Pomona values small, engaging classes with dynamic professors and involved students.

The body of information that we call “knowledge” is ever-changing, but the most important intellectual skills—those needed to acquire and evaluate knowledge, to put it into a meaningful context and to synthesize new ideas and solve new problems—are not. The main purpose of a Pomona education is to ensure that students develop the intellectual capacities and resilience to engage learning over a lifetime and to thrive in a changing world. Pomona’s curriculum provides a balance between the breadth of a traditional liberal arts education and the depth necessary for advancement in a specific field. At Pomona, students find great educational rigor, but also the freedom to pursue their individual interests.

Classes are demanding, ensuring that students’ intellectual capabilities are stretched. Readings are intensive; projects often require new ways of thinking and innovative methods of analysis. Part of the intellectual experience involves listening to others and considering different points of view. Journalist Walter Lippman said, “Where all men think alike, no one thinks very much.” At Pomona, bright, intellectually active students learn from one another in an environment that encourages collegiality, not competition.

At Pomona, no specific course is prescribed for graduation. Even the first-year seminars called Critical Inquiry courses offer first-year students a wide array of choices among classes with such titles as War and Art, Stages of Conscience, and Living with Our Genes. Likewise, in place of specific course requirements, Pomona’s Breadth of Study Requirements are designed to encourage exploration while providing significant freedom of choice. Students take at least one course in each of five areas: Creative Expression; Social Institutions and Human Behavior; History, Values, Ethics and Cultural Studies; Physical and Biological Sciences; and Mathematical Reasoning. There are also broadly defined requirements for foreign language proficiency and physical education. Whatever their field of study, Pomona students explore widely among a variety of disciplines, not only to inform their choice of a major, but also to expose them to the analytical methods of a variety of fields, hone their communication skills and put their eventual field of specialization into the broadest academic context.

For in-depth study, Pomona offers a choice of 45 majors, including all of the traditional disciplines of the humanities, fine arts, social sciences and natural sciences, as well as a variety of interdisciplinary fields. Majors at Pomona are not designed primarily to prepare students for specific careers, but rather to sharpen their ability to think critically and in depth using the analytical methods of the discipline. As part of the overall Pomona education, however, all majors have been shown to provide an outstanding foundation for success in whatever follows graduation—whether it be further study or the immediate start of a career.
 

Programs in the Natural Sciences  |  Programs in the Humanities and Fine Arts  |  Programs in the Social Sciences