学院概况

　　Bowdoin College位于美国东北部缅因州的Brunswick小镇，成立于1794年，由当时的麻省的州长Samuel Adams发起（当时缅因州还是麻省的一个区）。学校的名字是为了纪念Bowdoin College的一个主要捐助者James Bowdoin，该捐助者的父亲也是麻省的州长。在美国废奴隶制历史上产生过重要影响的美国著名小说“汤姆叔叔的小屋”就是由Bowdoin College的教员家属Harriet Beecher Stowe写作并由Bowdoin College出版发行，美国南北战争中的著名将军Oliver Otis Howard，林肯政府的财政部长Hugh McCulloch都是Bowdoin College的校友。而在南北战争最激烈的时候，Bowdoin College的许多学生更是投笔从戎，为美国的废奴运动做出了贡献。

　　Bowdoin College在学术上也是相当的优异。澳际美国部（ College都位居全美最佳文理学院的前十名，在2005年曾经最高达到过第四名。其物理系、经济学系和生物系在全美的学术界内是公认的强项。其政府系(government department)，则更是被伦敦经济学院评为全世界最好的小型学院政府系。因为如此，从这个寒冷的美国东北部的小小的校园里走出了许多影响美国和世界的大人物，例如美国总统Franklin Pierce，著名的参议院George Mitchell，美国参议院及前国防部长William Cohen，美国运通公司首席执行官Kenneth Chenault。并且，该学校毕业生中，考取美国前五名商学院或法学院的比率甚至超过了哥伦比亚大学、康乃尔大学、西北大学、加州理工学院等著名学府。

　　Bowdoin College在相当长的时间里一直是一个男校，1971年才开始招生第一届女生。因为地处偏远，并且缅因州文化传统行为保守，因此学校的生活在相当长时间内是比较平淡的。但自从学校开始招收女生，校园生活逐渐丰富起来，形形色色的学生俱乐部，学生电台在90年代后应运而生。值得一提的是，学校食堂的伙食据说很好，曾经被Princeton Review评为过全美最佳的大学食堂。

　　Academics

　　Bowdoin is consistently ranked among the top ten liberal arts colleges in the United States by U.S. News and World Report. In the 2009 edition of the rankings, Bowdoin ranks sixth, behind Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Wellesley, and Middlebury. In other years it has ranked as high as fourth.In 2006, Newsweek described Bowdoin as a "New Ivy," one of a number of elite colleges and universities outside of the Ivy League.Bowdoin is also part of the sat optional movement for undergraduate admission. As of April 2008, Bowdoin was the first college to be named "School of the Year" by College Prowler.

　　Bowdoin offers majors in African Studies, Anthropology, Art History, Asian Studies, Biochemistry, Biology, Chemistry, Classics, Computer Science, Economics, English, Environmental Studies, French, Gender and Women's Studies, Geology, German, Government, History, Latin American Studies, Mathematics, Music, Neuroscience, Philosophy, Physics and Astronomy, Psychology, Religion, Russian, Sociology, Spanish, and Visual Arts. In addition, the college offers minors in Theatre, Dance, Education Studies, Teaching, Film Studies, and Gay and Lesbian Studies.

　　The Government Department, whose prominent professors include Allen Springer, Paul Franco, Richard E. Morgan, Chris Potholm and Jean M. Yarbrough, was ranked the top small college political science program in the world by researchers at the London School of Economics in 2003.Government was the most popular major for every graduating class between 2000 and 2004.

　　A 2003 exposé in The Bowdoin Orient revealed that the departments with the most rampant grade inflation included theatre and dance, women's studies, and sociology; those with the least grade inflation included physics, economics, philosophy, mathematics and government.

　　Student life

　　Recalling his days at Bowdoin in a recent interview, Professor Richard E. Morgan '59 described student life at the then-all-male school as "monastic," and noted that "the only things to do were either work or drink." (This is corroborated by the Official Preppy Handbook, which in 1980 ranked Bowdoin the number two drinking school in the country, behind Dartmouth.) These days, Morgan observed, the College offers a far broader array of recreational opportunities: "If we could have looked forward in time to Bowdoin's standard of living today, we would have been astounded."

