Hi, I’m a sophomore and I’m considering applying ED I and/or ED II to Pomona and Bowdoin.
I’m really into outdoor activities–especially mountain biking–and I’m wondering which place is better for that. I know Bowdoin has better mountain biking trails probably but it’s also cold for a lot of the year.
What do people do outside during winters at Bowdoin? And how often? Skiing? Ice skating? Biking and hiking anyway?
And at Pomona, do people bike off campus, especially at Mt. Baldy and other trails in Claremont or is that not really part of the culture? How frequently do people go on hikes or drive to some lake in SoCal?
Bowdoin is in New England. Here in New England, we mountain bike in snow. You can find interesting perspectives on this by contacting James and Candice of Analog Cycles, who went off the grid and relocated their bike shop from Maryland to Poultney, Vermont. They love talking to other bikers - especially mountain bikers. They’d love to hear from you.
And we go hiking in snow, sometimes with snow shoes. We even do winter camping in snow. Try it, you might like it. You might even fall in love with it.
Pomona student here! Yes, I know a lot of people who bike off campus into the trails up north next to Baldy. Many many pomona people are really into the outdoors (backpacking, hiking, camping, etc). I mean you can just take a look at our orientation adventure: first week at pomona you get to choose to go on an outdoor trip (https://www.pomona.edu/new-students/orientation/orientation-adventure). In addition we have a huge huge outdoorsy club called On The Loose. Every week there are trips to hike/backpack around the LA area including Mt. Baldy, Joshua Tree National Park, and more! (https://on-the-loose.org/)
Having spent time in both New England and Pomona, I think the outdoors opportunities near Pomona are significantly better.
Pomona is underrated as an outdoors college. Many rural colleges’ admissions offices hype up outdoorsiness as a way of putting a positive spin on the fact that they’re in the middle of nowhere (e.g. Willliams), but that doesn’t mean they actually have better outdoors resources. Pomona doesn’t highlight the outdoors benefits of its location as much since it’s mixed in with hyping all the other benefits of being near Los Angeles, but the outdoors should be considered a huge plus just on its own. The Outdoor Education Center at Pomona is superb, and the range of destinations you get in Southern California completely dwarfs what’s available back east (unless you really hate drier landscapes, but even then, just go to Big Sur or the Sierra Nevada).
You should probably post this on the Bowdoin or Pomona threads on CC for more people familiar with the schools and their admissions processes to view this.
You are a sophomore, and the acceptance rates for these two colleges are below 10%, so it is not only too early for you to be focusing on specific colleges, weighing the relative pros and cons of two colleges from which you are much more likely to be rejected than to be accepted is definitely not a productive way to spend your time.
