<p>i will be visiting the claremont colleges area, and have to choose to do a tour of either pomona, pitzer, claremont mckenna, or harvey mudd. how do i decide? any recommendations for which one to visit?</p>
<p>thanks! all help is greatly appreciated</p>
<p>what are you into? majors? hobbies? personalities? they all have a bit of a different feel and specialty</p>
<p>First, as the post above asks, what are your particular interests?</p>
<p>Without that info I'd note the following:
the schools are immediately next to each other so you can certainly tour all of 'em on your own.</p>
<p>As far as campus feel/look/aesthetics I'd have to say Pomona is far and away the "winner" (except maybe for Scripps, but that's rather small and women only).</p>
<p>Pomona has the very "classic" college look/feel. It was designed by the same architect who designed Stanford and Occidental. Mudd pretty much looks like a giant brown lego set, pretty non-descript. Claremont, IMO, is a fairly hideous hodge podge of architecture and Pitzer is undergoing a major remodel/building phase. The original campus buildings look very much like a very bad 1960's apartment complex.</p>
<p>While each school is classified as a liberal arts college, they differ quite a bit in their "focus". </p>
<p>Dorms are all pretty nice but different from school to school. </p>
<p>so I guess going back full circle, your interests would make a difference in what "official" tour might be best for you.</p>
<p>CMC is so ugly...I threw up in my mouth a little when I looked at the pictures.</p>
<p>It's probably best to at least walk around each campus and talk to people to get a feel of where you would best fit in. In general, Harvey Mudd is the place to go if you're interested in math, science, or engineering, CMC is really strong for politics, economics, international relations, and business, and Pomona, as a general liberal arts college, is probably good for just about anything else. </p>
<p>Also, I really don't think that CMC's campus is that hideous. There are a few ugly buildings, but most of the architecture is pretty inoffensive. The actual facilities, on the other hand are very nice. The founder of Life Fitness is a CMC alum so he donates top of the line equipment for the gym, the classrooms are all comfortable and fully equipped, the dining hall is nicely designed with very good food (true of all the claremont colleges) and the dorms are pretty luxurious. Also they spend a good deal of money just on landscaping alone.</p>
<p>I think that going to a well-equipped school can be important. You don't want to be somewhere where the classrooms are in disrepair and the campus is dirty. But in the long run, I'm just not sure how important it is to be at a school with pretty architecture. Sure it's nice, and it might help school spirit, but I wouldn't make a decision on where to go based on looking at a couple of buildings.</p>
<p>Depending on the amount of time you have, you could tour 3-4 of the schools. D visited Pitzer and CMC the first day and then Pomona the second. We had scheduled some appointments at Pomona in the afternoon b/c she wasn't interested in Harvey Mudd or Scripps.</p>
<p>Good luck, and do shop around for the best fit! That counts more than "awesomeness."</p>
<p>
[quote]
CMC is so ugly...I threw up in my mouth a little when I looked at the pictures.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>CMC is actually quite pretty.</p>
<p>I did a summer program at CMC/Pitzer, and I live in the area (plus, my twin goes to Pomona/ I was accepted to one of the schools), so I do know the area. I have to defend CMC. They have really cool dorms, with what look like these sort of patios on some of them and the ability to sit outside.</p>
<p>don't discount the joys of sunbathing year round, guys.</p>
<p>Scripts is a gorgeous campus,there is a sense of serenity with fountains and greenery and Pomona is also beautiful architecture. CMC has nice dorms and has more of a modern Californian feel . In fact as the first campus we visited we liked it a lot. It just paled in comparison after visiting the Scripts and Pomona. Pitzer was run down and my D withdrew her application leaving the tour early . Academically they are all great schools.</p>
<p>Ditto arizonamom's comments.</p>
<p>Hmm...I will admit that I haven't been to CMC so I dunno from personal observation, but pictures like these:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/pitzer.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/pitzer.asp</a>
<a href="http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/mckenna.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/mckenna.asp</a>
<a href="http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/heggblade.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/about/tour/heggblade.asp</a></p>