　　Bowdoin is particularly well-known for its dining services, which the Princeton Review has ranked first in three of the last four years, including the 2006-2007 school year.The College has two major dining halls, one of which was renovated in the late 1990s, and every academic year begins with a lobster bake outside Farley Fieldhouse. Bowdoin also does well in other lifestyle categories; in 2004 it ranked 10th in dorm quality and 14th for quality of life.In April 2008, College Prowler, a publishing company for guidebooks on top colleges and universities in the United States and written by students, named Bowdoin College its "School of the Year" citing excellence in academics, safety and security, housing and dining.

　　Since abolishing greek fraternities in the late 1990s, Bowdoin has switched to a system in which entering students are assigned a "college house" affiliation correlating with their first-year dormitory. While six houses were originally established, following the construction of two new dorms, two were added fective in the fall of 2007, bringing the total to eight: Ladd (affiliated with Osher Hall), Baxter (West), Quinby (Appleton), MacMillan (Coleman), Howell (Hyde), Helmrh (Maine), Reed (Moore), and Burnett (Winthrop). The college houses are physical buildings around campus which host parties and other events throughout the year. Those students who choose not to live in their affiliated house retain their affiliation and are considered members throughout their Bowdoin career. Bore the fraternity system was abolished in the 1990s, all the Bowdoin fraternities were co-educational (except for one unrecognized sorority and two unrecognized all-male fraternities).

　　Bowdoin's chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, which was founded in 1825, is the nation's sixth oldest. Among those who have been inducted to the Maine Alpha chapter as undergraduates include Nathaniel Hawthorne (1825), Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1825), Robert E. Peary (1877), Owen Brewster (1909), Harold Hitz Burton (1909), Paul Douglas (1913), Alfred Kinsey (1916), Thomas R. Pickering (1953), and Lawrence B. Lindsey (1976).

　　Athletics

　　The Bowdoin Polar Bears compete in the NCAA Division III New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC), which also includes Amherst, Conn College, Hamilton, Middlebury, Trinity, Tufts, Wesleyan, Williams, and Maine rivals Bates and Colby in the Colby-Bates-Bowdoin Consortium (CBB). The College's official color is white, though black is traditionally employed as a complement.

　　Bowdoin offers thirty varsity teams, including men's teams in baseball, basketball, cross country, football, ice hockey, lacrosse, Nordic skiing, soccer, squash, swimming, tennis, and track, and women's teams in field hockey, golf, ice hockey, lacrosse, Nordic skiing, soccer, softball, squash, swimming, tennis, track, volleyball, and rugby. Men's ice hockey is the most popular spectator sport, with hundreds of students turning out for games against arch-rival Colby. In 2004, Bowdoin became the second college in the United States to elevate the women's rugby team to varsity status. While technically still varsity, the women's rugby team competes in New England Rugby Football Union, rather than NESCAC. The sailing team is co-ed and was considered in 2006 to be one of the top 20 sailing teams in the nation by Sailing World magazine. There are also intercollegiate and club teams in men's and women's fencing, men's and women's rowing, men's rugby, water polo, men's volleyball and men's and women's Ultimate. Recent NESCAC champions include men's tennis (2008), men's cross country (2001, 2002), women's basketball (2001-2007), women's ice hockey (2002, 2004) and women's field hockey (2001,2005, 2006, 2007); recent NCAA tournament appearances include women's basketball (Elite Eight, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007; Final Four, 2004), men's rugby (sweet 16, 2001), women's ice hockey (Final Four, 2002, 2003; Elite Eight, 2004, 2005), and women's field hockey (Final Four, 2005, 2006). Bowdoin College has won only one NCAA Division III Championship -- women's field hockey in 2007, deating Middlebury College in the finals.

　　In addition to the outdoor athletic fields, the College has indoor and outdoor tracks, a swimming pool, squash courts, an ice hockey rink, a rowing boathouse, several basketball courts, indoor and outdoor tennis courts, an independent weight room with 8 treadmills for the entire student and faculty population, elliptical machines, and a new astroturf field.

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