The 101 smartest liberal arts colleges in America
(Flickr / Grant)
Did your school make the cut?
If you're looking for an intellectually stimulating environment and a tight-knit community, you may want to consider one of the following universities.
From our recent list of the smartest colleges in America, we pulled out the top liberal arts schools, as categorized by US News & World Report.
These colleges emphasize undergraduate studies in the arts, humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences. Most are small, with class sizes typically under 20 students.
In order to determine a school's overall smarts, Jonathan Wai, a Duke University Talent Identification Program research scientist, analyzed the average standardized test scores that schools report to US News. (Those that did not report scores are not included.)
These tests are often criticized, but research shows that both the SAT and ACT are good measures of general cognitive ability, since just about any mental test measures one's ability to reason.
ACT scores were converted to SAT scores (math + verbal) using this concordance table so all schools could be compared on one metric. Then, an average of the 25th and 75th percentile was computed (see more detail on methods and limitations here).
On the following ranking, a (2) next to the school's name indicates that some or all students aren't required to supply scores; a (3) indicates that the school did not supply all students it has scores for, or did not tell US News if it had; a (4) indicates that the data is from a previous year, rather than from the most recent year; and a (9) indicates that the school may not require scores from all applicants and that it may not have submitted data for all students.
Here are the smartest liberal arts colleges in America:
Smarts Rank | School | Average SAT |
1 | Harvey Mudd College | 1494 |
2 | Pomona College | 1460 |
3 | Williams College | 1455 |
4 | Amherst College | 1450 |
4 | Swarthmore College | 1450 |
6 | Bowdoin College (2) | 1445 |
7 | Claremont McKenna College | 1435 |
8 | Carleton College | 1415 |
9 | Haverford College | 1410 |
10 | Vassar College | 1405 |
11 | Grinnell College | 1400 |
12 | Hamilton College | 1390 |
12 | Washington and Lee University | 1390 |
14 | Wellesley College | 1385 |
14 | Wesleyan University (2) | 1385 |
16 | Colgate University (3) | 1375 |
16 | Reed College (4) | 1375 |
18 | Macalester College | 1368 |
19 | Middlebury College | 1365 |
20 | Scripps College (3) | 1360 |
21 | Smith College (2) | 1355 |
21 | Oberlin College | 1355 |
21 | Bates College (2) | 1355 |
24 | Barnard College | 1345 |
25 | Colorado College (2) | 1340 |
25 | United States Air Force Academy | 1340 |
27 | Davidson College | 1335 |
27 | Mount Holyoke College (2) | 1335 |
29 | Colby College (2) | 1330 |
29 | Pitzer College (2) | 1330 |
29 | Connecticut College (2) | 1330 |
29 | St. John's College (NM) (2) | 1330 |
33 | Kenyon College | 1325 |
33 | University of Richmond | 1325 |
35 | Bryn Mawr College (2) | 1320 |
35 | St. John's College (MD) (2) | 1320 |
35 | Wheaton College (IL) | 1320 |
38 | Whitman College | 1315 |
39 | Bucknell University | 1305 |
39 | College of the Holy Cross (2) | 1305 |
39 | Union College (NY) (2) | 1305 |
39 | Franklin and Marshall College (2) | 1305 |
39 | St. Olaf College | 1305 |
44 | Lafayette College | 1300 |
44 | Occidental College | 1300 |
44 | Rhodes College | 1300 |
44 | Hillsdale College | 1300 |
48 | United States Naval Academy | 1285 |
48 | Centre College | 1285 |
48 | Gettysburg College | 1285 |
48 | Denison University (9) | 1285 |
48 | Lewis & Clark College (2) | 1285 |
48 | Bennington College (9) | 1285 |
54 | Dickinson College (2) | 1280 |
54 | Bard College (2) | 1280 |
54 | New College of Florida | 1280 |
57 | United States Military Academy | 1275 |
58 | Sarah Lawrence College (2) | 1270 |
59 | Sewanee—University of the South (2) | 1265 |
59 | Lawrence University (2) | 1265 |
59 | Hendrix College | 1265 |
59 | Thomas Aquinas College | 1265 |
63 | Earlham College (2) | 1260 |
64 | Trinity College (CT) | 1245 |
64 | College of Wooster | 1245 |
64 | Kalamazoo College | 1245 |
64 | Illinois Wesleyan University | 1245 |
64 | Transylvania University | 1245 |
69 | Skidmore College | 1240 |
70 | Furman University (2) | 1235 |
70 | Wheaton College (MA) (2) | 1235 |
72 | Soka University of America | 1230 |
72 | Hobart and William Smith Colleges (2) | 1230 |
74 | DePauw University | 1225 |
74 | Beloit College (2) | 1225 |
74 | Muhlenberg College (2) | 1225 |
74 | Gustavus Adolphus College (2) | 1225 |
74 | Wofford College | 1225 |
74 | Marlboro College (2) | 1225 |
80 | University of Puget Sound | 1220 |
80 | College of the Atlantic (2) | 1220 |
82 | Knox College (2) | 1205 |
82 | Cornell College | 1205 |
82 | Berry College | 1205 |
85 | Grove City College | 1202 |
86 | St. Lawrence University (2) | 1200 |
86 | Willamette University | 1200 |
88 | University of North Carolina—Asheville | 1195 |
89 | St. Mary's College of Maryland | 1194 |
90 | College of St. Benedict | 1185 |
90 | Millsaps College | 1185 |
90 | Hope College | 1185 |
90 | Augustana College (2) | 1185 |
90 | Birmingham-Southern College | 1185 |
90 | Calvin College (2) | 1185 |
96 | Westmont College | 1170 |
97 | St. John's University | 1165 |
97 | St. Mary's College | 1165 |
97 | Luther College | 1165 |
97 | Lake Forest College (2) | 1165 |
97 | Concordia College—Moorhead | 1165 |
Note: The above schools are categorized as liberal arts colleges by US News & World Report.
NOW WATCH: These college majors lead to the highest starting salaries
More From Business Insider
