<p>I was admitted to Amherst and went to the overnight sleepover for admitted students. One turn off for me was that everyone was carrying around athletic equipment bags, and Amherst seemed really into two things, its sports and a capella. Don’t get me wrong, I love sports, but I was overwhelmed with the jock culture.</p>
<p>However, Bowdoin will be cold as **** a large part of the year. I personally wouldn’t go through that. Amherst will still be cold, but not as hellish.</p>
<p>I have Oberlin, Carleton, Grinnell, and Macalester already on my list. However, I’d like to add another NO LOANS school as a financial lottery ticket, so to speak. (“Another” because I already have Swarthmore and Pomona, plus Yale for the super-lottery.)</p>
<p>Bowdoin is coastal and has real seafood! I grew up in Newfoundland, Canada, so trading off cold for fresh seafood is worth it to me.</p>
<p>I think you’ll find that at Carleton students are quite big on intramural sports.</p>
<p>What about Skidmore? Very generous with merit money to one of my son’s friends.</p>
<p>“At small LACs like Amherst or Bowdoin, the football team alone (roster ~ 70 guys) is nearly 10% of the total male student enrollment.”</p>
<p>I think it’s worth mentioning that Bowdoin’s football team is awful…</p>
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<p>It’s interesting that the key difference between Swarthmore and Bowdoin is that Bowdoin has a football program. So, basically 50 percent of the sport budget goes to present a mediocre football team (Trinity has kicked them bad, at least in recent memory including a 40-16 stomping at Bowdoin last year (a 54-13 loss the year before). </p>
<p>I guess as long as they get to beat up on poor old Bates the Alums are happy. I heard that at last year’s blowout win against Bates the Bowdoin kids were chanting ‘let the lesbians play’ across the field. That’s harsh. :)</p>
<p>"I heard that at last year’s blowout win against Bates the Bowdoin kids were chanting ‘let the lesbians play’ across the field. "</p>
<p>'nough said.</p>
<p>“I heard that at last year’s blowout win against Bates the Bowdoin kids were chanting…” </p>
<p>hearsay. </p>
<p>there’s no way that that was said. no way. the big chant at Bowdoin vs Bates is “Mules are sterile” (referring to the Bates mascot) and the WORST that gets said is sometimes Bowdoin kids chant “safety school”</p>
<p>Bowdoin has a good record on LGBT issues…it just wouldn’t make sense if people were chanting that</p>
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Part of the difference is certainly football, but schools like Bowdoin or Amherst also support other sports that are not offered at schools like Haverford or Swarthmore. </p>
<p>For example, Haverford not only lacks football, but also men’s and women’s ice hockey, men’s and women’s golf, men’s and women’s swim/dive, and skiing, all of which are varsity sports at Bowdoin. </p>
<p>Swarthmore lacks football, men’s and women’s ice hockey, men’s and women’s squash, and skiing. There is only one coed golf team.</p>
<p>In fairness, Haverford has fencing teams and a cricket team. Swat has a badminton team.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure Swarthmore does not have men’s or women’s wrestling either: [Swarthmore</a> College Wrestling Homepage](<a href=“http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/Athletics/Wrestling/index.html]Swarthmore”>http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/Athletics/Wrestling/index.html)</p>
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The Bates mascot is the bobcat. Colby is the white mule.</p>
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They don’t, but I didn’t use that as an example because most New England LACs – including Bowdoin and Amherst – don’t have wrestling either. </p>
<p>The only NESCAC schools to sponsor NCAA wrestling teams are Trinity, Wesleyan, and Wiliams. There is no NESCAC wrestling championship.</p>
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True, but Bowdoin is not exactly unique in this regard. Over the past 7 seasons, Trinity football has accumulated a record of 52-4. It’s news when anyone beats them.</p>
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<p>Tzar09,</p>
<p>Perhaps you were too wasted at the Bowdoin football games to know what teams you were playing.</p>
<p>haha- here goes my credibility, but i’ll be a frosh next year so i’ve never actually been to a football game there</p>
<p>that being said i was having a conversation with a current student about chants and what not and he was telling me what people say at games. “let the lesbians play” did not come up. also, i wasn’t kidding. Bowdoin does have a good record on LGBT issues. Bowdoin isn’t vasser/wesleyan but its not the ‘good’ol boy’ bit either. it just doesnt make sense that people would say that.</p>
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<p>How would the Haverford Honor Code stifle political dissent?</p>
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<p>Did Colby’s chant of “Ugly Chicks” addressed to Bowdoin’s student body come up? Point being that after a few drinks, political correctness can often be shown the door. However, I would hope that a chant of ‘let the lesbians play’ at a football game would make a lesbian Bates student smile a bit. Sort of like the woman in Providencetown MA. wearing a t-shirt that said P-Town, where the woman are strong and the men are pretty.</p>
<p>^^ Due to the strictness of the social honor code, unwelcome opinions could easily be taken as disrespectful, particularly in the heat of passion. I happen to likely agree with most of Haverford’s students, but that isn’t the point.</p>
<p>I would like to point out that Bowdoin is in Maine but is near the ocean so that keeps the climate more mild than many people think. The ocean keeps the temperature warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer than somewhere that is land locked. So I would say that winters deep in the heart of the Mass. mountains can be just as harsh. And yes I have been both places in the winter time.</p>