Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME, with a leafy 205 acre campus is known for its fine faculty, emphasis on the outdoors, and for being one of the first most competitive colleges to offer “SAT optional” admissions.
Regardless of whether a student submits SATs or not, the admissions process is a rigorous one. Only 14.8% of applicants were admitted, with a notable 50.5% yield— the college’s highest ever. The freshman class is only 500 students (from 41 states, plus District of Columbia and Puerto Rico and 37 international students from 13 countries) of an overall enrollment of 1831 undergraduates.
Students interested in the out of doors will be comfortable with the culture at Bowdoin. The strongest departments include the sciences, art history, English, government, and economics. The College has a new robotics lab. At Bowdoin, students are taught by their professors, not by teaching assistants.