Hi everyone, I was recently deferred from Yale SCEA and am currently finalizing my RD apps. One of my favorite aspects of Yale was the sense of community I felt there; Yale has a reputation for being “warm and fuzzy” and having friendly students. Are there any other schools that have a similar vibe? I know LACs will provide a strong sense of community, but I would prefer a medium-sized college with 5,000+ students. I just want to make sure I’m not missing any schools in my list. Any input would be appreciated. Thanks so much!
Good safety level college for you with that vibe and the right sized population: Loyola University, Maryland.
Yes, a lot of smaller colleges have that vibe: e.g., Bates, Hamilton, Williams. How about Colgate, which is a slightly larger LAC?
What about one of the Claremont colleges? You get the benefit of the LAC with the bigger community of the consortium schools. All but maybe CMC could fit your criteria.
Case Western Reserve U has a wonderful community in Arts and Sciences. The Greek life there is service oriented,
and the music and arts are very rich like Yale, one of the better art museums, free every day, is walking distance from the dorms, and professors use this art museum as part of the learning in seminar style classes. While Case it known as a “preprofessional” school, our son found it to be amazing for LAC, including strong professors in ethics, Hindu culture and philosophy, music, world languages, and economics. The school offers a $3000 summer grant in any field including humanities and social sciences so students can stay the summers and work for professors, and many research oriented programs. All Case Western freshman read a common book the summer before freshman year.
There are a number of Ivy League/Wash U rejects at Case Western, but they get over it quickly and become a family.
The size is what you are after, 5000 undergrads. Cleveland Orchestra is top five, and students walk to the venue, with huge discounts.
Case Western offers many students support to get admitted to medical school, PhD programs, law school and business school as well. There are study programs for specialized GRE exams like the physics GRE. Professors care about students.
Case seemed very friendly indeed, until the admissions decisions came. 
I think Brandeis is in that size range, too.
“Friendly” is about finding your group. That can happen at scores of colleges. What else is already on your list?
Agreeing with @lookingforward . I haven’t really seen any unfriendly residential colleges. It’s all a matter of finding folks you like. That can (or perhaps won’t) happen at any college. If one doesn’t find friends given a period of time, it’s actually a pretty good idea to transfer as lack of community (when “everyone else” has it) is a big mental challenge that rarely has a good component to it.
My lads went to three different colleges and all found friends. The only one of the three they chose that you might like is the University of Rochester.
I think of William and Mary, Rochester, and Tufts as VA, Upstate NY, and Boston versions of the similar type mid-size national universities with outstanding academics and great communities and desirable campuses.
Thanks for the suggestions everyone! Some schools currently on my list that I got a “friendly” vibe from are WashU, UNC, and William and Mary. Thinking about applying to Brown or Tufts if I have time
Rice & Notre Dame come to mind.