<p>made CMC seem like the ugliest college I have considered.</p>
<p>Odd...I don't think those pictures are ugly at all. You must be considering a very beautiful set of colleges.</p>
<p>Re: "...Pitzer was run down..." The school is currently undergoing a major building program. In the fall of 2007 all of the incoming freshman are supposed to be housed in a new dorm complex. The dorms will be certified as completely "green," in line the the college's basic philosophy. If you are curious, you can check out the construction project by clicking on the construction webcam, at <a href="http://134.173.115.201:8040/%5B/url%5D">http://134.173.115.201:8040/</a> This live feed shows 3 separate camera angles; so, when you visit the webcam, wait for the camera to move to see the entire project. What they are building now is phase I. They have more phases planned for the future.</p>
<p>Can you only do 1 tour because you're looking at another L.A. college? We had 1 day to tour and we were able to do a full look at 2 Claremont colleges.</p>
<p>As for ugly - the campus looks very California to me. We looked at many eastern gothic style colleges, but found the Claremonts to be lovely in a west coast way.</p>
<p>It's no aesthetic showstopper, but definitely not "throw up in your mouth" ugly. It is, among other things, home to my very favorite fountain of the 5Cs! Worry not (or at least not until you visit) ;-)</p>
<hr>
<p>To the OP: </p>
<p>I'm assuming from the 4 choices you list that you're male and can thus rule out Scripps. If you're female and only ruling it out b/c it's a women's college, then my #1 piece of advice is to reconsider that choice.</p>
<p>So now...do some of your own research into the schools you're choosing between. A few things will become clear very quickly, as the four schools are all pretty different. The wonderful thing about Claremont is that the place you want to go to school and the place you want to live don't always have to be peeeerfectly aligned. "Well, I really just love the vibe of Pitzer, but I want to be a theatre major and only Pomona offers it" is totally acceptable, but that option will never make sense unless you spend some time on your own researching the consortium: <a href="http://www.claremont.edu%5B/url%5D">http://www.claremont.edu</a></p>
<p>Are you basically positive that you want to major in something that Mudd offers, or if not, then are you absolutely positive that you won't mind going through frosh chem, soph physics, the Mudd math sequence, etc. <em>anyway</em> (and at the very least minoring in something that Mudd offers)? If not, I'd say that your time would be better spent looking at another of the schools. That's the most obvious point that I see. And if you ARE positive that you want to major in math/science/engineering, do you want to put up with taking econ, civics, philosophy, etc. at CMC? You by no means have to be a politics-buff to attend CMC, but you should definitely have some level of related interest/tolerance, because you'll be surrounded by a very particular atmosphere. A little bit of research will illuminate that kind of stuff.</p>
<p>The four schools you list have wildly different admission standards. Are you looking for a safety/match or for a reach? Another point to consider.</p>
<p>Even if you can't do tours of all the schools when you go down, they're adjacent to one another, so you should be able to do walk-throughs (you can round the entire consortium in under a half hour, going fairly leisurely and getting a feel for general atmospheres). I'd really recommend this, if not multiple tours.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>I can't put it better than Student615 already has. I do, however, want to point out one thing to remember: not all of the Claremont Colleges allow their students to complete their major (or even a second major) at another one of the consortium schools. I know for a fact that Pomona students cannot do their major through another school, even if the major is not offered at Pomona. However, I understand that a few of the other colleges permit off-campus majors. Be sure to check on this carefully during your research if you plan on doing a lot of cross-enrollment and possibly an off-campus major.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Somebody mentioned Pomona having a theatre major. Not strictly true. The Seaver theatre is on the Pomona campus, but the theatre program is not a Pomona program, it is a Claremont colleges program. That is, it is a shared program among all five Claremont colleges. If you look at the course catalogs for Pomona, Scripps, or Pitzer, you will find the same theatre program and courses listed. </p>
