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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Both great schools in very different settings. I don’t think there is any real similarity on the “5 college consortium” front. That’s a very loose consortium in the case of Amherst. Pomona and the other four Claremont consortium colleges border each other and kids are always on the others’ campuses for parties, or on the way to town, or for classes. There is a lot of cross-enrollment.

It’s also extremely difficult to get into Pomona from around here as an unhooked student. Your odds of acceptance are much lower than the already low acceptance rate would suggest. At Amherst, a significant portion of the students are athletes. This is not true a Pomona, though Pomona-Pitzer has some excellent teams. [/quote]
I don’t agree with this at all in terms of the 5-college consortium: there is a free bus system, UMass is on the other side of downtown Amherst (you can walk), and it is easy to get to Mount Holyoke and Smith. There are several 5 college majors and programs, and advanced Amherst students have the opportunity to even take graduate classes at UMass. Also think about the intellectual synergy created by 5 colleges all within 15 minutes of each other in terms of lectures, activities, movies — everything. We are talking, “which famous person can I see speak at which college this week.” I cannot speak to Pomona, but that consortium does not have nearly the same critical mass of students.

Amherst has a ton of athletes (35-40%) and a big athlete divide (problems with them living together exclusively etc.) It is also very big on recruiting URMs. Since athletes are disproportionately white, it creates a very polarized dynamic. (Amherst got rid of legacy, but athletic recruiting favors whites way more than legacy, both in terms of sheer numbers and the magnitude of the admissions boost, so there is just a tad of hypocrisy there.).

From an admissions standpoint, Amherst is probably a tougher admit for white, non-athlete applicants than is Pomona, for the reasons stated…[/quote]

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