This week is NACAC week (that’s the National Association for College Admission Counseling), and this year’s conference is being held in Los Angeles, CA!
Today, I got the chance to visit all five of The Claremont Colleges in nearby Claremont, CA. Read on for my thoughts about these unique campus communities.
Olivia visits The Claremont Colleges
The mountain view from the 4th floor of the Kravis Center at Claremont McKenna College.
What sets The Claremont Colleges apart from other campus communities is the strength of the 5-College Consortium.
All 5 campuses (collectively known as the 5Cs) house their own unique communities with their own academics, extracurriculars, and admission processes—but together they also offer a larger, more vibrant environment of over 6,000 undergraduates in which to live and study. The Consortium allows students from any campus to take courses on any of the others (including entire majors!), attend social events and activities together, and develop lasting connections with a diverse array of people.
Based on my whirlwind tour (which has the caveat that we didn’t get to enter very many buildings on any of the campuses), I’d say each campus excels at the following quick hitters:
Best food: Harvey Mudd
Best dorms: Pitzer
Best community spaces: Scripps
Best social life: Claremont McKenna
Best artistic/athletic facilities: Pomona
Read on for more details about each of the five campuses, including their student communities, academic strengths, and admissions tips!
Murals and student artwork are common across Pitzer’s campus.
What makes Each SCHOOL AWESOME?
CMC: Its pre-professional focus. Students here are generally very career-driven and the college provides ample opportunities to pursue fully funded internships, research, and networking tracks in industry hubs like San Francisco and New York City.
Pomona: Its long-standing history and traditions. Pomona truly takes the classic New England liberal arts college environment and transplants it into beautiful, sunny Southern California—what’s not to love?
Scripps: Its empowering and nurturing environment for women and nonbinary students. As a women’s college with very close ties to all its coed Consortium partners, it truly provides the best of both worlds: a small, feminist, women-driven space plus ample opportunity to socialize with all genders.
Harvey Mudd: Its quirkiness. Mudders have a particular way of life that sets them apart from their 5C partner campuses and from other technical colleges. Residence life is hugely important to students’ identities, and they take a very interdisciplinary liberal arts approach to science and technology.
Pitzer: Its activism. Pitzer students are outspoken and unapologetic about their views and values, and the campus comes alive with their voices not just through posters but through murals and graffiti walls.
The dining and community spaces at Scripps College are especially beautiful!
FAVORITE SPOT ON CAMPUS?
CMC: The 4th floor of the Kravis Center, which boasts stunning views of the Claremont campuses and the mountains beyond.
Pomona: The fountains! Just all of them.
Scripps: The coffee shop at the student center, which has this beautiful tree-lined inner courtyard where students can hang out and study.
Harvey Mudd: The “Res End.” Mudd basically has two sides: the Academic—or “Ac”—End, and the Residential—or “Res”—End. In the Res End you can clearly see the quirks and personalities of each of the 9 residence halls on display through their music, flags, and outdoor furniture choices.
Pitzer: The Grove House! This gorgeous building was bought at auction by Pitzer students for $1 (apparently they were the only ones to show up to the auction!) and is now a student-run cafe surrounded by gorgeous native landscaping.
Harvey Mudd’s various shops and makerspaces can teach you everything from crochet to welding.
5 WORDS TO DESCRIBE CAMPUS?
CMC: Stately, Modern, Central, Outdoor-oriented, Greek-inspired
Pomona: Traditional, Spacious, Classic, Artsy, Expressive
Scripps: Peaceful, Gardens, Cohesive, Hidden Spaces, Stucco
Harvey Mudd: Quirky, Tight-knit, Tech-savvy, Long, Hands-on
Pitzer: Botanical, Sustainable, Colorful, Lively, Resort-like
Pomona’s “Big Bridges” is the largest performance event space on all the Claremont campuses, and once hosted a concert by Taylor Swift back in 2013!
THE "TYPICAL STUDENT" IS...
CMC: Career-driven (though still with an appreciation for the liberal arts) and thrives on socializing, networking, and discussing difficult topics.
Pomona: There isn’t one, according to our tour guides! But they are all intellectually curious and many have a strong appreciation for the arts.
Scripps: More reserved, someone who values one-on-one connection and thrives in a super supportive environment.
Harvey Mudd: Nerdy, curious, and quirky. Most students love video games and nerd out about math problems, but also value writing and public speaking.
Pitzer: Outspoken and passionate about social and/or environmental justice. Pitzer students are very true to the campus’s 1960s hippie roots.
CMC’s famous “The Cube” is a popular silent study space on campus.
INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE?
