The second college I recently toured was Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York.
Skidmore is a highly selective liberal arts college of 2,400 students. Their admission rate last year was 42% but the students who get in, like their choice. 93% stayed for the sophomore year.
Students start their college career taking one of the Scribner Seminars. These small seminar classes are limited to 15 students each and focus on providing a strong foundation in writing and quantitative reasoning. Don’t worry if you think this sounds boring. Skidmore faculty make sure that you learn strong writing and reasoning skills while enjoying your classes. Here are some seminar topics from last year: Detective Fictions, Dark Designs; Earth System Evolution, The First Four Billion Years; and Japanese Animation.
Skidmore has particular strengths in the arts including studio art, art history, dance and theater. However, the college is also strong in the other almost 40 majors it offers. Of note, the college does have a business major which many small liberal arts colleges do not.
The college does have an interesting program where 36 incoming Freshman start their college career at a semester long Skidmore program in London, England. The program is led by two Skidmore faculty and students are fully integrated into the regular college upon their return.
The college has 19 varsity teams that play Division III sports as well as a number of intramural and club teams. One of the varsity teams is women’s riding.
This is a fairly new looking campus as it moved from downtown Saratoga Springs to its current location in the early 1970’s.
The mid range SAT scores of 1,730 to 2,030. The mid range of the ACT is 26 to 30. The college also recommends that students submit two SAT Subject Tests one of which is recommended to be a foreign language.
The college has substantial financial aid available although they don’t guarantee to meet 100% of need.
This is another wonderful small college for the right student.
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