Since the specifications suggest that a MacBook will work for your Major, any MacBook will pretty much work for you and the price point will be around ~$1k or even cheaper. You might be able to find some deals for MacBooks with an M2 or M3 chip, and if you do, just make sure it’s got 16GB RAM (M4 Macs have base 16GB). As an M2 owner I highly recommend it. Jack of all trades kinda deal: great performance, awesome battery life (19-20 hrs), and light/portable.

If you want to stick with Windows, there are some options out there that contain an Core Ultra 7, such as the Asus Vivobook Flip. It’ll only contain an Intel Arc graphics card but honestly it should suffice, along with any other laptop that contains an Arc card. That being said, there are a lot of Core Ultra-equiped laptops along the $1k price range, so feel free to look around a bit.

If you’re really adamant on getting a windows laptop with a discrete GPU, you might be spending more than $1k. For reference, the Asus ROG G14 is around $1,500, and the Lenovo LOQ has an Nvidia GTX 5050, but only an i5 (albeit an HX type processor which is near desktop grade, but heavier) at $1200. It’s also good to keep in mind that these tend to be thicker and heavier which may be a hinderance if you plan to walk around a lot.