Bowdoin College

Quick Stats

5700 College Station
Brunswick, ME 04011-8448: [map]

Phone: (207) 725-3000

2011-2012 Tuition

$42,816: tuition and fees

Students

1,762: enrolled

49%: male /

51%: female

Admissions

Jan. 1: application deadline

19.7%: accepted

More Information

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U.S. News Rankings

Ranking score and category

U.S. News rank	Category Name
#6	National Liberal Arts Colleges

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Summary

Bowdoin College is a private institution that was founded in 1794. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 1,762, its setting is suburban, and the campus size is 205 acres. It utilizes a semester-based academic calendar. Bowdoin College's ranking in the 2012 edition of Best Colleges is National Liberal Arts Colleges, 6. Its tuition and fees are $42,816 (2011-12).

Bowdoin College is located in the coastal New England town of Brunswick, Maine. The Bowdoin Polar Bears compete in 31 varsity sports in the NCAA Division III New England Small College Athletic Conference. Bowdoin has more than 100 student organizations. One of the largest and most active groups is the Outing Club, which offers 100 excursions each year. Peucinian Society, founded in 1805, is one of the oldest literary and intellectual societies in the country, with alumni including poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Bowdoin abolished fraternities in 1997 and replaced them with a system of college-owned social houses. Freshmen are required to live on campus and are assigned to a college house that provides residential social activities.

Bowdoin was a men’s college until 1971, when the school admitted its first female students. It was also one of the first selective schools to make the SAT and ACT optional on its application in 1969. More than half of Bowdoin students study abroad for a semester through more than 100 affiliated academic programs. Notable alumni include former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Melville Weston Fuller, author Nathaniel Hawthorne, former U.S. President Franklin Pierce, and human sexuality and gender researcher Alfred Kinsey—subject of the 2004 biographical film bearing his surname.

School mission (as provided by the school):

A liberal arts education at Bowdoin is not about being small and safe; it is about having the support to take surprising risks. That means caring more about the questions than giving the right answers, discovering you are good at something you did not think was your strength and making connections where none appear to exist. Bowdoin's curriculum offers a bold blueprint for liberal education designed to inspire students to become world citizens with acute sensitivity to the social and natural world. Its interdisciplinary focus encourages students to make connections among subjects, discover disciplines that excite their imaginations and develop keen skills for addressing the challenges of a changing world. Bowdoin students achieve at the highest levels but also lead balanced lives. Campus visitors frequently comment on how friendly everyone at Bowdoin is to visitors and how happy everyone seems at Bowdoin. This impression is supported by high retention, graduation and alumni giving rates. The connection to place is vitally important to the educational, social, service and recreational opportunities at Bowdoin. Maine is much more than the College's address. A Bowdoin education is best summed up by "The Offer of the College": To be at home in all lands and all ages; To count Nature a familiar acquaintance, And Art an intimate friend; To gain a standard for the appreciation of others' work, And the criticism of your own; To carry the keys of the world's library in your pocket, And feel its resources behind you in whatever task you undertake; To make hosts of friends ... Who are to be leaders in all walks of life; To lose yourself in generous enthusiasms, And cooperate with others for common ends. This is the offer of the college for the best four years of your life. --Adapted from the original "Offer of the College" by William DeWitt Hyde, President of Bowdoin College, 1885-1917.

General Information

School type	private, coed college
Year founded	1794
Religious affiliation	N/A
Academic calendar	semester
Setting	suburban
2010 Endowment	$753,525,000

Applying

When applying to Bowdoin College, it's important to note the application deadline is January 1, and the early decision deadline is November 15. Scores for either the ACT or SAT test are due January 1. The application fee at Bowdoin College is $60. It is most selective, with an acceptance rate of 19.7 percent.

For more information about the tests, essays, interviews, and admissions process, visit the Applying to College knowledge center.

Selectivity	most selective
Fall 2010 acceptance rate	20%
Application deadline	January 1
SAT/ACT scores must be received by	January 1

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Academic Life

The student-faculty ratio at Bowdoin College is 9:1, and the school has 67.8 percent of its classes with fewer than 20 students. The most popular majors at Bowdoin College include: Political Science and Government; Economics; English Language and Literature, General; Biology, General; and History. The average freshman retention rate, an indicator of student satisfaction, is 96.5 percent.

