Colby College

Founded in 1813, Colby is the 12th-oldest private liberal arts college in the country. Located in central Maine, our 714-acre Mayflower Hill campus overlooks downtown Waterville and the Kennebec River Valley.

Colby’s 2,000 students come from nearly every state and more than 70 countries to take advantage of our renowned academic programs, a curriculum that encourages educational exploration, and collaborative learning experiences led by world-class professors.

Our exploratory Jan Plan term, extensive study-abroad opportunities, and graduate-level research experiences are pillars of the Colby education. In both the classroom and the field, students work closely with professors—a collaboration that is transformational for both and often results in lifelong connections.

Cocurricular and campus life programs optimize learning opportunities and help students develop leadership and communication skills. Members of the Colby community come from a range of backgrounds and offer diverse perspectives.Every member of the community has different experiences to share, enriching classroom and dining hall discussions.Our liberal arts curriculum, combined with many other facets of the Colby experience, prepares students for postgraduate success in nearly every field imaginable. Students graduate with the skills and experience that employers and grad schools desire.

With 58 majors and 35 minors, Colby offers the ideal liberal arts and sciences environment: the variety you need for wide exploration and the depth you need to focus in your area (or areas) of interest. Along the way you’ll gain the tools and experience to master any profession and adapt to any circumstance. Heading for a career in medicine, law, or engineering? We have the courses and advising to get you ready—while ensuring you graduate with the liberal arts and sciences knowledge and skill set that will make you a better doctor, attorney, or engineer.

They’re world-class scholars and teachers who dive deeply into major issues facing our world. From research assistantships and independent study projects, to summer experiences and excursions abroad, they view collaboration with students as essential to the work they do. What’s more, students who work with professors often become co-authors of books, articles, and papers, and travel to national and international conferences, all before they receive a degree.

At Colby you’ll spend January doing just one thing of your choosing. Our innovative winter term is about exploration, expansion, freedom, and the chance to really focus. Do research in Belize. Shadow an oncologist at a local hospital. Take an internship in Miami. Become an EMT. Make a movie. Follow your fascination. Try something entirely new. Whatever it is, spend January in motion.

It’s in our DNA—the tendency to ask tough questions and allocate brain space to search for solutions. The opportunities are here for any student who wants to get involved. Dive into one-on-one collaborations with professors in any major throughout the year—on campus and around the world. Publish and present. Partner with leading research institutes. Tap into ample grant support. Be part of an annual student symposium for which classes are canceled and everyone shows up.

The Colby Liberal Arts Symposium (CLAS) is a celebration of student scholarship. For one day each year, the Colby community comes together to recognize and celebrate students’ many forms of scholarly engagement. The Colby Undergraduate Summer Research Retreat (CUSRR) is a two-day symposium and retreat in The Forks, Maine, featuring student talks and poster presentations on a wide variety of topics. The Colby Achievement Program in the Sciences (CAPS) is for incoming Colby students from groups that traditionally have been underrepresented in the sciences. The Presidential Scholars Program offers the top students in each incoming class opportunities to conduct research alongside world-class professors as soon as they arrive on campus along with access to a pool of grants to design their own projects.

It’s the hallmark of the liberal arts experience: the opportunity to explore your interests broadly and to specialize in the field (or fields) of your interest. At Colby our centers, partners, and multidisciplinary curriculum give you the flexibility to always be discovering and the skills and connections you need to stake your path.

At Colby you’ll be a resident of Maine, but a citizen of the world. An international student body makes campus a global gathering place, and nearly 70 percent of students choose to live and learn abroad. You’ll choose among 200 programs in more than 60 countries—for a semester or for a year or for the month of January. Through cultural immersion, you’ll learn how to navigate a world with rapidly shifting boundaries.

It’s a novel idea: start your college adventure across the Atlantic as part of our innovative experiences for first-year students in Salamanca, Spain, or Dijon, France. Take challenging courses. Learn Spanish or French through total immersion. Live with a local family. Travel extensively. See the sights. Savor the culture. Soak in the opportunity to pack years of personal and intellectual growth into a single semester.