Bates College Top Questions

I think I addressed this above.

The only person who would feel out of place at Bates is someone who doesn't accept other types of people.

Bates's fashion typically falls under a few categories: the more preppy dressers, the crunchy granola dressers, and the athletic edged dressers. Different types of students interact, but for the most part, the extremes from each clique stay within themselves.

There really is no such thing as a typical Batesie. That sounds like a college guidebook cliché, but it’s true. Most students are active in many different facets of the college experience. I have one friend who works as a tour guide, captains intramural teams every season, volunteers down the street at a hospital, plans to major in neuroscience, participates in student government, and loves seeing theater productions (especially Shakespeare.) On top of all this, he’s a genuine guy who always has time to make you laugh. Though of course sports teams and other groups sit together for dinner sometimes, we do a lot of table hopping. It’s not uncommon to spend a couple hours in Commons (the dining hall) for dinner, moving from table to table and chatting with acquaintances you run into in the pizza line. Mostly just because it's located in Maine, Bates isn't the most diverse school in terms of racial and geographic heritage.

The student body is awesome - I really believe that the Bates student body is the best thing about the school. A fair amount of Batesies are from Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, and the vast ethnic majority of the student body is white. However, there are a lot of international students and they are totally involved socially with the regular Americans. There are a lot of very well-to-do Bates students, as tuition is around 45 grand and rising, but Bates also does a fantastic job of giving financial aid. The majority of the student body is towards the left politically.

The student body ranges from preppy students to very hippie students and covers a lot in between. There is one dining hall where all students gather for every meal. Most students are from New England, New York or California

As a gay Latin American at Bates, I can say I didn't have a hard time adapting at all. People are open and respected about their sexuality and background. However, there are very few African Americans (ridiculously few), and few Latins, for that matter. Thus, these groups tend to stick together. Most students are from Massachusetts. Many are politically active - the vast majority of us are very liberal democrats.

There's some diversity on campus. THough there are a lot white upperclass kids there. A lot of different groups interact. Students are predominantly more left winged, but it seems there are some republicans.

Bates student body is increasingly diverse in interests, religious beliefs, political interests, and cultural background. The one unifying characteristic of the Bates student body is attitude. Much of the student body is very friendly and open.

When you first get to Bates you feel like everybody on campus is from, "20 minutes outside Boston," which seems lame if you don't want to hang out with similar people all the time. But I found out that it's definitely not true. A lot of Bates kids are from the northeast, but a lot are also from everywhere else, including abroad, so it is actually geographically diverse.