The College of the Atlantic, founded in 1969, is a private, alternative liberal-arts college located in Bar Harbor on Mount Desert Island, Maine, United States. It awards a bachelor's degree and a master's degree solely in the field of human ecology, though with a variety of emphases. The college is small, with approximately 364 students and a full-time faculty of 27, and 15 part-time faculty. Its curriculum includes student-directed projects, community involvement, and interdisciplinary learning. The school's curriculum is based on human ecology, and all freshmen are required to take an introductory core course in human ecology during their first term. Other requirements include two courses in each focus area (Environmental Studies, Arts and Design, Human Studies), one quantitative reasoning course, one history course, and one course that involves extensive writing. The intention is for students to explore and integrate ideas from different disciplines and to construct their own understanding of human ecology.