Villanova University is a private Catholic school in Villanova, Pennsylvania. There are 6,500 full-time undergraduate students, and a Villanova degree is considered one of the best economic values in the United States.

Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut, but you probably know it better as part of the Ivy League. Whatever it is that you want to study, it’s safe to say that Yale has one of the best programs in the world for it. The students agree. 99% of first-year students return for their second year. If you get into Yale and you can manage the work — you stay.

is an Ivy League school that is located in Providence, Rhode Island. Just over 7,000 undergraduates attend the school, and the acceptance rate for the class of 2024 was 6.9%. Brown is known for its open curriculum, but there is a common misconception that it’s an ideal fit for students who want to figure out things along the way. This is false, and you certainly shouldn’t mention the words “open to exploring Brown’s many options” in your supplement. To succeed at Brown, you need to be a self-starter who can think ahead and structure their education in a meaningful way.

Washington University in St. Louis is a private research university in St. Louis, Missouri, with an undergraduate student body of around 7,700. Many students seek out WashU for their exceptional research programs, opportunities, and facilities, but the university is more than a just petri dish for research. One in every three students take part in study abroad, 75% participate in intramural (club) sports, and 80% pursue multiple majors or minors. It’s also a geographically diverse school, as 90% of undergraduate students come from out of state. Despite coming from far and wide, the campus community is very close, and there are many traditions that foster deep bonds among students and faculty. One of our favorites is DUC N’ Donuts — or free donuts and coffee on the first Friday of each month.

The University of Colorado Boulder is a public research university. As its name suggests, it’s in Boulder, Colorado and about 29,000 undergraduate students attend the school. It’s a big school in a city setting, and students at Boulder love the outdoors. The most popular majors are computer science, psychology, and integrative physiology. The acceptance rate is around 80%.

The University of California application is the California-specific application for the nine UC schools: UC Davis, UC Berkeley, UC Merced, UC Santa Cruz, UC Santa Barbara, UCLA, UC Riverside, UC Irvine, and UC San Diego. The UC Application is similar to the Common Application, but it is an entirely different system, requires some different information, and has its own deadline: November 30th.  

Washington and Lee is a liberal arts school in Lexington, VA with about 1,750 undergraduate students. Although Washington and Lee is small, the school is home to a few unique programs including Poverty studies and the Williams school, which is a business education within the framework of a liberal arts curriculum. The school also has an interesting schedule: there is a fall term, a winter term, and then a spring term. Spring term is only four weeks long, and during that time students take only one class and do a deep dive on a specific subject. The acceptance rate for the class of 2023 was 18%.

Georgetown is a Jesuit university in Washington, D.C. Georgetown College, the undergraduate college of arts and sciences at the university offers students a liberal arts education that prioritizes diversity of experience with an emphasis on the Jesuit tradition of service towards others. There are 3,400 students, who make up the majority of the 6,300 undergraduate students across the school’s undergraduate colleges.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research institute renowned for its engineering, math, and science — or STEM — programs centered on innovation. MIT is in Cambridge, Massachusetts, not far from Harvard University and only a short distance from Boston. There are 4,602 undergraduate students and 11,574 students in total. When considering applying to MIT, it’s important to remember that it is more than a school that is big on math. They expect every student to be well-rounded, requiring a diversity of courses, and there are exceptional research and maker opportunities for those looking to put their passions into play.

Bard College is a small liberal arts school in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. Only 1,900 undergraduates attend the school and the student to faculty ratio is 10:1. All freshman participate in a common curriculum, and the school is big on civic engagement. Bard is test-optional, and the acceptance rate is around 58%.

Harvey Mudd is a science and engineering college in Claremont, California. It is hyper-focused. It is for engineers, scientists, and mathematicians. If you do not want to major in one of those areas, it is literally not designed for you. However, Harvey Mudd doesn’t cut its students off from the world of humanities.  The HSA program mandates that students pursue an area of interest in the humanities before graduation, and they encourage a well-rounded education through the Claremont Colleges consortium, which allows students to take classes at Pitzer, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, and Scripps while keeping Harvey Mudd as their ‘home’ institution.  

The University of Rochester is a private research university located in Rochester, NY. A medium-sized school, U of Rochester has notable achievements in science (its Institute of Optics was one of the first of its kind in the nation), but it also has a flair for the creative. In fact, like Brown, the school has an open curriculum, meaning there are no required subjects. The acceptance rate last year was 29%.

Lehigh University is a small research university in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. There are 5,047 undergraduate students and 1,802 graduate students, placing it on the larger side of small. Lehigh is recognized as an NGO by the United Nations and has 56 UN-related programs every year. They also have impressive academics, but they are better known for the social side of things. Lehigh has a very significant Greek-life and a lot of school spirit, which shows itself at the annual Lehigh-Lafayette football games. 53% of the class of 2022 was filled with Early Decision applicants.

Bryn Mawr College is a private liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. It is a small school with only 1,350 undergraduates. More importantly, it is a women’s college. According to their website, “Bryn Mawr College considers as eligible to apply to the undergraduate college all individuals who have identified and continue to identify as women (including cisgender and trans women), intersex individuals who do not identify as male, individuals assigned female at birth who have not taken medical or legal steps to identify as male, and individuals assigned female at birth who do not identify within the gender binary.” The acceptance rate at Bryn Mawr is 34%  

Williams College is a private liberal arts college in Williamstown, a small town in the Berkshire mountains of Massachusetts. Williams has approximately 2,000 students, and the most popular major is economics. The Williams admissions office emphasizes that they are not just looking for students with excellent grades and scores — quantitative measures that aren’t perfectly parallel with potential. They want creative, community-focused students. One of the more unique quirks at Williams is that students can borrow art from the College’s museum to hang on the walls of their dorm!

The University of Chicago is a large liberal arts undergraduate college within a powerful research university in Chicago, Illinois. There are 6,285 undergraduate students and 10,159 graduate, professional, and other students. The university is known for a rigorous Core curriculum that requires all students to gain a well-rounded liberal arts education before graduating. It also operates on a quarter system, rather than the typical semester system that most colleges use.  Gaining admission to the University of Chicago is analogous to getting into an Ivy League university. The acceptance rate is a mere 7.3%.

Davidson College is a liberal arts college in Davidson, North Carolina, a close-knit community a thirty-minute drive north from Charlotte. There are 1,843 undergraduate students, and they boast Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, as an alumnus. Davidson is affiliated with the Presbyterian church and has stuck to a strict Honor Code system for over 100 years. The Honor Code has evolved with the times, but what hasn’t changed are the commitments to academic excellence, intellectual freedom, and moral courage.

Mount Holyoke is an all-women’s liberal arts college in South Hadley, Massachusetts. It is an all-women’s school, but it is not entirely female. Mount Holyoke embraces students who are cisgender women, trans, gender non-conforming, and non-binary who feel that an all-women’s educational environment is the best fit for them. The 2,208 undergraduate students are nearly equally spread among the humanities, social sciences, and STEM subject, and 89% of classes have less than 30 students. They are also test-optional, which means that they do not require you to submit SAT or ACT scores.  

Georgia Tech is a public research university in Atlanta, Georgia. The school is majorly technology-focused and students who attend the school rave about the research opportunities on campus. About 16,000 undergraduate students attend the school, and the acceptance rate for the class of 2023 was 18.8%. 

Occidental is a small liberal arts school in Los Angeles, California with just over 2,000 undergraduate students. Classes are generally small: 90% of them have less than 30 students and the average class size is 18 students. The acceptance rate hovers around 37%.