<p>i should add a caveat that i live in a very small town that is i said is a dry county, the larger cities ie tuscaloosa birmingham etc may be very different.</p>
<p>I think you would be ok in Tulane. I know a number of Jewish students (not observant) who attend. The school draws plenty of northern students.</p>
<p>If it’s CS you’re interested in RPI and WPI both gave my older son merit scholarships and are both anxious to encourage more women.</p>
<p>Just a thought-what about Davidson-excellent LAC in the south without the southern feeling that predominates many campuses. FA is excellent, professors are wonderful-sounds like it meets many of your criteria.</p>
<p>Rhodes has the Bellingrath which I believe is a full ride and provides an incredible education, beautiful campus, strong in both liberal arts and sciences.</p>
<p>Is CS your intended major? Did you PSAT score met the NMF cutoff for your state? What other academic areas are you interested in? And are you willing to considerthe west coast?</p>
<p>Hmmm… If you’re looking for computer science, intellectual, good with merit, I would suggest Case Western.</p>
<p>The University of Rochester has some very significant merit scholarships, and it is an excellent school.</p>
<p>Six years ago our son applied only to colleges which were safeties or strong matched. Not only did he rack up $375,000 in merit scholarships but he ultimately attended a university which both challenged him academically and afforded him many opportunities to distinguish himself in his departments.</p>
<p>One year after graduation he has a great job and has been accepted to a highly selective graduate program in his major of computer game design.</p>
<p>His college friends remain in touch and he will hooking up with one of his project team collegues this month in Cali at a national computer gaming convention in San Diego on the company dime.</p>
<p>Big fish in a median pond worked very well for him!!!</p>
<p>Cast your net wide. Be sure to apply to lots of colleges, even some (financial) reach private colleges. The old rules are going out the window in the new economy. Every college will respond to the new challenges in a different way. Some may decide to give a lot more merit aid than they would have before for highly qualified applicants like you. And Duke was a good suggestion- yes, it is the South but it is Duke. And yes it is uber competitive but then you seem like an exceptionally strong applicant.</p>
<p>keilexandra,
I appreciate that the thrust of this thread is to flush out as much information as you can about schools that are both academically top-notch and financial safeties, but you may be asking too much. I thought Grinnell was a great suggestion—academically a top LAC and one that offers far more merit aid than others in its peer group. But you’re right, they probably won’t offer you a full ride or even full tuition. But you’ve got to face the fact that it’s a market out there. Pretty much the only schools that will offer full rides or even full tuition purely on the basis of academic merit are schools that aren’t strong enough purely on the academic side to compete for students like you on that basis alone. </p>
<p>The very top schools don’t offer any merit aud because they calculate they can get top students without it; it’s a financial stretch for a lot of families, but many decide it’s worth it. A notch below that, some schools will offer merit aid but are generally not overly generous with it, counting on a blend of academic quality and cash incentives to help them attract top students. It’s only another notch or two below that you start to see really big merit awards; those schools are not going to get many top students unless they offer cash bonuses, and frankly one of the reasons they can afford to make those big awards is that they just won’t see that many qualifying claimants. </p>
<p>I’m not saying it’s a perfectly informed market. In my judgment, some schools are overrated and some underrated, and consequently there may be good values to be had out there. I think Grinnell is one of them. If Grinnell were located in New England it would almost certainly be a top 10 LAC, but because of its location in “flyover land” it has trouble attracting top students from the big population centers on the coasts and needs to offer cash rewards in the from of quite generous merit aid. But it probably won’t give you a full ride. If that’s not good enough on the financial side, you may have to settle for a school a little further down the academic pecking order. If you want high-end on the academic side, you may have to settle for less generous financial aid. I suspect you won’t find a better balance between academic quality in a LAC and generosity of merit aid than Grinnel—though if I’m missing something, please do tell, readers.l</p>
