OP okay but this is what I’m literally asking. Something like Davidson’s academic offerings (esp policy and Econ), kids vibe that is left leaning without being quirky, sports culture without having 35% of the kids playing a sport (so more - “let’s go to the big game this weeekend”), serious academics without a grinder culture, happy kids. Things that he was neutral about: location, southern-ish, architecture, town. Deal breaker: size. Too small. |
| My son was deciding between Davidson and William and Mary and picked William and Mary because of Davidson's size. He's very happy at W & M. |
ED Vanderbilt and cross your fingers |
William & Mary, although they don’t have the sports culture. Colgate, although they have the long winter? Don’t discount the positive impact of climate on the vibe at Davidson that is appealing to your son. |
Winston Salem is fun actually and there’s enough hipster pancake places downtown to have hangover pancakes on Sunday. Also live music venues and that food hall thingy near the reimagined tech warehouses All of these places were packed with preppy 20-somethings when we’ve visited. |
Tons of kids get 0 merit there. And the standard for getting merit is high because overall stars are high. So kind of depends what you mean by top stats. Also, most of merit is 1/3 off of tuition. |
What is the minimum size? Bc I agree with Richmond but it’s only 3100 undergrads. |
+2 My 2 kids both crossed Wake off the list after a visit because Winston Salem is so boring and just blah. |
| villanova? |
You have a Big Ten/SEC kid. You just haven't come to terms with it yet. |
We had the same experience. There is just nothing going on in Winston Salem. |
Interesting take. Very perceptive. |
What’s a private school, less-than-15k big ten/sec school? |
Northwestern. But much harder admit than Davidson. |
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Look at colleges on the “happy student” lists. Davidson’s signature is rigorous academic in a kind, supportive environment. Too frequently, rigorous academics coincide with a grinder culture.
Our son will be attending Davidson in the fall. His ED2 was Willam and Mary. While W&M has a bit of a study hard culture, it is similar to Davidson in the happiness/kindness of the students. Both Davidson and W&M frequently show up on “happy student” lists. Some have mentioned Vanderbilt, another school that gets mentioned on happy student lists, as does Brown. We have family experience with both these schools, and the experiences have been good, but size and professor research/tenure requirements do impact student/professor relationships. You might look at Wesleyan because it’s about 4k kids, but it is in the NE and some consider it too woke. |