<p>This shared program concept is true for a number of other subject areas. Some programs are shared by all five colleges, while others are shared by only certain colleges. </p>
<p>E.g.,</p>
<p>Pomona and Pitzer jointly field the Pomona-Pitzer Division 3 teams. Likewise, CMC, Mudd, and Scripps field joint teams. </p>
<p>Pitzer, Scripps, and CMC share the same science programs.</p>
<p>So, when you look at the 5 colleges you have to look carefully at what you want to do, and whether it is available in the college you plan to attend.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.theatre.pomona.edu/%5B/url%5D">http://www.theatre.pomona.edu/</a> -- "The theater program provides an academic concentration for students of the five Claremont Colleges..."</p>
<p>Claremont has cooperative departments, joint departments, intercollegiate departments, and then lots of departments that are just on one or two campuses and are not exceptionally cooperative. As far as I'm aware, theatre is a Pomona-only department and theatre majors from every other school are off-campus majors through Pomona (though their degrees will be from their own schools). The other schools do not have theatre departments. They DO have lots of related extracurricular offerings and events. Also, students from any school are welcome to take Pomona's classes, participate in shows, etc. When you look at the course catalogs for each school, you see the same classes because all of the schools use the exact same catalog. I wouldn't bet my life on this, but I think it's correct. In fairness, the distinction may sound minimal to people who aren't totally familiar with the consortium, but is actually fairly significant. Claremont's strange like that!</p>
<p>That said, I originally made the point in an effort to speak against froshwanabe's claim that "when you look at the 5 colleges you have to look carefully at what you want to do, and whether it is available in the college you plan to attend." To a degree, this is certainly a valid point. For a random example, and I'm not actually positive about this, I don't think that engineering can be studied as an off-campus major through Mudd unless part of a 3/2 program. If you for some reason have your heart set on playing CMS basketball, then I suppose you can't go to Pitzer. But by and large, my point was that you have to look beyond what's available at the college you plan to attend, because odds are very, very good that if it's available in Claremont, it's available to you, regardless of where you are or where it comes from, so in this instance, the importance of "fit" might be greater than the importance of things like "availability of major," "quality of faculty," etc. on your chosen campus. Again, froshwanabe certainly raises a fair point, but I don't think it tells the whole story.</p>
<p>ETA: Chopsticks, I actually didn't know that about Pomona...that's very odd. I know that Scripps can freely major off-campus and I'm fairly certain the same goes for CMC and Pitzer. I believe that Mudd can major off-campus as long as they also have a degree (can be a minor) from Mudd. Off the top of my head, I can't think of a department that Pomona doesn't have (though it seems like there must be some! I know they do engineering as 3/2). Not all of their departments are equally large or strong, so I definitely know people who take classes off-campus, but I wonder if the non-availability of off-campus degrees actually limits them at all? Huh. Thanks for raising this point.</p>
<p>I think these posts demonstrate what a great choice the claremont schools are for many students. Several great schools on their own merit, cross registration and the enviorment of about 7,000 students while going to a much smaller school. Not to mention the beautiful small town and SC weather!</p>
<p>Just a picky comment on my part: note that when I say "a department that Pomona doesn't have," I meant "have or have direct access to." Some majors don't really have departments in the normal sense, and some departments don't actually have a home-campus (various "...studies" come to mind). These wouldn't count as off-campus majors, even though they're not actually based on Pomona. Similarly, any shared or joint department. </p>
<p>There also seem to be a few Pomona degrees that require "Special Majors," which may or may not be the same idea as an off-campus major (see, for example, Asian American Studies). Obviously, there's much less (if any) need to major off-campus, and I can't imagine Pomona having a policy (especially one that seems so counter-Claremont) if it put its students at any kind of a disadvantage at all. </p>
<p>Anyway...mostly irrelevant. Chopsticks just raised a point that piqued my interest. Darn the 20 minute edit rule!</p>
