking the writing course in college was NBD. She’s actually a pretty good writer even if she doesn’t like it. She knows the difference between there, their, and they’re.
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@ucbalumnus, Evergreen State is one of the ones that uses a writing in the disciplines model—so yes, they very definitely do have writing requirements.
Also, for the mention of page counts upthread, that isn’t a good measure of rigor. When I teach writing-focused courses, my students very quickly learn that it can be much harder to write a good 1000-word paper than a good 2500-word one.
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That’s why I said many of these colleges and assuming that CTCL colleges don’t have intense writing requirements could be an even worse assumption. I didn’t research all the colleges for sure, but I did look at three colleges mentioned - Clark, Denison, Hendrix and have visited Saint Mary’s in CA, and they’re all have some intense first year experience, seminars, stricter core curriculum.
“I know of precisely zero colleges that don’t actually require course-based demonstrations of facility in writing.”
Outside of colleges that give AP credit as others have mentioned, there are colleges where you can take a writing requirement class pass/no-credit.
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A definitional point: Colleges that give writing course credit for AP scores are not examples of colleges that don’t require first-year writing courses, they’re examples of colleges that have offloaded some of their first-year-writing course requirement workload onto high schools and the College Board.
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You asked about rigorous writing requirements in the first year and there are many colleges that waive that requirement or don’t require you to take Writing in the first year or have the option of taking it pass/no-credit, meaning you only need a C to meet that requirement. You can’t keep changing the definition because the original point of rigorous FYW was an unsupported, overgeneralization.
Let’s move on from a pedantic debate on semantics. 
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I’m good with moving on, but can I at least defend myself against being told that I made “an unsupported overgeneralization”? (As an academic, those are borderline fighting words.) That charge was leveled based on the logic that a student being required to get a C or better (or the equivalent) in a rigorous first-year writing class (or the equivalent) isn’t actually a FYW requirement, which seems rather off to me. I mean, just because there are multiple paths toward completing a requirement doesn’t mean that there is no such requirement.
And it doesn’t change the core of my assertion anyway, which was that the idea of trying to find an “easier” college is kind of doomed, since all postsecondary education requires postsecondary-level (and thus rigorous) coursework.
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I think you’ve gotten some good suggestions on potential colleges. Now I urge you to open up a bit to the advice you didn’t want to hear. The most important part of a good college list is fit. Understood the No 1 criteria is affordability, but I think you really need to look at whether an LAC and the requirements for intensive reading, writing and class participation is where your child will be comfortable. I worry that you are betting on a magical transformation to motivate your son to want to learn and succeed.
What is he doing now to demonstrate he wants to go to college? Is he working to save money? Writing essays? Taking an academic enrichment class?
My point is spending time finding an easy college for a non-motivated kid may not be addressing the real issue. I would really encourage you to get your son front and center on the college process. He needs skin in the game.
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I wonder if the idea was there may be a liberal arts college for the son and twin to attend together.
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The son also has this senior year of high school to get more prepared for college. Even if the high school is not preparing him (although the twin doesn’t seem to have the same issues and yet has the same opportunities), that doesn’t mean the student can’t do some prep. Take a DE course, take the dad’s class at the UC-D, take a Coursera course online (credit or no credit), take a speed reading course. Probably won’t help with the admissions side of it, but the Dad assures us the son doesn’t need admissions help as he will be competitive for merit aid and the dad is just looking to make the transition to college smooth and protect the gpa.
Use this final year to prep for college.
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OP: admittedly, this might not be what you and your son are looking for, but seems interesting, so just thought I would mention. On this thread, @bloomfield88 mentioned a program whereby you spend two years at a JC with a guaranteed entry to certain top Virginia schools, provided a GPA threshold is met (may be some other requirements). For Reasonably Bright HS students that would like a 'Second Chance' - #6 by ucbalumnus).
Sure there are requirements but the flexibility in taking it anytime in the first year or two years or pass/fail would help students like the OP’s son who wants to protect his GPA the first year while figuring out what major, potentially science, to select. And while the CTCL list has a lot of good suggestions, that lack of flexibility along with the rigor would probably not make them a good fit.
Another overgeneralization, just because it’s a college class doesn’t mean it’s rigorous, rather than getting into semantics, there are many counter examples to disprove that statement, e.g. the majors or classes that many athletes take to remain eligible, neither the course, nor the professor in some cases, are rigorous.