Do Both
Think courageously, believe passionately
At Calvin, no one will ask you to leave your faith at the door when you enter a philosophy classroom or a biology lab. In fact, your professors will challenge you to deepen your faith by tackling big ideas and current issues. It might get messy at times, but you’ll never be alone as you explore things like:
- Cell research and eco-terrorism
- The effect of social networking on interpersonal relationships
- The role of hip hop music in popular culture
Real research
Go to a college where you can get knowledge and create knowledge. Partner with your professors to do real research in areas vital to society such as diabetes, the effects of pollution and racism.
Real culture
A Christian college that brings in bands like The Decemberists and Ratatat? Calvin is the kind of place where you can both discern and enjoy popular culture.
100+ majors and programs
Learn to serve God—and the world—in over 100+ academic areas. Because at Calvin, we believe that all things are worthy of our investigation, from therapeutic recreation to archaeology and Spanish.
Become world ready
You want a job after graduation, and we can help with that. But you want more—you want a life that goes beyond yourself, a life that is part of making change happen.
Calvin can offer you the kind of Christian education that fills you with a deep sense of purpose—and make you exactly the kind of person publishing companies and churches and schools and law offices want to hire.
Business + baking
As a business major with lots of internship and real-world experience, Kelly LeCoy '11 was set to get a big job in a big city after graduation. Instead, she decided to stay in Grand Rapids and invest in the business and creative community here.
2010 graduates who were employed or in graduate school one year after graduation.
80%Calvin students with at least one internship while in college.
How one Calvin grad used his experience doing research with Calvin professors to succeed in graduate school.
Learn from the best
Calvin College is the kind of place where your profs know your name, and where teaching is job number one.
When they’re not helping you brainstorm paper topics or troubleshooting a quiz, they’ve got some serious stuff going on—they’re probably writing a book or an Emmy-winning screenplay or fussing with molecular tinker toys for a $1 million National Science Foundation grant they got last year.
Top scholars
Calvin faculty members are regularly recognized by their peers for their excellent work as scholars. Last year, they won a top poetry prize, two Fulbright Fellowships and $8.7 million in research funding.
Student-faculty ratio
82%Faculty with PhD or highest level degree
Ride along with biology professor Keith Grasman and three of his student researchers as they travel to an island in Saginaw Bay to study the effects of pollution on Great Lakes colonial waterbirds.
Connect on a global level
Why walk to class when you could take a jet? Connect with people who think and live in different ways through Calvin’s off-campus programs and other global opportunities.
- Do an internship or service-learning project in Germany or Hong Kong.
- Conduct research with a professor in Africa.
Digging and preserving
Archaeology prof Bert de Vries has spent 40 years exploring and preserving ruins of an ancient city at Um El Jimmal, Jordan. The best part? Every year he brings Calvin students with him to help with his ongoing work.
Number of students who studied off campus in 2010-2011
Start exploring your options when it comes to studying off-campus.
13 semester programs
30+ January interims
View Off-Campus Programs in a larger map
Play, kayak and jump through a fall day in West Michigan.
Hit the streets with Streetfest
Embrace Grand Rapids from day one as you do service projects throughout the city with other first-year students. Once you’re settled in, get connected to longer-term service-learning opportunities at local schools, churches and non-profits.
A very personal internship
Senior Allison Schepers landed an internship at Grand Rapids’ premier medical research facility, Van Andel Institute. She’s helping to find a cure for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, a disease that took her grandfather’s life in 2009.
Live fully—and faithfully
At Calvin, you'll learn to connect the way you think with the way you live. What do you know? Who do you love? Where do your plans and ideas intersect with God's vision for your life and his world?
Fill your mind and your spirit with great films and political debates, challenging assignments and dorm Bible studies, pre-concert conversations with bands like Switchfoot and Cut/Copy and service-learning in the Grand Rapids community. Learning to be a wise and faithful participant--and leader--in God's world doesn't happen overnight - it takes practice.
Serve / learn
Spend your spring break serving and learning with other Calvin students all over the country.
concerts, films and events each year
70student organizations
