Conn College has no merit aid.
Donât know if it meets all criteria, but reading your post made me think of Union College (Schenectady, NY). Might be worth a look.
Reed is one of my top choices. VERY intellectual, progressive, and quirky. No greek life or sports teams (although they do have intermural sports). The professors are supposed to be fabulous. It is just outside of Portland, and the campus and surrounding area is gorgeous. There is themed housing so you can have those late night conversations with people similar to yourself. There is even housing that puts you up with international students! They just built a new, state of the art performing arts building. The only âdown sideâ is that it seems to be a bit smaller than you are looking for (about 1500 students).
Also no merit aid at Reed.
I donât know why multiple people have suggested Grinnell, since the OP states that itâs already been ruled out.
Your description of your daughter is a lot like my son, he ended up at Grinnell and loves it. He enjoyed his visit to Goucher, it was the only school that showed us their pilates studio instead of their climbing wall. However, it fell off his list because he had other safeties he thought would be more academically challenging like Wooster. Goucher does have some cross enrollment with Hopkins, they are not close but a bus connects them and that would provide plenty of challenge. Also, I remember being impressed with the study abroad program.
One of his main criteria was an accepting, diverse non-judgmental student body. He felt that at Dickinson, even though they lean preppy (but noticeable diversity). He thought Muhlenberg was accepting but the student body was not diverse enough for him, they did tell us during the tour that the sidewalk in front of the dance studio was heated so dancers did not get cramps. He eliminated Oberlin because he felt everyone was very very liberal and not open to other opinions even though he is very, very liberal.
Good luck, I think your list if balanced and sheâll have choices come next year. Also liked getting early answers from Dickinson and Wooster makes the wait easier.
I know this is a much larger school than your daughter is considering, but my colleagueâs daughter, who is a serious dancer, just got a great merit scholarship at the University of Kentucky. She also said the dorms there are incredibly nice.
I would still check out Mount Holyoke & Bryn Mawr even if she isnât interested in womenâs colleges. If you go to the Womenâs Colleges forum, there are lots of examples of girls who were staunchly against them, visited, and fell in love.
Also, with Kenyon, make sure to visit & interview! They are getting very yield conscious so showing interest is important- the past two years there were kids getting accepted to Ivies & waitlisted or rejected there. Great school.
Would also add in Denison in Ohio- good mix of students & a balanced atmosphere, great academics & plentiful merit aid.
Conn college sounds like a fit with its strong science and dance programs, but there is not a lot of merit there. Hamilton also seems like a fit, but again little merit.
Barnard has an excellent dance program and its affiliation with Columbia does lend some coed vibe.
On the Dickinson/Lafayette/Gettysburg/Lehigh debate - I think none are snobby, Dickinson more quirky/eclectic than preppy, Lehigh very Greek centric, Lafayette and Gettysburg preppy but not overly so.
I know U Rochester was already mentioned. I donât know how good their dance program is, but if it hits everything else, I wonder whether your daughter would want to check out local dance studios that arenât necessarily affiliated with the university? I think there are a couple of good ones (I live nearby and my knowledge is mostly based off of local friends FB pages, their high school age kids are big into dance and do a lot of competing. I think those studios also extend to adults). Anyway, it is a possibility that might not be as doable for more remote colleges.
Ursinus College in PA is a great school and is one the CTCL(colleges that change lives) campuses. They do offer merit aid. It is in a cute suburban area, but not very far from Philadelphia. A friendâs daughter attended and loved it. My oldest daughter also applied to Dickinson and was accepted with a nice merit scholarship. It did not seem super preppy or snobbish to us, there seemed to be a wide range of students and Carlisle is such a cute college town.
My oldest daughter also applied to Ursinus and was offered a nice merit scholarship, but chose to attend the University of Richmond, her younger sister also attends UR. UR has a bit of a preppy reputation, and does have 30% of student involved in greek life(no residential frats or sororities tho), but neither of my daughters is preppy or involved greek life, nor are they big partiers(they prefer to hang out with friends, watch movies, play games-Settlers of Catan is a favorite!- have a casual dinner out, etc.) and they absolutely love UR.
