Undergraduate Enrollment: 1,300
Female Student Body: 55%
Tuition: $32,360
Craft Club: Stitch-N-B*tch
Popular majors: Anthropology, English, biology

Sources: Reed College, princetonreview.com

Reed College’s lush green campus sits just outside downtown Portland, Oregon. A quarter of its 100-acre campus is a wildlife preserve; complete with a creek, canyon and lake. The gothic architecture of the buildings and the quiet trees turn the campus into a sanctuary where students can focus on their studies. Built in 1908 as an institution focused on intellect, the reputation continues. Juniors must pass a qualifying exam to get into their senior year, and all students must write a senior thesis in order to graduate. Savvy Miss spoke with junior anthropology major Emily about what life at the tightly-knit college is like.

SM: Why did you come from all the way from Pittsburgh to attend Reed?
Emily: I knew I wanted a small liberal arts college that was academically rigorous, and my first concern was that it had a good anthropology department. I went through ‘ye old list of colleges’ on the East Coast and nothing fit. [So,] I ended up doing something I would never recommend, actually, I showed up to freshman year orientation at Reed without ever having seen the campus.

SM: Did you find any surprises once you got there?
Emily: Yes. There are some very unusual things about the school…we’re basically a bunch of geeks. There is the Doyle Owl, which is a 3-foot tall cement statue of an owl. It used to live on top of the Doyle dorm block, and legend goes that a student decided to hide it. Now it’s become a tradition with other students. It’s been stolen, dropped off a bridge, traveled to other countries. Most people think there is more than one owl posing as the Doyle Owl. Every now and then it will show up on campus. The goal is to capture it, keep it for as long as possible while making sure other people know you have it. Every time it comes out at a social event people crowd around it and come out acting like they have seen God!