<p>Keilexandra - my D is likely going to be in a similar position to yours, both financially and academically, so I’ve been reading your thread hoping to gain some advice for her. You have gotten some good advice here, though I’m sure none of it is new to you. Perhaps Smith or Bryn Mawr? I’ve heard they both offer great aid, my D won’t consider them because she wants a co-ed school. I can’t blame her, but those are two good options for you.</p>
<p>Keilexandra, I suggest that you think about what kind of kids are your friends- who you enjoy hanging out with, & what kind of things you enjoy doing.</p>
<p>If the answer is that you really like hanging out with the smartest kids at your school and doing “brainy” stuff … then maybe your g.c… is right.</p>
<p>But I can tell you… that “academic peers” stuff would have been far off the mark for both my kids. I can also tell you that I think to this day my son probably regrets turning down a spot at Lewis & Clark, which he thought of as a “safety” (something like his 4th choice). He went off to a more selective, higher ranked LAC, quit after 2 years, worked for 3 years, then finished at a CSU (Cal State U) Lewis & Clark had originally offered enough merit aid in combination with need based aid to bring the cost to less than the amount we would have paid for a UC campus at the time. He applied to L&C later on as a transfer, but was waitlisted and opted for the CSU instead. L&C probably would have been a better social fit for many reasons. </p>
<p>I don’t know how well your gc knows you, but I know that both my kids really did not enjoy hanging around the “smart” kids at their high schools – and neither did I. We all seem to value diversity in our friendships more – and part of that “diversity” is to have friends who are not all that intellectual or academically focused. </p>
<p>I don’t know about merit aid at the particular colleges you named, but they all sound like reasonable safeties to me. The statement about “academic peers” strikes me as snobbish. Again – I don’t know you and maybe your g.c. does – if your idea of a good time is to sit around discussing Proust, then maybe she is right. But you will be able to find challenge at a safety college if you look for it, you will find other smart & capable students just about everywhere, and if you enjoy socializing with a wide range of people, then it doesn’t really matter whether they all are your “academic peers”.</p>
<p>You also wrote, “wouldn’t I get more out of class discussions with “academic peers” as my counselor says?” My personal answer- based on experience - is NO – you will get more out of class discussions at whatever school has the most economically, geographically and ethnically diverse student body. Class discussions aren’t everything – but the more heterogeneous the group, the more varied the input, and the more wide-ranging the discussion. Also, it is often the case that you learn the most from the presence of the people who ask the “dumb” questions – that’s because most of those questions aren’t so “dumb” after all, and they often get to the heart of what others want to know but were afraid to ask for fear of seeming stupid.</p>
<p>parent56, I understand that religion in the south is much more than an academic topic. Thus I have chosen not to venture there. Think of it like an “out” homosexual student choosing not to attend a conservative religious college–I am an “out” atheist and I refuse to suppress that so that the majority feels more comfortable. Rather than go to the South and make that an automatic conflict, I’ll stick to places where my viewpoint is accepted. I am not comfortable in a culture where Christianity is an assumption in everyday conversation.</p>
<p>mathmom: CS is my secondary interest, and as English is my primary, I’ve ruled out tech schools. Those would be good suggestions otherwise though!</p>
<p>Davidson sounded lovely but, alas, does not offer a CS major at all.</p>
<p>I will be entering as an intended English major, with CS added if the particular form allows multiple academic interests. I expect to be a NMF, as well, and geographically will consider the two coasts + upper Midwest + Canada.</p>
<p>Case was on my list at one time; how is its humanities? Rochester is a definite apply; I visited and liked it a lot.</p>
<p>bclintonk: Because of my situation, I am applying to a full slate of need-only schools as well as merit, and I’m definitely applying to Grinnell. </p>
<p>LIMOMOF2, Smith and BMC don’t offer enough on merit alone, and due to the gender handicap they don’t measure up to my need-based list.</p>
<p>calmom: I’m definitely friends with non-“brainy” kids, but since I attend a competitive charter school, that qualification may be skewed. Even my non-brainy friends are unashamed of, for instance, loving Chem and AP Bio. And while I’ve never read Proust, I would love a good discussion of Shakespeare or comparative linguistics. </p>
<p>Thank you so much, everyone, for the ideas!</p>