UR has one of the highest rates of students participating in travel abroad programs(60%), and roughly 10% of students are international. 23% are US students of color, and there is a lot of economic diversity. They offer 50ish full tuition/full ride scholarships to incoming freshmen each year, in a variety of areas-science, leadership, the arts, and music., and some $15K presidential scholarships as well. They have Dance as a major and minor and students who are interested in dancing, but who are not dance majors/minors are welcome to participate. For more info. on dance opportunities - http://theatredance.richmond.edu/performance/student-groups.html
Advocate.com named UR one of â7 Brave Campuses for LGBT Students in the South,â noting Richmondâs four-star rating on the Campus Pride Index and the addition of gender identity and expression to the nondiscrimination policy.
UR has small classes, great professors with lots of opportunities for discussion, excellent advising and career counseling.
Our family has fallen in love with the Richmond area, UR is 10 minutes from downtown, with lots to do, great food, parks, etc. It does get cold and snows on occasion in the winter, usually storms of a few inches, enough to look pretty and facilitate some sledding on dining hall trays, but not enough to cancel classes very often. Richmond has a strong âsouthernâ history, but it has become very metropolitan with lots of transplants relocating there from all over the country. My husband and I are from New England, and we donât feel at all of place when we visit. Richmond does have a good sized airport and there is an Amtrak stop a few miles from campus. Richmond is about 2 hours south of DC.
Another comment that Dickinson overall is not snobby or overly preppy. My kid who went there is not preppy at all, nor are her friends. Not snobby, either â most of her friends were getting FA and had some student loans.
I agree that you should encourage her to visit Smith & Mt Holyoke if possible. Merit aid is especially good at MHC, and my quirky kid liked it a lot after visiting (applied and got $25K of merit, too). Neither of my Ds really thought they wanted womenâs colleges, but both were quite taken with MHC, applied, and were accepted.
Surprisingly, in my researching schools with strong dance I came upon Case Western. Check out the dance courses. I assume when looking for dance you want advanced ballet and modern, and ensembles. Case Western is very science/engineering oriented, but I thought they had a great selection of majors. Bucknell impresses me for dance, but itâs Greek oriented. Also, Wake Forest, but again too Greek. Conn. College is also strong in dance, but I thought I read that they didnât give merit. Bates College, another good dance school sounds like a good fit, but I donât think they have merit. You might want to check. I will try to remember what other schools are strong in dance.
Also, when looking at schools, see which allow you to send in an arts supplement. Some give scholarships for dance (you might have to at least minor in it or in some cases just be involved in ensembles) This might be an alternative to merit aid.
St. Olaf hits many of the boxes, including size and projected merit aid and very strong music. Just donât know about dance since that was completely off our radar during our search. Worth looking into.
OP mentions WashU, and merit is a very remote possibility there, so probably out.
Lawrence was also going to be a suggestion, but not sure why OP ruled that out alreadyâŠ
Good luck. With that defined list of needs, this should not be an exhaustive search.
Colleges whose sticker price minus average merit aid is less than $40K, and where at least 20% of students get merit aid, include:
URichmond
Rhodes
Wooster
Beloit
Lawrence
Hendrix
Illinois Wesleyan
Junniata
Kalamazoo
Knox
Agness Scott (women only)
Centre
Case Western
University of Portland
Trinity U (TX)
Clark
Bard maybe? I second Union. Skidmore is good, but not so good with merit $$$. Like others, we really liked Dickinson. Made the final 3 and gave nice merit $$$. I also encourage you to add one larger and one or two midsize schools to the mix so that when next spring comes she has options. My D originally wanted âsmall LACâ but later on decided she wasnât so sure about that. It was nice to have schools of various size on the list of acceptances.
@mamaedefamilia I would suggest that you actively investigate colleges that were founded by Quakers/Friends. Most are no longer run by Quakers, but have maintained their commitment to services, equality (including LGBT), etc. and are small with laid back, informal and intellectual discussion based courses. They do not have greek life (it goes against their belief that ALL should be welcome in groups/clubs) and tend not to have sports as a centerfold.
