Skidmore college seeks to prepare liberally educated graduates to continue their quest for knowledge and to make the choices required of informed, responsible citizens. Skidmore faculty and staff create a challenging yet supportive environment that cultivates students intellectual excellence.
With a small but diverse student body from widespread states and countries and a large faculty of dedicated teacher-scholars (student-to-faculty ratio: 8 to 1), Skidmore offers over 40 majors in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, as well as in career-specific fields such as management and business, social work, education, and exercise science. Add to this the prominence of the performing and visual arts, which have long set Skidmore apart. Faculty have earned recognition from Guggenheim, Pulitzer, and Emmy awards to fellowships and grants from Fulbright, MacArthur, and the National Science Foundation, among others. Skidmore is known for its interdisciplinary approach to learning, collaborative student-faculty research, and off-campus study program (nearly 60% of students study abroad). The college's rigorous academic regimen begins with the First-Year Experience, which integrates the curricular, co-curricular, and residential aspects of a student's first year. Students select a Scribner Seminar from among 50 offerings. Seminar faculty take seriously their role as advisors and mentors, serving as each of their students' advisors until they have selected a major. Students in each seminar are housed in rough proximity to each other in residence halls to cultivate richer learning-living communities in which lasting friendships are often formed. The college's curriculum emphasizes foundations in the liberal arts and interdisciplinary study. The beautiful 890-acre campus, 300 acres of which consists of the recreation- and field- research-rich North Woods, has been recently upgraded with key renovations to science, athletics, dining, and residential facilities.