Bard College at Simon's Rock
Bard College at Simon’s Rock is the nation’s only college designed expressly to educate bright, highly motivated students after the tenth or eleventh grade. Founded in 1966 as the nation’s first and only early college, Simon’s Rock joined the Bard College system in 1979. It maintains its own 275 acre campus in Great Barrington, Massachusetts (the heart of the culture-rich Berkshires), which is surrounded by the Berkshire’s lush mountains, hiking and skiing opportunities, as well as world-class cultural attractions such as the Tanglewood Music Festival, Jacob’s Pillow, the Norman Rockwell Museum and an abundant group of theatre companies.
Simon’s Rock is a small, selective, intensive college of the liberal arts and sciences and maintains a unique identity in the higher education landscape as a supportive intellectual home for early college students. All of the College’s 450 full-time students enroll after the tenth or eleventh grade. They pursue Associate of Arts degrees, with students admitted to the College’s Upper College program continuing four years of study, which has them graduate at Simon’s Rock with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
Simon’s Rock’s emphasis on interdisciplinary education is grounded in more than 40 academic concentration offerings, led by faculty trained in the country’s best universities. The College is known to offer inspired and inspiring classes; first-class facilities for the sciences, the arts, and athletics; and an astonishing range of opportunities for conducting specialized research and gaining hands-on experience.
The curriculum is organized into four academic divisions as well as interdivisional studies, and rooted in critical thinking, artful expression, and a broad interdisciplinary survey of key texts and concepts. Founded on Bard’s own first year requirements, Simon’s Rock students base their curricular explorations on foundations arranged in the First Year Seminar. The Seminar has students examine the classic works of Sophocles, Plato, Dante, Shakespeare, Austen, and others, accompanied by a variety of articles, essays, poems, and stories. Students move on to enroll in the Sophomore Seminar, which balances this foundation in an examination of modern theory read the works of Darwin, Nietzsche, Tagore, DuBois, Woolf, Kafka, Marx, and other 19th and 20th century thinkers whose perspectives shifted radically from prescribed social norms.
At the end of their sophomore year, students enter a process called Moderation. During Moderation, they consider how to map the next extension of their academic pursuits alongside a faculty advising committee. Based on their work, interests and goals, they may elect to apply for admission to Simon’s Rock Upper College (B.A.) program or consider transfer opportunities. Upper College students usually spend their junior year off campus, or enrolled in one of the College’s several signature programs, which include partnerships with Lincoln College at Oxford University, Columbia University’s Engineering Program, Manchester University and others. In their senior year, students complete a senior thesis, which is an intensive scholarly labor that is often equivalent to graduate-level scholarship. All students meet weekly with their faculty advisor.
Bard College at Simon’s Rock alumni include Founder and President of MoveOn.org Eli Pariser; Academy Award-winning writers and directors Joel and Ethan Coen; Singer-songwriter and founder of the band Soul Coughing, Mike Doughtey; Human rights activist and freelance journalist, Ronan Seamus Farrow, as well as numerous writers, academics, scientists, non-profit leaders and accomplished artists.
