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| The Princeton Review’s 2006 edition of ‘The Best 361 Colleges’ ranked the New College of Florida in Sarasota as the most gay-friendly school in the nation, based on responses from students nationwide. The majority of the gay-friendly colleges and universities were in Massachusetts, while those with a low acceptance of gays generally were in southern states or politically conservative regions. (Photo courtesy of the New College of Florida) |
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1 - New College of Florida - Sarasota,Fla.
2 - Macalester College - St. Paul, Minn.
3 - Wellesley College - Wellesley, Mass.
4 - Eugene Lang College - New York, N.Y.
5 - Mount Holyoke College - South Hadley, Mass.
6 - St. John’s College - Annapolis, Md.
7 - Bryn Mawr College - Bryn Mawr, Pa.
8 - Lawrence University - Appleton, Wis.
9 - Emerson College - Boston, Mass.
10 - Harvey Mudd College - Claremont, Calif.
11 - St. John’s College (NM) - Santa Fe, N.M.
12 - Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering - Needham, Mass.
13 - Wesleyan University - Middletown, Conn.
14 - Marlboro College - Marlboro, Vt.
15 - Carleton College - Northfield, Minn.
16 - Smith College - Northampton, Mass.
17 - Haverford College - Haverford, Pa.
18 - Reed College - Portland, Ore.
19 - Bard College - Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y.
20 - Oberlin College - Oberlin, Ohio
1 - Hampden-Sydney College - Hampden-Sydney, Va.
2 - University of Notre Dame - South Bend, Ind.
3 - Baylor University - Waco, Texas
4 - Wheaton College - Wheaton, Ill.
5 - Grove City College - Grove City, Pa.
6 - Univ. of Tennessee-Knoxville - Knoxville, Tenn.
7 - Texas A & M Univ.-College Station - College Station, Texas
8 - College of the Holy Cross - Worcester, Mass.
9 - Samford University - Birmingham, Ala.
10 - Brigham Young University - Provo, Utah
11 - Seton Hall University - South Orange, N.J.
12 - Valparaiso University - Valparaiso, Ind.
13 - Pepperdine University - Malibu, Calif.
14 - Washington and Lee University - Lexington, Va.
15 - Trinity College - Hartford, Conn.
16 - Vanderbilt University - Nashville, Tenn.
17 - Wake Forest University - Winston-Salem, N.C.
18 - University of Utah - Salt Lake City, Utah
19 - Providence College - Providence, R.I.
20 - Southern Methodist University - Dallas, Texas
Source: The Princeton Review Inc.
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HOME > ENTERTAINMENT > FEATURE
By: ELIZABETH WEILL-GREENBERG COMMENTS
 
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question of perception. There’s a misunderstanding of Catholic teaching on sexual orientation that tends to pervade popular culture.”
UNLIKE HOLY CROSS, Seton Hall University’s administration refused to recognize its gay student club, TRUTH, sparking a lawsuit that is still weaving through the New Jersey courts. The group continued to unofficially meet though.
Seton Hall ,in South Orange, N.J., ranked 11th on the “gay community is not accepted list.”
“I don’t think [the ranking is] an accurate reflection of what Seton Hall is,” said Kelly Kaysonepheth, a senior and editor-in-chief of the school paper, the Setonian. Her editorial staff supported TRUTH, she added.
“Seton Hall shouldn’t be defined by that one ranking,” she contends. “What I found heartwarming was despite the denial, the group still forged on and held meetings.”
Seton Hall student government is planning to conduct its own survey to check the accuracy of the ranking, said Andrew Medeiros, Setonian assistant news editor and the reporter there who covers lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues.
Some students at Vanderbilt, a Southern conservative school in Tennessee, took issue with their school’s ranking on the gay unfriendly list. Vanderbilt also ranked No. 4 on the list of schools that had little interaction between people from different racial and class backgrounds.
“Some other schools in Nashville are not even close to how progressive Vanderbilt is,” said Jonathan Sager, treasurer of Lambda, one of the two campus gay student groups.
Many students at Vanderbilt who come from small, Southern towns, he said, have never met an openly gay person before.
“It’s not always comforting to walk around campus and be open about your sexuality,” he said. At times, other students will look at his equal marriage buttons pinned onto his backpack with, he said, “weird looks – what are you doing?”
To get off the worst list, Tanya Mayo, program director for the Gay-Straight Alliance Network, advises schools to create GSAs and conduct trainings on homophobia for faculty and administration. Also, she suggested, schools can integrate lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues into their curriculum. When those subjects are introduced into the classroom, she said, it shows the “greatest overall climate change.”
SCHOOLS ON THE worst list tended to be Southern and conservative, like Virginia’s Washington and Lee University, in Lexington, which ranked 14th on the “gay community not accepted” list.
Many of the colleges on the pro-gay list are known for having socially conscious and politically progressive students — from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Md., to Eugene Lang College, the undergraduate, liberal arts division of the New School University in New York, Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, the New College of Florida in Sarasota, and Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn.
New College of Florida, which was rated No. 1 on the “gay community accepted” list, also ranked N
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