Ah, I did over interpret you. Sorry about that. I now read you as saying you don’t mind a college with some GenEd distribution requirements so long as they don’t fall into the Core Curriculum category, like Columbia.
I think you would like Wesleyan. The problem with finding other schools like it is that they would all be smaller by quite a bit. For example, Amherst and Wesleyan have a lot in common, but Amherst at 1800, is quite a bit smaller. So are Colby, Bowdoin and Bates. Vassar at 2400 is a popular overlap with Wesleyan.
Colby is one of the very few colleges that is even more in the middle of nowhere than Middlebury Bowdoin and Bates are inside small cities.
@User372623 You may want to look at Pitzer - not even close to a safety, but it does really check most of your boxes. Grinnell isn’t a safety but it has open curriculum and an excellent language program. It doesn’t click any of the rest of your boxes, though. It’s in the middle of rural Iowa.
As a California resident, what do you think of UCs and CSUs?
UCs’ general education requirements vary by campus, division, or (at UCSD and UCSC) residential college. CSUs have a common set of general education requirements that are fairly voluminous, although most categories have many choices within the category (i.e. not a “core” with specified courses).
As far as what schools can be a safety, it would help others help you if you specify your academic profile, what you can afford, and what your financial aid situation is. A safety must be a school that will admit you and will be affordable.
UCSD may be of interest to you. They don’t have an open curriculum like Brown or John’s Hopkins but they have 7 colleges you can prioritize. I think the Roosevelt college, for example, requires a ton of humanities and writing GE courses that may interest you.
You have great stats and I love that your ECs are themed around what seems to be your passion. I can see it without even reading your essays, yet. Good luck!!
Not really related to this topic, but I watched several college decision YouTube videos. Kids apply safety schools and get accepted.
Often they are happy to get accepted, but some kids say,
“I am happy, but I am not going there anyway…” or “I am not going to this school, I don’t really care about this school…”
I wonder why they applied to those schools to begin with. It’s just wasting. Wasting time and money, and wasting other kids’ spot. As soon as I hear these comments from kids, it starts showing what kinds of kids they actually are. I feel they are so arrogant…
So when kids select the safety schools, they should really like that school.
Oh, I’m familiar with the range! I would like to study classics and religion, but not as main focuses. (I do have a few years of Latin under my belt!) I like CompLit because it’s a combination of history, literature, world language, and classics.
They also emphasize language courses for Midd students: I’ve heard that all language classes start with full immersion, so that even people who take STEM majors can be fluent in 1-2 new languages by the time they graduate! (On a Midd panel, a CompSci student said he took Chinese on a whim and fell in love with the language and the culture because of the intensive language immersion Midd offers.)
I do know that my school has a good relationship with a lot of schools– USC, UMichigan, NYU, WashU, and Tulane are coming to mind (along with UPenn, Cornell, and Harvard.) I was considering WashU because they have a great anthropology program- any thoughts?
I think can empathize with kids having contingency plan. The last few years have been crazy years. Your match isn’t a guarantee, let alone reach, dream schools. You can’t blame kids for applying to safety schools even though they aren’t that crazy.
My son applied to a couple “safety” schools in the CSU and UC system. His match schools with increased applicant rate and test blind at UC (despite him having a 36ACT, strong ECs, and 4.2 UC cap and 4.41 UC Weighed) are not even a guarantee on top of UC always seems so random who they let in.
Check out the following: Tufts, Boston College, Williams, Amherst, Emerson, Trinity College (you probably would consider this one a safety), Johns Hopkins, Pomona, and Claremont McKenna.
Also if you are looking for some more safeties, check out Fordham (it’s in NYC but doesn’t feel like it), Lehigh, Lafayette, Connecticut College, Fairfield, and there are also many schools in Philly you should check out.
Lots of ideas for more reaches here but that doesn’tsoundlike what you’relooking for. Take a look at Bard. Bryn Mawr could be a good one too if you are open to a women’s college.
Bowdoin and Bates are inside small cities.