@aubrieallen The Dell you listed is as good as you're going to find for $500, unless you get lucky with a purchase on Ebay. (And that's obviously a risk.) For a little more, you could do a little better, but maybe not enough better to justify the higher price.
I don't know how much of your schoolwork you'll need to keep locally on your hard drive, but if it's a lot (in terms of size), you might want more than 256 GB storage. Still, text-only papers and research should be fine, especially if you're going to keep not using mods or custom content. The Sims 4 program files currently take about 45 GB storage with all packs included, and that probably won't ever hit 60 GB. Saves and library items are much smaller, possibly under 1 GB in total for normal use.
For $550, you could get a somewhat stronger processor with a somewhat stronger integrated graphics chip, plus double the storage. The processor and its graphics chip are just the newer version of what's in the Dell, but there is a noticeable improvement. Given the lower resolution of the monitor (1266x768), this laptop might run the entire game on high settings, but definitely better than the Dell.
https://www.newegg.com/acer-aspire-5-a515-44-r4m5/p/N82E16834316900?Item=N82E16834316900
Another option with similar performance, but a higher-resolution screen, is this Acer. It does only have a 256 GB hard drive though. It's $650, but Acer offers a 10% student discount through Student Beans.
https://store.acer.com/en-us/laptops/spin-3-laptop-sp314-53gn-52gr
https://store.acer.com/en-us/student-discount
True gaming computers are more expensive, and heavier and bulkier, so you might not want one anyway. But in case you're interested, this HP has an open-box option for $577. Its hardware would run all current Sims 4 content on ultra settings, although only barely. Still, it's in a much higher class of performance—the graphics card is more than twice as fast in gaming than the others.
https://www.bestbuy.com/site/hp-15-6-gaming-laptop-amd-ryzen-5-8gb-memory-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1050-256gb-solid-state-drive-shadow-black/6364574.p?skuId=6364574
If you have more questions, please feel free to ask.