The Claremont Colleges are an American consortium of five undergraduate and two graduate schools of higher education located in Claremont, California, a city 35 miles (56 km) east of downtown Los Angeles and 25 miles (40 km) west of downtown San Bernardino. Unlike most other collegiate consortia, such as the Five College Consortium in Massachusetts and the Tri-College Consortium in Pennsylvania, the Claremont College campuses are adjoining and within walking distance of one another. Put together, the campuses cover roughly 1 square mile (2.6 km2).
Known colloquially as the 5Cs (or 7Cs when including the graduate institutions), the Claremont Colleges were founded in 1925 when the all-graduate Claremont University College (now Claremont Graduate University) was established in addition to the older all-undergraduate Pomona College. The purpose of the consortium is to provide the specialization, flexibility and personal attention commonly found in a small college, with the resources of a large university. Their compartmentalized collegiate university design was inspired by Oxford University and Cambridge University. With more than 6,300 students, about 700 faculty, and approximately 1,600 staff and support, the colleges offer more than 2,000 courses to students. The Claremont Colleges are a unique consortium that the Fiske Guide called "a collection of intellectual resources unmatched in America". For the Class of 2020 admissions cycle, four of the five most selective liberal art colleges in the U.S. by acceptance rate were among the Claremont Colleges, while Scripps College had the second lowest acceptance rate among women's colleges, preceded by Barnard College.
Video Claremont Colleges
Colleges
The five undergraduate colleges are:
- Pomona College (founded 1887), a small, coeducational, liberal arts college that offers majors in humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Pomona College is the founding member of the Claremont Colleges.
- Scripps College (founded 1926), a small, liberal arts, women's college, which offers 35 majors in both the sciences and humanities.
- Claremont McKenna College (founded 1946), a small, coeducational, liberal arts college that specializes in economics, political science, international relations, and public policy. It also maintains a broad set of majors in the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities. Claremont McKenna College is also home to the Robert Day School of Economics and Finance, which offers both an undergraduate program and a master's program in finance.
- Harvey Mudd College (founded 1955), a small, coeducational college specializing in engineering, mathematics, computer science, and the physical and biological sciences but also includes coursework in the humanities and social sciences.
- Pitzer College (founded 1963), a small, coeducational, liberal arts college offering an alternative curriculum, noted for interdisciplinarity. It also has a particular emphasis upon social justice and social responsibility. Pitzer is part of the SAT optional movement among liberal arts colleges.
The five undergraduate Claremont Colleges are commonly referred to as the "5Cs", while "7Cs" is used to refer to all the colleges, including the two graduate institutions.
The two graduate universities are:
- Claremont Graduate University (founded 1925), awards master's and doctoral degrees in 31 disciplines: arts, humanities, social sciences, behavioral & organizational sciences, management/executive management, psychology, educational studies, religion, mathematical sciences, information systems & technology, community & global health, and botany.
- Keck Graduate Institute of Applied Life Sciences (founded 1997), a biomedical graduate school offers professional Master of Bioscience (MBS) degree and PhD in Applied Life Science for MBS graduates. It also offers a Postdoctoral Professional Masters (PPM) and a joint PhD program in computational biology with Claremont Graduate University. The Keck Graduate Institute School of Pharmacy opened in 2014 offering a four-year Doctorate of Pharmacy degree (Pharm.D.). Keck Graduate Institute also sponsors a four-year undergraduate program in collaboration with the Minerva Project, termed Minerva Schools at KGI, though students are not physically present on the Claremont Colleges campuses.
The Claremont School of Theology (founded 1885) (and thus Claremont Lincoln University) is affiliated with the consortium, but is not a member.
Maps Claremont Colleges
Rankings
According to the American Liberal Arts College rankings released by U.S. News & World Report in fall 2017, the "5Cs" were ranked among the top 40 liberal art colleges in the United States: Pomona College (#6), Claremont McKenna College (#8), Harvey Mudd College (#12), Scripps College (#26), and Pitzer College (#33). Additionally, all of the undergraduate colleges are categorized as "Most Selective". Forbes ranked the 5C's among the top 60 undergraduate colleges (including universities and military academies) in the nation and within the top 25 liberal arts colleges for its 2017 report: Pomona College (#10 overall, #1 LAC), Claremont McKenna College (#11 overall, #2 LAC), Harvey Mudd College (#18 overall, #5 LAC), Scripps College (#43 overall, #16 LAC), and Pitzer College (#59 overall, #23 LAC). Niche listed all of the undergraduate colleges within the top 30 small colleges in the United States as measured by surveys rating various components of the undergraduate experience: Pomona College (#2), Harvey Mudd College (#5), Claremont McKenna College (#10), Scripps College (#22), and Pitzer College (#29). U.S. News & World Report also releases individual graduate program rankings for the Claremont Graduate University, with several of its programs ranking in the top tier of graduate programs nationwide.
