<p>what are the students exactly like at bowdoin. when i tell people i am applying to bowdoin they seem somewhat surprised… i guess i would say i’m a preppy girl who likes a lot of school spirit and likes to play tennis and other sports. my other top choices are dartmouth, duke, williams, colgate, uva, and georgetown. would i fit in at bowdoin? oh and i am a democrat but not very politically active.</p>
<p>I applied to Bowdoin ED I and was deferred. I have researched the school pretty extensively and Bowdoin students are known to be very friendly, relaxed, and hard working. The workload is supposed to be quite hard, but manageable. There is also definitely a preppry contingent, in the girls as well. Every person on my tour looked quite preppy. The school is pretty community oriented and the teachers are very passionate. I like Brunswick, but if you are into big cities Bowdoin probably isn't for you. The school is incredible, but try not to set all of your hopes in one basket. I kind of did, and am now pretty hurt seeing as that I didn't get in. This school is extremely selective, alomst as selective as Williams and many ivies. I feel like Georgetown and Colgate take more people and they are both incredible schools. It seems like you have to be especially qualified and have something truly special about you to get into Bowdoin. I don't know what your statistics and activities are but if you like the school- definitely apply. All I know, is that many highly qualified people seem to get rejected even if you demonstrate a great amount of interest. I was a very strong student, did several intersting extracurriculars, had essays which related unique metaphors, had good recs, but didn't sumbit SATs. I think this hurt me. If you have high grades, SATs, and everything else you probably have a very good shot at admittance. I do, however, think that this incredible school is a crapshoot even for highly qualified students.</p>
<p>I think you'd fit in here. There are preppy people, we definitely go out for the sports games, and most people are athletic to at least a 'go to the gym' degree. </p>
<p>I think about 80% of the campus identifies as 'democrats' and only a small portion are actually politically active. If you've got questions about that, or want to get involved with that, private message me if you'd like. I'm pretty involved in the college democrats scene.</p>
<p>I would say that the students here are both pretty preppy and athletic. Sure, there are also some outdoorsy, hippie types, but you would definitely not be in the minority. I know some girls that play field hockey and squash (sorry, I'm not sure about tennis) and a lot of them are preppy and athletic. Not sure if that helps you any, (haha) but I think that being preppy and athletic is pretty much the norm. And I think that most students here have a lot of school spirit--lots of kids go out to the big games against Colby and just in general, the people that go here are proud to go here. And yes, Bowdoin tends to be liberal but there are certainly a lot of people who aren't very politically active. But, the college democrats do organize a bunch of things and try to get people involved, so you could become more involved if you wanted to.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone! I just started getting the vibe that Bowdoin was more like Vassar or Wesleyan when I always thought it was more like Colgate except with a little more diversity which is nice. I have been talking with the tennis coach and he seems interested so I hope that will help me. However I am definitely not going to apply ED2 because I applied to Williams ED and got cold feet about 2 weeks before the letters came(thankfully I was deferred). I am just not ready to make my decision within the next 2 weeks. Do you think this will hurt my chances of the tennis coach helping me? or if he truly does have an interest in me will he pull for me despite the fact that i'm applying RD?</p>
<p>I believe that Bowdoin is pretty similar to Wesleyan. They are both known as "little ivies" and both have depressing acceptance rates. They are both pretty liberal but Wesleyan is ultra liberal. I think the tennis coach can help you. These schools are all so competitive and that could give you an extra edge.</p>
<p>To the person who asked about getting the help of the tennis coach, it's much easier for the coach to help you during the early decision phase (either ED I or II) of the admissions process. This is due to the fact that there are various regulations on the number of applicants who can get a slight bump through the admissions process based on their atheltic accomplishments. Because of these numerical limits, the coaches prefer to focus their support on athletes who are absolutely certain of choosing Bowdoin. And the coach's ability to help you will rise in direct relationship to the quality of your athletic achievements and the likelihood of your contributing to one of the Bowdoin teams.</p>
