Barnard College is literally across the street from Columbia University. A small women’s liberal arts college, Barnard is highly selective (combined SAT 2050/2400 and GPA 3.84). The admissions office was incredibly approachable and I immediately received an email reply and had a meeting set up with Jessica Lee (MA region) and Chloe Woodward-Magrane for the day of my visit. Ms. Lee took nearly 30 minutes to sit with me, talk about Barnard and the admissions process and learn about students at The Springfield Renaissance School. She’s is excited to get to know our students! Addition Chloe spent 30 minutes taking about Barnard Opportunity Program (see below) after the tour. What an amiable and helpful bunch! They are following the Renaissance College Road Trip on Twitter!!! Wow.
I went on a tour with a sophomore who is a native New Yorker who chose to stay in the City for college. Barnard has general education requirements which must be satisfied in 9 areas and four semesters of a language – students take two first year foundation courses (First Year Seminar and First Year English) which are intended to provide students with critical thinking and analysis skills – something Barnard describes as “ways of knowing”. Students also have to take two years of P.E. Women at Barnard enjoy small classes and many are seminar style with 12 or so students and professor. No hiding there! One notable strength is the internship agreements that the school has in fashion, on Broadway, and the United Nations among others. The tour was a little hard because major construction is going on to build a student activity center. We were able to move around through tunnels that are throughout the campus. Housing is both on the campus and in typical New York City apartment buildings and over 90% of students live on campus.
Barnard accepts the Common Application with a supplement portion (four questions). Chloe Woodward-Magrane described the process as being “wholistic”, meaning getting to know the student versus being simply numbers driven (“not really huge on SATs”) – taking the SAT in December is too late. Even so, the expectation is that students will take the SAT and two SAT II or the ACT with the writing portion. Ms. Woodward-Magrane said they want to know who you are as a student and a person. Recommendations should be teachers from your junior or senior year – school counselor and two academic teachers. The essay needs to be a topic that explains, “What gets you out of bed in the morning?” She emphasized that proof reading and checking for grammar mistakes are a must before you send. Interviews are available for rising seniors on or off campus, but are not required.
Tuition at Barnard is $50,000. Financial Aid is Need Blind. Barnard wants to know what families can afford and this is based on the FAFSA and the CSS Profile. The school meets 100% of a family’s demonstrated need and is a combination of loans, grants and work study. Barnard has a program called BOP (Barnard Opportunity Program which provides low-income students of promise with 5 years of financial, academic support and an opportunity to start in the summer in order to get acclimated to college life, NYC and the rigors of Barnard academics. Seems like a nice opportunity for the right student.
The College Road Trip Never Ends