Bard College

Bard College is a small liberal arts school scenically located in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, on a sprawling be-mansioned 600-acre campus overlooking the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains.

Professors include such luminaries as Joan Retalleack, John Ashbery, Chinua Achebe, Joan Tower, Luc Sante, Robert Kelley, Andre Aciman, Thurmond Barker, and others. A new performing arts center by designed by acclaimed architect Frank Gehry was recently completed. The college is presided over by bow-tied Leon Botstein, amateur conductor and alternative education advocate who, when he arrived at Bard almost three decades ago, was the youngest college president ever. Many of Bard's hipster graduates relocate downstream in Williamsburg, a neighborhood in northern Brooklyn.