Speaking of College Admissions….

I was asked for advice by parents seeking a college for their daughter. I thought I’d crowd-source it. The girl has some unique needs: she is Jewish and she (a) keeps kosher, so she needs the availability of kosher food, but she is not Orthodox and Stern College would not be a good environment for her; (b) is not very political, but is turned off by left-wing activism (her parents are quite conservative politically); (c) is personally rather conservative, a “traditional values” type, if you will; and (d) is somewhat shy and would likely thrive at a smaller college rather than at a huge university.

Given what I know of her, I would think that if she were Christian, a small Catholic or Christian liberal arts college would be a good match. If there are any such schools that have significant Jewish populations and kosher food that could very well work, but I can’t think of any. Even Notre Dame, somewhat to my surprise, apparently has vanishingly few Jewish students. Hillsdale, to take an officially secular example, is in the same boat. I thought of McGill as an option, if only because the non-Orthodox Jewish community in Canada tends to be more traditional than in the U.S. Other ideas?

UPDATE: To clarify, she and her parents aren’t insisting that all of these conditions be met, and are mulling some of the obvious choices, like Brandeis and Muhlenberg. But there is a universe of possibilities beyond the obvious ones (and she may not get into some of the obvious ones), and there tends to be a path dependency in these things where kids apply to the schools that everyone in their circle is already familiar with. I’m trying to look beyond the obvious possibilities to see if there are some schools that are a potentially good fit that aren’t so obvious, and I’ve already received a bunch of good suggestions in the comments (e.g., U. Chicago, Mount Holyoke, Miami, CUNY honors program, Smith).

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