<p>Actually, a good friend of mine at school was choosing between Wesleyan and Bowdoin, and I would disagree that they are very similar. I think Wesleyan is much more liberal and much more politically active. I would also say that Wesleyan has a reputation for being fairly counter-cultural that Bowdoin really doesn't. My friend ultimately decided on Bowdoin because she thought Wesleyan would be a little too intensely liberal whereas Bowdoin would be a bit more traditional and more of what she wanted. The fact that Bowdoin's food was better also didn't hurt (just kidding. kind of). But yeah, you could really compare Bowdoin to virtually ANY other highly selective liberal arts college and come up with at least some similarities, but from the experiences of myself and my friends who all chose Bowdoin, I would say that Colby and Colgate and possibly Midd (minus the language emphasis) are the most similar schools to Bowdoin in terms of student body, community, athletics, campus feel, and academics.</p>
<p>And about the sports thing-- a lot of the athletes I know applied ED because they said that they didn't think that they'd be able to get in otherwise. I don't really know much more about it, but I imagine that applying ED does give you a pretty big advantage</p>
<p>Applying ED gives you very little advantage. In fact at many other selective schools and ivies the percent of ED vs. RD is considerably higher than Bowdoin. Bowdoin accepts 30 percent early, just 6 percent more. Wesleyan by the way accepts 44 percent. I do not know so much about Wesleyan so thanks for clearing that up Geniurski. But I always thought that Wesleyan and Bowdoin do have some similarities- they are both excellent "little ivies" and are both liberal. I do, understand though, that Wesleyan is incredibly liberal, noticeably more so than Bowdoin.</p>
<p>What does Bowdoin do these days to orient and welcome incoming frosh?</p>
<p>Go U Bears! (Can't wait for the hockey games!!)</p>
<p>2010!!</p>
<p>Wesleyan has been setting the standard for liberal, progressive small colleges for over half a century: </p>
<p>I would say that most, if not all, of its peer colleges in the New England area have made advances in Wesleyan's direction, particularly in the last twenty years or so. In Bowdoin's case, as in Wesleyan's, it has not been without a certain amount of dissent:</p>
<p>John- do you go to Wesleyan, somewhere else, or where are you applying to schools. I loved Wesleyan but decided not to apply because I didn't think I could get in. If you do go to Wesleyan, please tell me more about your experience.</p>
<p>Actually, right now it might be arguable that Wesleyan doesn't set the standard anymore :-p</p>
<p>US News and Report Top Liberal Arts Colleges 2006:</p>
<p>1.) Williams
2.) Amherst
3.) Swarthmore
4.) Wellesly
5.) Carleton
Tie for 6.) Bowdoin and Pomona</p>
<p>12.) Wesleyan</p>
<p>:-p</p>
<p>Yes. And as we all know, USNews is SO fair and balanced:</p>
<p>Well, I for one, do not believe in statistics. I only use them to convince my father...</p>
<p>I do, however, use princeton review to get a sence of each colleges charicteristics...ie. Bowdoin's Dorms, food, teachers. I also used Fiske, and "CollegeProwlr". If there is a system I use, it is the WSJ feeder score, it helps me get a ...vague... sence of what the graduate schools think of the colleges. Never, ever, trust the claimed accuracy of each school. They fail to recognize that each student is different, and performs differently at different colleges.</p>
<p>I'd say we're pretty similar to the "preppy college norm" of Middlebury, Williams, etc. but with a more outdoorsy twist.</p>
<p>I got to visit Bowdoin, through thier invitational, and enviroment is truly something else. Firstly, everyone there is really nice, well comming from Jersey, it would seem everyone in the world is nice, but thats beside the point. I found it awesome when cars actually stop for you and the students are really friendly. From sittin in on classes the proffesors are real cool. Yeah its a little preppy, but not that much. There is a fair amount of diversity there, while I was there I got to see a hip hop show, and learned to dance the salsa. </p>
<p>Its different enviroment and not for everyone. The campus is real small, you can walk from one end to another in like ten minutes, but is real beautiful. Despite the weather, from everyone I talked to, I can gather that all all like it up there. </p>
<p>All in all, you can read as much as you want to about the college, but until you visit it, you really can't grasp a feel of the college.</p>
<p>Membrane, I still cannot get over the cars stopping thing. It just blew my mind when I first came here. Like I was out running on Maine Street one morning and a lady rolled down her window and started apologizing profusely because her car covered half of the crosswalk. Its like pedestrains have priority, instead of cars. People here are just so unbelievably nice, and they don't find it strange at all. Definitely a world apart from Jersey.</p>