Each college is independent in that, for example, students receive their degrees from the one college in which they are enrolled, and administration and admissions departments are independent. The seven-institution Claremont Colleges system is supported by The Claremont Colleges Services (TCCS), which provides centralized services, such as a library, student health, financial and human resources, telecommunications, risk management, real estate, physical plant maintenance, and other services, for those colleges.
Shared facilities include the Libraries of the Claremont Colleges, Campus Safety, the Tranquada Student Services Center (which houses Baxter Medical Center, Monsour Counseling Center, and the Health Education Outreach), McAlister Center (home of the Office of the Chaplains and the Claremont Card Center), EmPOWER Center (which works to address sexual violence), the Rick and Susan Sontag Center for Collaborative Creativity (The Hive), the Huntley Bookstore, all dining facilities, and several sports facilities. The Claremont Colleges Library is an example of the level of cooperation in terms of support services. The size of the library collection ranks third among the private institutions in California, behind only Stanford and USC.
Shared academic departments include the Intercollegiate Women's Studies Center, the Intercollegiate Department of Chicano Studies, the Intercollegiate Department of Asian American Studies, the Intercollegiate Department of Black Studies, the Intercollegiate Department of Religious Studies, the Intercollegiate Department of Media Studies, and the Five-College Theater Department.
Shared intercollegiate programs include the European Union Center of California, the Chicano/Latino Student Affairs Center, the Office of Black Student Affairs, the Office of the Chaplains, Hillel, and the Queer Resource Center.
In addition, three of the Claremont Colleges--Claremont McKenna College, Pitzer College, and Scripps College--share a single science program. These three colleges pool their resources to create the largest academic department in Claremont, the Joint Science Department. Many research projects and courses utilize the Robert J. Bernard Field Station, an 86-acre (35 ha) natural area which consists principally of the rare Coastal Sage Scrub ecosystem.
Many clubs are open to students from all the undergraduate colleges. The Student Life, the largest student newspaper at the 5C's, covers all five schools and publishes a weekly print edition as well as online content. KSPC 88.7 FM is the non-profit community radio station associated with the Claremont Colleges. Students from the colleges host KSPC shows and help run the station.
The Robert Day School at Claremont McKenna College is open to students from all five undergraduate colleges.
Comparison of undergraduate colleges
History
In October 1923, President James A. Blaisdell of Pomona College wrote to Ellen Browning Scripps describing a vision of educational excellence he had for the future Claremont Colleges:
I cannot but believe that we shall need here in the South [of California] a suburban educational institution of the range of Stanford. My own very deep hope is that instead of one great undifferentiated university, we might have a group of institutions divided into small colleges -- somewhat on the Oxford type -- around a library and other utilities which they would use in common. In this way I should hope to preserve the inestimable personal values of the small college while securing the facilities of the great university. Such a development would be a new and wonderful contribution to American education. Now the thing which would assure this future institution to Southern California is land... It is now or never. To save the needed land for educational use seems to me to guarantee to Southern California one of the great educational institutions of America. Other hands through the centuries will carry on the project and perfect it. But never again can there come so fundamental a service as this.
Athletics
Claremont-Mudd-Scripps athletics teams from Claremont McKenna College, Harvey Mudd College and Scripps College compete as one team. Male athletic teams are called the Stags, and women's teams are called the Athenas. Pomona College and Pitzer College compete together as Pomona-Pitzer. Their teams are called the Sagehens. The teams participate in NCAA Division III in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC). In the Division III Final Standings for the 2016-2017 year, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps ranked 4th nationally, while Pomona-Pitzer ranked 29th; both were the top two performers in the SCIAC.
Club and intramural sports
In addition to the Stags/Athenas and the Sagehens, there are several 5C club sports teams, including roller hockey, men's and women's rugby union, both of whom attended Division II Nationals in 2004 and 2006, the men's team winning the Division II national championship in 2010, men's lacrosse, field hockey, crew, cycling, women's ultimate, who reached Nationals in 2004, 2011, and 2013, and won the tournament in 2012, and men's ultimate frisbee, 2008 Southern California Sectional champions and 2011 Division III National champions.
The Claremont Roller Hockey Club, the Claremont Centaurs, has also been one of the more successful Claremont Consortium clubs, winning the Division 3 Championship of the WCRHL (West Coast Roller Hockey League) in 2009-2010, 2010-2011, and 2011-2012.
In popular culture
The Claremont Colleges are referenced in Max Brooks's 2006 apocalyptic horror novel World War Z, in which the students at the colleges hold off 10,000 zombies by fortifying Scripps's walled campus. Brooks is an alumnus of Pitzer.
References
External links
- Claremont Colleges Photo Archive in the Claremont Colleges Digital Library
- Claremont Colleges website
Source of article : Wikipedia