Class sizes

Student-faculty ratio

9:1

4-year graduation rate

90% - High

Five most popular majors for 2010 graduates

Political Science and Government	20%
Economics	14%
English Language and Literature, General	10%
Biology, General	8%
History	8%

More About Academic Life

Student Life

Bowdoin College has a total undergraduate enrollment of 1,762, with a gender distribution of 49.4 percent male students and 50.6 percent female students. 93.0 percent of the students live in college-owned, -operated, or -affiliated housing and 7.0 percent of students live off campus. Bowdoin College is part of the NCAA III athletic conference.

See what students are saying about life at Bowdoin College.

Total enrollment	1,762
Student gender distribution

Undergraduate men who are members of a fraternity	N/A
Undergraduate women who are members of a sorority	N/A
Collegiate athletic association	NCAA III

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Campus Info & Services

Bowdoin College offers a number of student services including nonremedial tutoring, women's center, placement service, day care, health service, and health insurance. Bowdoin College also offers campus safety and security services like 24-hour foot and vehicle patrols, late night transport/escort service, 24-hour emergency telephones, lighted pathways/sidewalks, and controlled dormitory access (key, security card, etc). Of the students at Bowdoin College, 40 percent have cars on campus. Alcohol is permitted for students of legal age at Bowdoin College.

Students who have cars on campus	40% - Low
Health insurance offered	Yes
Students required to own/lease a computer	No

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Paying for School

At Bowdoin College, 45.6 percent of full-time undergraduates receive some kind of need-based financial aid and the average need-based scholarship or grant award is $35,590.

Paying for college doesn't have to be difficult or devastating. Go to the Paying for College knowledge center to get advice on raising cash and reducing costs.

Tuition and fees	$42,816 (2011-12)
Room and board	$11,654 (2011-12) - High
Financial aid statistics

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Student Reviews Ratings data provided by Unigo

Bowdoin, like any school, can be what you make of it. It can seem like a small school dominated by New England prep school kids who like to get drunk, or you can seek out the many people who are not this way. Bowdoin has many material perks - the housing is much better than many comparable schools (especially for freshmen), the food is really great (even for vegetarians like me), and the location gives you both the advantages of cities within reasonable drives as well as being walking distance from cute shops and restaurants of a small town. And yes, the academics, for the most part, are very good, particularly once you get past entry-level classes. I would comment that school spirit and traditions don't seem to be very important here.

Hannah Sophomore

The best thing about Bowdoin--and this is probably more a recommendation to small liberal arts colleges in general--is the access to faculty and the mentoring that happens on campus. This is especially apparent in the sciences, where faculty mentoring can make all the difference. I'm in an intro biology class right now, and not only do both of the professors know my name, one of them has even shared some advice with me during office hours. When I see him in passing around campus, he'll often ask me if I've identified any birds recently (he's an ornithologist) or if I have any questions about ecology in general. These little encounters really make me appreciate the size of Bowdoin and the amount professors invest in their students. At a large university, I don't imagine professors make much time for a freshman biology aspirant. Here, it's unusual for a serious science major to graduate without having spent a significant amount of time working in a professors lab, probably graduating as a published author.

Anonymous Freshman

When I was first looking at colleges my junior and senior year in high school, I was convinced that I wanted a huge student body. Coming from a small private school in Baltimore, I felt that I needed to have that experience. When I started looking into Bowdoin, the class size was the one thing that made me hesitant about applying, despite the fact that I loved everything else about it--the social house system, the balance of athletics and academics, the food (of course), the campus, the location, etc. I decided that regardless of what size school I went to, I would have significantly more classmates than the 75 I had in high school, so either way, I was going to have a plenty of different experiences. When I got here my freshman year, I found that the class size was practically perfect. Enough people to always be meeting new ones and small enough that I didn't feel overwhelmed. One experience that I'll never forget is when the women's Field Hockey team won Bowdoin's first ever National Championship. The entire campus was at the field house at 1 am on Saturday night to greet them. One of the houses off campus threw them a huge party and practically the entire campus was there, supporting the team until 5 o'clock in the morning. Even security guards were there when the team got off the bus, taking pictures and cheering them on with the rest of campus. It really was a huge testament to our incredible school spirit.

Abbie Sophomore

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* Overview details based on 2010 data

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Summary

General Information

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