Guilford comes to mind, and Earlham
They are not overly competitive to get into and tend to lack competition on campus (meaning that they strive to welcome the gifts of all, not the academically gifted or sports stars above others)
I would also look at Colleges that Change the World (the list/book is called something like that).
Finally, if you can get her to reconsider Womenâs colleges (get her to at least LOOK at one) then I would say Bryn Mawr. It is in a great college area, just outside of a city and in a consortium with Haverford (just down the road), Swarthmore and Upenn. She can take classes, do band and activities, etc. at those campuses and as such will get a co-ed fell as needed. That all will add to the intellectual challenge. They are not as tough to get into as Haverford but the connection will provide even great academic stimulation. Sometimes you have to get them to visit before ruling certain types of schools out.
Best of luck. My 3rd fits your bill in ability and interests and we canât pay(with two in college now and more to come after him!) but will get little to no aid. We are thinking of HBCUs with lower thresholds for merit than the big name ones, and Quaker/Earthy schools, etc.).
Take a look at University of Scranton. Although Jesuit, the religious aspects were much less visible than some of the other Jesuit schools D applied to. I believe UG is around 5000. They have very good merit aid.
Conn Coll is a NESCAC school and those schools only give financial aid, no merit. So, that excludes Bates, Trinity, Hamilton etc. Franklin & Marshall also only gives financial aid. Bard is a confusing hybrid, it seems that it only gives merit to students who also show financial aid. Sarah Lawrence may be similar to Bard in that way, and would be worth confirming that.
Dickinson has a relationship with the Central PA ballet program, and while it is less diverse than, say, Grinnell, it is not an overwhelmingly preppy community, the feel is much more of a balanced student body. Its highest automatic award is $20k I believe.
Bryn Mawr and Mount Holyoke would be wonderful match/safeties for merit, and are worth further consideration. With the BiCo consortium with Haverford, a Bryn Mawr student can make the community as co-ed as they choose.
We too were a merit-only family, and my studentâs list was entirely match and safety schools because we needed substantial merit. I would suggest that the decision to strike off Kalamazoo, Beloit etc. is premature â there just arenât going to many choices of schools which meet ALL your requirements, so some flexibility will be necessary. Be flexible going in, and take a look at a variety of schools to develop a sense of what is non-negotiable. My own kid thought no greek life and no gen eds were non-negotiable requirements, but found a school which has more of both than he wanted, but the school is great in so many other ways, that didnât matter. If he had never visited or given it serious consideration, he would have missed a real opportunity which turned out to be the best fit at the end of the process.
Many of the midwest LACs have a lower sticker price than east coast, so that is like an extra $6-8k in the bank already. Earlham, Knox, Kalamazoo, Beloit, Lawrence, are less expensive and room and board is often several thousand dollars less than east coast as well. Centre College in KY is lower sticker price with good merit, and works on expanding its geographic diversity, so a mountain region kid might be very interesting to them. Earlham and Kzoo have no greek life, Kzoo is a vibrant arts community, and a pretty cool downtown with lots of renovated industrial space converted to arts performing space etc. Knox, Beloit, Lawrence and Wooster all have 15-25% greek life participation, but it is not dominant and is very different feel than many other campus greek life â those schools are not the stereotypical âVineyard Vinesâ greek life, and the student bodies at each is diverse, inclusive, and welcoming.
Good luck, be flexible, and have fun on the journey.
Check out James Madison Univ in Virginia. Great dance, affordable, greek, but big enough that you can find others not involved.
It has been mentioned before but would look at Pitt if youâre in Pennsylvania on this trip. Vibrant city, good airport access, diverse campus . Bigger that your D wants, but I know many students who are very happy there. Also, would easily fit your budget even if she doesnât warrant automatic merit with her numbers.
They have special days during summer visits where you can fill out the preliminary app with no fee, then send supporting documents once you get home.
Also, because they have modified rolling admissions, it is frequently the first college to release a decision - sometimes September or October.