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School data & stats
Outcomes
Cost
Community
Overview
Dartmouth is the smallest Ivy League institution, set in the small town of Hanover, New Hampshire, along the Connecticut River near the Vermont border and the Appalachian Trail. Its undergraduate-first culture, remote setting, and outdoorsy identity give it a distinctly different feel from its more urban Ivy peers, closer to a classic New England liberal arts college with research-university resources, including its own graduate schools of business (Tuck), medicine (Geisel), and engineering (Thayer) that undergraduates can connect into.
Academics
The flexible, quarter-based D-Plan calendar lets students arrange their terms non-traditionally, including off-campus terms for research, internships, or study abroad, and a shared sophomore summer on campus that has become a distinctive Dartmouth tradition in its own right. Strengths run through economics, government, engineering — Thayer's combined bachelor's program is a well-regarded path into the field — and the broader liberal arts, with close faculty access typical of the school's small size. Undergraduates can also take courses connected to Tuck and Geisel, giving early, informal exposure to business and medicine beyond a typical undergraduate program.
Campus & student life
Hanover's remote, small-town setting fosters a tight campus community and a famously outdoorsy student life anchored by the Dartmouth Outing Club, founded in 1909 and among the oldest and most active collegiate outdoors organizations in the country, which runs pre-orientation First-Year Trips into the surrounding mountains for incoming students. Greek life is unusually prominent for an Ivy, houses a large share of upperclassmen socially, and shapes campus life more visibly than at most peer schools. Traditions like Winter Carnival and the Homecoming bonfire on the Green, where first-years run a lap for each class year, mark the calendar alongside a strong tradition of school spirit and alumni loyalty.
Getting in
Dartmouth's process is holistic and highly selective, and given the small-town, undergraduate-focused setting, admissions tends to look for students who will genuinely embrace a close-knit, less urban, outdoors-oriented campus community rather than merely tolerate it. Essays and recommendations are weighed for genuine fit with that specific culture as much as for raw academic strength.
After graduation
Graduates go heavily into finance, consulting, and medicine, aided by an unusually loyal and tightly networked alumni base that stays actively engaged with the college well after graduation. Proximity to Tuck and Geisel also feeds real pipelines into business and medical careers for undergraduates who build those connections early.
Worth knowing
The D-Plan's flexible, non-traditional term scheduling is a real structural feature that affects when students are on campus with their friends and when they're not — worth understanding since it can scatter a given class's on-campus terms, aside from the shared sophomore summer nearly everyone attends together. Greek life's prominence means students who want to opt out entirely should know that going in, though plenty do and find other communities.
Admissions
Deadlines (2026–27 cycle)
Applying (2026-27 cycle)
Apply through Common App or QuestBridge.
Dartmouth's Early Decision is binding, so an admitted student withdraws every other application and enrolls at Dartmouth.
Interviews: Interviews aren't required for any first-year applicant; you may be invited to meet with an alumni interviewer during the review period.
Supplemental essays (9)
Why Dartmouth
As you seek admission to Dartmouth's Class of 2031, what aspects of the college's academic program, community, and/or campus environment attract your interest? How is Dartmouth a good fit for you?
Prompt 2, Option A
There is a Quaker saying: Let your life speak. Describe the environment in which you were raised and the impact it has had on the person you are today.
Prompt 2, Option B
"Be yourself," Oscar Wilde advised. "Everyone else is taken." Introduce yourself.
Prompt 3, Option A
What excites you?
Prompt 3, Option B
Dolores Huerta stated: "We must use our lives to make the world a better place to live, not just to acquire things. That is what we are put on the earth for." Describe how you aim to create positive change.
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