Couple of other options came to mind that all have active IHSA teams:
Ithaca (NY): About 4600 undergrads and can cross-register at Cornell
UNC - Asheville: About 2900 undergrads at NC’s public liberal arts college
Washington College (MD): About 1k undergrads
I would go straight to test optional. If she is a straight A student able to pay and not seeking admission to very highly selective schools, i suspect she will see good results applying as TO.
BTW, the student who did the podcast mentioned above had very unique circumstances which do not seem relevant to your daughter.
Thank you. I actually remember that student’s posts from combing through looking for equestrian teams. I do think my kid will be happiest at a smaller school, under 3-4k…when her brother came home at Christmas and told her his Intro CS class had 400 students in it, her jaw hit the floor and she said ‘there’s no way I’ll go to a school that big!’ Small LAC looks like the best bet for her so far!
Have you looked at Earlham? I believe it has a very active equestrian program, and in my circles has a socially-liberal/quirky reputation similar to Oberlin and Vassar.
Edit: Oh, and I believe they were test optional, including for merit, long before COVID.
Mt. Holyoke, Smith, Wesleyan, and Wheaton (safety)
All very LGBTQ+ friendly
Not sure about equestrian!
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As class size appears to be an important factor in your daughter’s decision process, I went ahead and looked up the class sizes using this aggregator. Each university’s Common Data Set will have its own information, and broken down into greater detail (i.e. 0-9, 10-19, 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, and 50+). As a class with 25 would feel very different than a class with 45 (but this aggregator groups them all together), that could be an important piece of information to research.
This list is sorted by the percentage of classes with more than 50 students As a caveat, reporting on class size data is imperfect. I suspect that most schools do it the “right” way but some schools have been known to game the system by listing every recitation section as a different class in order to improve their numbers. So a student might be in a 290-person lecture 2 days a week but it has 15 recitation sections meeting once a week with fewer than 20 students, and the school will count that as 16 classes (i.e. 6% with 50+ and 94% with less than 20), when most people would really consider it 1 class of 50+. The same can sometimes be done with student to faculty ratios (such as whether/how part-time or visiting instructors are included, etc.). That said, this is the best we can do at a distance. (Talk to students at the schools to find out the real experience.)
There may be some surprises on the list as well (for me, it was that New Paltz has smaller class than Geneseo). So although there is definitely a relationship between the school’s overall size and the class sizes, it’s not an absolute (such as UNC-Asheville having smaller classes than Smith). Additionally, the vast majority of the schools on the list will, I think, offer the small class sizes that your D is seeking, despite some differences in the school’s class size percentages.
| School | Student-to-Faculty Ratio | Class size of 0-19 | Class size of 20-49 | Class size of 50+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vassar | 8:01 | 71% | 29% | 0% |
| Dickinson | 9:01 | 78% | 22% | 0% |
| Skidmore | 8:01 | 77% | 23% | 0% |
| Bard | 9:01 | 85% | 14% | 0% |
| Goucher | 9:01 | 87% | 13% | 0% |
| Agnes Scott | 11:01 | 75% | 25% | 0% |
| Scripps | 10:01 | 76% | 25% | 0% |
| Pitzer | 10:01 | 74% | 26% | 0% |
| Washington College | 8:01 | 91% | 9% | 0% |
| Drew | 12:01 | 68% | 32% | 0% |
| Oberlin | 9:01 | 79% | 20% | 1% |
| Sarah Lawrence | 11:01 | 87% | 12% | 1% |
| Mt. Holyoke | 9:01 | 76% | 24% | 1% |
| Connecticut College | 10:01 | 69% | 30% | 1% |
| Bates | 10:01 | 63% | 36% | 1% |
| Middlebury | 9:01 | 59% | 40% | 1% |
| Bennington | 9:01 | 63% | 37% | 1% |
| St. Lawrence | 11:01 | 68% | 31% | 1% |
| UNC - Asheville | 11:01 | 72% | 27% | 1% |
| Earlham | 6:01 | 85% | 15% | 1% |
| Wheaton (MA) | 11:01 | 64% | 35% | 1% |
| Wesleyan | 7:01 | 74% | 25% | 2% |
| Smith | 8:01 | 69% | 28% | 3% |
| SUNY New Paltz | 16:01 | 41% | 56% | 4% |
| Ithaca | 11:01 | 59% | 37% | 4% |
| SUNY Geneseo | 16:01 | 34% | 59% | 7% |
| Northeastern | 16:01 | 66% | 28% | 7% |
| Miami (OH) | 15:01 | 35% | 53% | 12% |
| U. of Vermont | 19:01 | 41% | 42% | 17% |
The discussions of class sizes are perennials on CC. So I just want to point out that this is ENTIRELY driven by level and major. There are huge universities and tiny LAC’s where the Herodotus seminar is exactly the same size- 8 students.
