“It ought always to be remembered, that literary institutions are founded and endowed for the common good, and not for the private advantage of those who resort to them for education. It is not that they may be enabled to pass through life in an easy or reputable manner, but that their mental powers may be cultivated and improved for the benefit of society.”
Rev. Joseph McKeen, first president of Bowdoin College, Inauguration Address, September 2, 1802.
Our second Preliminary of the Bowdoin Project, the “Institutional Profile,” is a collection of 41 charts, tables, and basic facts about Bowdoin College. The Profile includes student enrollment data, graduation rates by ethnicity and race, and faculty salary comparisons.
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Since September 2011, NAS has been conducting an in-depth, ethnographic study of Bowdoin College in Maine. We asked, “what does Bowdoin teach?” and examined Bowdoin’s formal curriculum, its residential and student life policies, and its co-curricular and extra-curricular activities. We have dedicated a page on our website to the Bowdoin Project. The full report will be published there in April. In the meantime, we will continue posting a series of Preliminaries which will provide context for the report.