Hi - I’m a history professor, so maybe I can shed some light on short and long-term plans. You’re just finishing your Associate’s degree, so it’s a bit of a leap at this point to be thinking about Ph.D. programs.
First - you do not need to go to an Ivy or equally prestigious LAC to get into a strong Ph.D. program. At universities, very few students in a discipline like history remain in the same program for grad school. So a BA at Penn, for example, likely won’t mean a Ph.D. at Penn. Rather than focusing on future doctoral programs, you simply need to do very well in college, produce some good undergraduate research and writing, and get to know your professors well enough to get good recommendation letters. In thinking about transferring, think about colleges with strong history programs, but these can be LACs, publics, or anywhere, really, as long you don’t transfer to a school that’s actively cutting humanities. It does help to graduate from a school with some name recognition among academics (I know this because I teach at a regional public with relatively little name recognition outside my area, and our top students have trouble getting into top Ph.D. programs, regardless of how talented they are). But lots of schools have name recognition. It would help to find someplace where you are eligible for generous financial aid. It’s not that Ph.D. programs are terribly expensive (getting financial support in the form of grants or assistantships is typical), but if you’re going that route, it will be many years before you’ll earn a real income again, so you need to plan ahead and not spend too much on education now, if you can avoid it.
Second - You don’t need an Ivy Ph.D. program to have a career in academia. If/when you do apply to Ph.D. programs, you should do so based on strength in your intended field, not based on overall prestige. In other words, applying to Ph.D. programs is not like applying to undergrad schools – you’re searching for a mentor as much as you’re searching for a degree-granting university. Yes, some prestige helps, but prestige comes from your mentor as much as it does from your university, and an Ivy-or-bust mentality makes even less sense for grad school than it does for undergrad. By the time you get to that point, your undergrad advisers should help you find appropriate programs that have top scholars in your field.
Third – Please consider alternative career paths and other uses for your anticipated history degree. The job market for academics is horrible, especially in history and the humanities. Between the sinking job market, evaporating funding, and the coming demographic cliff (which will, temporarily at least, mean fewer college students), doctoral programs are limiting admissions. There is work for adjuncts but it’s low-paid and comes with no guarantees for continued work and no benefits. Yes, you can teach at a community college (and even some 4-year colleges) as an adjunct with an MA, but that is not where you want to spend the rest of your career (there are some tenure-track positions at CCs for those with MAs, but not many). Plus, if you’re a non-traditional student, you’re already getting a late start. Finishing college + a Ph.D. program + years of adjunct teaching –> starting a career in your 40s with no retirement savings.
Keep options open as you move forward. Happily, there’s a lot you can do with a history degree, some of which uses historical expertise, and some of which uses the analytical skills you gain as a history major. I always recommend that my students check out this information as they think broadly about their futures: Careers for History Majors – AHA
You can remain more nimble if you think about various MA programs that can set you up in applied fields and give you the background to apply to Ph.D. programs if you’re interested in pursuing that option. Think about MA programs in library science, museum studies, public history, and similar fields.
So - focus on your BA for now, and look for the school that will provide you with the most resources (including internships that are history-adjacent) and are the best academic and financial fit. You can wait to figure out what options you should explore for grad school.