<p>
Well, I guess the question isn’t whether you would like such a discussion, but whether you want to be around people who have those sorts of discussions all the time. </p>
<p>As I said, you’ll find smart kids at any college, but my kids really like watching movies and listening to music; some kids (not mine) really enjoy physical activity, athletics & outdoorsy stuff. I’m just saying you should think about whether your preferred social environment would be tied that closely to academics.</p>
<p>K- I haven’t looked into Smith and Bryn Mawr myself, but I’ve been told by people who work in college admissions that those two schools do offer good merit and need-based aid. U of Rochester is a great choice, as is Lafayette which someone else here recommended. Southern schools seem to offer the best merit aid, but like my D, you’re not interested (I keep hoping she’ll change her mind). How about schools like American and Villanova - both are good schools that offer decent merit aid.</p>
<p>Keilexandra - I’m curious about the title of this thread --“My GC thinks …”
Apparently, you attend a charter school,
your GC is very experienced and you respect her,
and she KNOWS YOU. </p>
<p>So what has she suggested these “academic/ financially doable” schools would be???</p>
<p>These may not be helpful to you, but to others:
Muhlenberg Honors Program
Univ of Richond - I know student who was awarded the full scholarshp
Univ of Miam-- i know student who is attending with 75% costs paid</p>
<p>Washington College - Washington Post writes:</p>
<p>Why is the Rose O’Neill Literary House a mecca for student writers? Perhaps Colman McCarthy, writing in The Washington Post, explains it best.</p>
<p>"What keeps the creative energy at full flow is the Literary House, the campus hangout for writers. It is a dayspring, a place of refuge from the ups and downs where for a stretch it can be only the ups and ups needed to write well. The spacious house, a three-story bulk with too many rooms for anyone to bother counting, has a couple of roofline garrets where students can hole up to finish their final drafts and suffer in revisionary peace.</p>
<p>In defense of the South: I have spent my entire life in the South and have never once been asked which church I attend (answer: I don’t). Interesting the stereotypes on here.</p>
<p>YDS - my D’s reason for not wanting to go too far south is that she wants to stay closer to home, no stereotypes involved. :)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If it’s a stereotype, it’s one that is supported by a lot of lifelong Southerners, who often cite it themselves.</p>
<p>I’m sick and tired of the stereotyping and bashing of the Northeast and northeastern schools that goes on here, too. </p>
<p>How about calling it a draw and giving it a rest?</p>
<p>OP, don’t be put off by the anti-intellectualism of some posters. It is an all-too-common trend in our society, and CC is no exception. There is nothing wrong with wanting to have classroom discussions with your intellectual peers, and it does not make you a snob in any way. Seeking out intellectual peers does not preclude diversity, either. Highly intelligent and intellectual people–not necessarily the same thing, of course–come from all kinds of backgrounds and have all kinds of interests. That is the rationale that most of the hyper-selective schools use when they talk about “crafting a class” and all that.</p>
<p>There is a reason why many gifted kids mentally “check out” of school. There is a reason why many kids absolutely adore CTY. Often, it is because for the first time they are able to have classroom discussions with, and socialize with, significant numbers of their intellectual peers. It is a very real need for some people, and doesn’t preclude other interests or having other friendships.</p>
<p>Lots of good ideas in this thread. I don’t have too many more.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>New Orleans is not “the South” in the way you seem to be thinking about it. I hardly think that being an atheist would be any kind of issue at Tulane at all. (It’s much more likely that being devoutly religious in any respect would be an issue at Tulane.)</p></li>
<li><p>Friends of my children with significant money issues got decent aid at Beloit and Lawrence, both in Wisconsin. I don’t know if merit or need-based, though. Both would be safeties for a top student, but neither would be anything like an intellectual wasteland.</p></li>
<li><p>Look at the Honors College at the University of Pittsburgh? Obviously not a LAC, but a very popular financial safety choice for strong students here, and I promise you that there are some very good ones there (although I can’t promise you that they feel that everyone around them is on the same level). It offers substantial merit aid for in-state students; I’m not certain what the out-of-state situation is.</p></li>
</ol>