International students are common across all five campuses, making up anywhere from 5% (Scripps) to 15% (CMC) of each student body. Because each campus is quite small, international students are typically well-integrated into the full campus community.
Though some international students may feel uncertain about being so far from the big city of Los Angeles (about 45-90 minutes depending on traffic or train schedules), the colleges here offer an abundance of resources for just about any endeavor you might want to pursue. Also, all students get free MetroLink passes that make getting to and from the city much simpler for students without cars.
All first-year students at Pitzer live in the buildings surrounding the Pitzer Pool to promote a strong sense of community within each incoming class.
SPECIAL PROGRAMS/OFFERINGS APPLICANTS SHOULD CONSIDER?
CMC: CMC specializes in economics, politics, and government with the view of making sure its students are global citizens. They now also offer a new major in Integrated Sciences, through which students can concentrate in Genomics, Systems Biology, and Health (GSH); Brain, Learning, and Decision (BLD); or Climate, Energy, and the Environment (CEE).
Pomona: Pomona has particularly robust programs in foreign languages, visual arts, and the only Theatre major across the 5Cs. Computer Science is an increasingly popular major (which students have to enter a lottery in order to declare) and the new minor in Data Science is also attractive to many students.
Scripps: Like Pomona, Scripps offers a wide variety of academic options with a particular emphasis on cultural and gender studies and lots of options in biology and life sciences.
Harvey Mudd: In addition to the typical array of STEM majors expected at a technical college, Mudd also offers 7 unique Joint Majors, including Chemistry and Climate, Computer Science and Climate, Computer Science and Physics, and Mathematical and Computational Biology.
Pitzer: Pitzer also offers a wide range of majors, and is a particularly strong place to study fields like Environmental Analysis, Cognitive Science, Organismal Biology, or Media Studies.
The Harvey Mudd campus is long, divided into the “Res End” to the east (pictured here) and the “Ac End” to the west.
TIPS FOR THE APPLICATION PROCESS?
All five colleges look for strong grades and rigorous courses in their application review processes, along with engaging activities and personal essays. Each college also has some of their own particular elements they look for in an application:
CMC really values their supplemental essays: this is how they find students who demonstrate a passion for discussing complex or challenging topics and an interest in global citizenship. They particularly want to admit students who will take full advantage of the wide array of research and pre-professional resources available on campus. The video interview is optional but recommended.
Pomona is permanently test-optional as of 2023 and really seeks to admit as wide a diversity of students as possible. To succeed at Pomona, reflect deeply on your individual personality and interests, then be sure to emphasize those in your application materials.
Scripps emphasizes the importance of inclusivity; they are permanently test-optional and 60% of applicants do not submit test scores, and their core curriculum focuses equally on both writing and research. They are also interested in understanding the challenges students have faced on their road through high school and how those students have learned and grown.
Harvey Mudd, as a technical college, has more specific prerequisite courses than the other colleges: all applicants must have taken chemistry, physics, and calculus in order to be competitive in the applicant pool. Mudd also takes their core values and their honor code quite seriously, so emphasizing your understanding of and commitment to them can serve you well.
Pitzer is super fit-focused, so they review students’ supplemental essays and overall institutional fit very closely based on their institutional core values. If you love Pitzer, make sure you can articulate why! Pitzer is also the only 5C that is test-blind, meaning they will not look at SAT or ACT test scores from any applicants. Pitzer also has an optional video interview, like CMC, but it is not as important to their process as CMC’s is.
Flags around Pitzer’s campus state the core values they look for in their application review process.
FUN FACTS?
CMC: The Athenaeum event space hosts speakers from different career fields every week, including global figures like Bill Clinton, Desmond Tutu, and Cornel West.
Pomona: They have a long-standing tradition of getting “fountained” on your birthday, which basically means your friends make you jump in one of the campus’s many fountains. They also have a dining space called the Oldenborg Center, which is open for lunch every day and where the only rule is “no English”!
Scripps: The Scripps motto is Incipit Vita Nova, meaning “Here Begins New Life.” New Scrippsies enter the Denison library front door on their first day to sign their class book, then exit through the front door when they graduate. If you want to enter Denison library at any other time, you have to use a side door!
Harvey Mudd: All students take a required underwater robotics class and take their final projects to test off the coast of Catalina Island! (The Mudd dining hall, Hoch-Shanahan, is also rumored to have the best food on campus, especially brunch!)
Pitzer: Nearly all of Pitzer’s buildings are LEED-certified (many Gold or Platinum LEED-certified), and running on the treadmill in the gym helps produce energy that powers the building!
Next stop: