Is diversity in life something man constructs or something that is latent in the created order of the universe?  Many in our day are seeking to ensure that all institutions in America reflect life’s diversity by using various criteria to manufacture institutional diversity.  Does this work?  Can it work?  Should it work?  Recently these questions were studied in an interesting manner at Bowdoin College in Maine.

Bowdoin College is a small private liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine.  It has about 1,700 students enrolled currently.  Famous alumni include Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Long-fellow, Franklin Pierce, and Joshua Chamberlain. The 2013 annual ranking of U.S. News & World Report ranks it as the 6th best liberal arts college in the nation and it is ranked 14th on Forbes magazine’s list of America’s Top Colleges.

In recent years, Bowdoin College has begun seeking to recruit students of diversity by hosting its “Experience Bowdoin Weekends.”  These are “an opportunity usually for multicultural, low-income, first-generational students who have not had the opportunity to come see Bowdoin,” said Associate Dean of Admissions and Coordinator of Multicultural Recruitment Elmer Moore.  He emphasizes that this is not minority recruitment, but rather “multicultural and diversity recruitment.” (Source)

This experience follows the study conducted by The National Association of Scholars and the resultant media debate that came from that study.  As you read and watch your way through this experience, seek to answer the question, “What is Real Diversity?” and well as considering how we should preserve and pursue it, if indeed we should.

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