Looking for match and especially safeties for a kid with the following profile:
All A’s and A-'s with the exception of B/B+ each semester in math; school doesn’t weight or rank
Expected ~1500 SAT based on PSAT and previous testing
Most rigorous schedule at selective Northeastern private school that sent more than 10 percent of class last year to Harvard or Yale
Decent, but not national-level ECs related to desired major
Likely Eagle Scout
Four year Varsity athlete, but not continuing in college
Looking to study political science, history or geography with desired career in foreign service/international affairs
Full pay, but eager for options where merit will be offered
DS is highly intellectual and a self-described nerd. Will not be interested in a party culture, but would love meeting others who want to talk in depth about politics, history, etc.
No real geographic boundaries, but would probably not love the deep south. Open at this point to looking at schools of different sizes, but I suspect a smaller school will be a better fit.
Would prefer minimal to no Greek life and a campus political climate that is respectful of a diversity of opinions.
Obviously, there are the DC schools, American and GW. You could add in Richmond. If you are full pay, some of the state flagships have really strong poly sci programs. Wisconsin and Ohio State would be good examples. No merit at Wisconsin, but possible at tOSU. They benefit by being in the state capital.
Rice would fit the bill for a match/reach if he is ok with Texas. There is no Greek life at Rice, but has residential colleges instead. It has a happy nerd vibe. Rice has about 4000 undergrad students and a good political science department.
Brandeis has a strong international affairs focus, and is Greek-free and “nerd”-friendly. The political scene in Boston is active and interesting as well.
William and Mary could be a good fit too; it does have Greek life but not to an overwhelming degree.
I wouldn’t call either a safety but I would think they’d be matches.
Perhaps Macalester? Occidental?
Does he have a particular country or region where he’s especially interested in studying abroad? Different schools are better connected in different places; some even have satellite campuses abroad that could be a draw.
FWIW, the Consortium for the Teaching of Indonesian (COTI) includes those U.S. universities which provide regular instruction in Indonesian language: Arizona State University; Cornell University; Johns Hopkins University; Northern Illinois University; Ohio University; University of California, Berkeley; University of California, Los Angeles; University of Hawai’i; University of Michigan; University of Washington; University of Wisconsin-Madison; and Yale University.
UW-Seattle, UW-Madison, and UMich could be excellent options as well. Also Pitt, which isn’t on the COTI list but offers Indonesian Language through its Linguistics department.
With respect to your son’s desire for in-depth discussion, this may connote an interest in political theory. For this, Kenyon’s Integrated Program in Humane Studies (IPHS) – which the school describes as drawing “broadly from history, literary studies, political theory and philosophy” – would be worthwhile to look into. (He could select individual courses, the entire program would not be mandatory.) Kenyon offers merit scholarship recognition to a significant number of students. Among other undergraduate-focused colleges with strong course offerings across history and government, Hamilton is notable for its active D.C. term with associated internships. For a top school that tends to be relatively accessible to male applicants, Vassar could be appealing for its generally intellectual atmosphere. Neither Hamilton nor Vassar offer merit scholarships, however.
Williams College, Bowdoin, Carleton, Middlebury, are all small LACs, and all all have very good programs in International Relations or Political Science, and none have Greek life.
If you are eagar for merit, please take some of these suggestions with a grain of salt. There are so many schools that offer merit and the atmosphere you are looking for your son. It sounds like he is a great student. You’ll have plenty of great options.
Grinnell College in Iowa is a small liberal arts school that offers good merit – many international students as well as students from throughout the US. No Greek life. Students are friendly and accepting. No application fee and no writing supplement last time I checked, so easy enough to add it to the Common App (priority deadline for merit consideration is Dec. 1). It has a huge endowment that provides many, many opportunities to students (for paid summer research, travel, etc.) It’s currently #11 in LAC rankings, but I think it would be higher if it weren’t in a small town in Iowa. It also does a superb job of preparing students for grad school. Because of location, I would recommend visiting before deciding to attend. Accepted student days are extremely well-run.
Since I mentioned only one of several potential programs of interest above, I should note that the University of Richmond offers an international studies major with a Middle East concentration as well.
If the high school sends that many to Harvard and Yale, wouldn’t it be a high school with (a) a well staffed college counseling/advising group, and (b) privileged connections to highly selective colleges and universities? If so, wouldn’t the high school’s college counseling/advising group be much more knowledgeable about college selection and reach/match/likely/safety assessments for the student than random posters here?
“desired career in foreign service / international affairs” = Georgetown School of Foreign Service, Johns Hopkins University & Tufts University should all be considered.
Your son should plan to study abroad during college if he wants a career in foreign service / international affairs or even for international business.
Fluency in a foreign language is also important for careers in those fields.
Fluency in a foreign language is super helpful. It used to be Princeton or Georgetown for foreign service. CIA or State etc. Today it’s open to all schools. In fact top state public schools are well represented.
In fact, you can go to BU as a econ major and go to congress before the age of 30.
And international relations isn’t just government service. Every major corporation and multi-national has important teams focused on these issues. Gov relations, marketing, management, product dev and hr all get involved.
Merc81 lol, hard to step around that issue. Deep south is more about vibe than geography. Friend’s kid with similar interests considered Vanderbilt and Emory-ended up happy at Vanderbilt. But yeah it is in Tennessee. It’s PolySc dept was controversial in the past but I think it is strong now.