Econ, Psych and Chem intro classes are going to be huge at a large university, and will be among the largest classes taught at a small college. But no student takes intro classes for four years!
Student to faculty ratios are extremely deceptive. Are emeritus faculty in that number? (they are at many U’s. They may teach one course every other year.) Are professors out on parental leave included in that number? (yes). Are faculty who are spending the year abroad, on sabbatical, etc. included? Yes. Parents see these ratios and assume “my kid is going to get individual attention”. Maybe yes, maybe no, but the differentiating factor is YOUR KID, not the faculty/student ratio.
I would not rule out a college because of the “perception” of size. I was a Classics major, and I promise you, a class of more than 12 was unusual. And the only large lecture that I took (over 100 students) was with a legend- an absolute legend-- whose course was incredible, life altering, etc. Sometimes classes are large because the professor is world renowned and everyone wants to sit there and be mesmerized- whether you are interested in the topic or not.
Test prep tutor here. For this student in particular, I see almost no point. To raise the score substantially enough to be worth submitting is going to involve a LOT of prep and a lot of money.
I’m very much in favor of students not testing unless necessary. She isn’t applying to any colleges, it seems, where a score is required or preferred, even if the school is test optional. It doesn’t seem necessary for her. It won’t be worth the money, her wasted time, and the stress.
I worked with a kid last year in a similar situation. He decided to take the test once, just to see how he would do. He scored around 1100. It confirmed that prep wasn’t worth it. It would have required a lot of time and money to get him to a level where a test would possibly be worth submitting at his reaches.
He went TO. He got a couple of WL at two NESCAC schools. He is attending a very good LAC. He and his parents are in agreement that not prepping was the right call.
Let her find better uses of her time.
TO if
most of the schools on their list don’t require it and they are okay of letting go those that do
Test prep will in any way take away from study time for more difficult classes like APs
Test prep makes kid feel like a failure
More meaningful activities like ECs could be taking place
They are not likely enough to improve enough for it to add anything to their application.
Where does she stand in terms of the CDS for the schools she is interested in? The only reason to add test scores is if it pushes her over the edge in another area she is lacking. It does not sound like she can score high enough for this to be the case.
I appreciate your response! She would genuinely be happy at a place like Beloit College (my alma mater), Sarah Lawrence, Bard, etc. I think those schools are achievable applying TO, so we do have some solid targets for her. She hates test prep- OCD and standardized tests just don’t mix- and I anticipate the prep process to be a fight. I’m glad you said this, it does make me feel better about not forcing her to do a ton of prep over the next year. She’d much rather spend her time volunteering & doing her extracurriculars. Thanks again for your insights!
Thank you- very interesting data and worth exploring further!
I’m going to jump in and vote for Skidmore. They have an equestrian team (in fact Thoroughbreds are the school mascot), and Saratoga is all about horses. It’s a very queer affirming community. (I went there and so did my trans son).
Hiya! Making an appearance here. I’m now transferring to BU for the fall, (no hate to NEU!) but yeah, I’m happy to talk about my experience and stuff! (Those of you who know me from my chaos thread- happy to update y’all via DMs)
Hey, that is great! I felt that NEU, with its coop system, was not a great match for you. BU definitely would be a better fit for your prened and research aspirations.
I agree- I’m happy to chat about it via DMs- it’s been a year :’) and I will try out for the BU Equestrian Team, so hopefully that happens?
My daughter also struggles with tests. We went to and she did fine with merit, etc. I would build out the essays and resume instead. To go from a 23 to a 32 (which is lowest I would submit) isn’t realistic and will cause way too much tension.
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