[whiteperil] Sean: Camp on campus

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Posted by Sean:
Camp on campus
http://whiteperil.com/posts/1156943918.shtml


   The Advocate's publishing arm is [1]getting into the college rankings
   act (via [2]Michael):

     Since 1992, the Princeton Review, has ranked the 20 schools that it
     considers the most and the least "gay community accepted."
     [[3]Here's the list.--SRK] This year, the review ranked New York
     University as most gay friendly and Notre Dame as most
     inhospitable.
     Steele points out that the Review's gay-friendly rankings are based
     on student opinion, while his guide is based on quantifiable data.
     Harriet Brand, spokeswoman for the Review, said the survey of
     115,000 students is more compelling because students offer a more
     accurate, ground-level gauge of a campus's climate.

   I have to side with Harriet Brand here--and not just because of
   company loyalty. Numbers of courses listed in the gay studies
   department, dollars of funding for gay student organizations, and the
   like are presumably what The Advocate is quantifying--The Boston Globe
   doesn't say--but they only tell part of the story. "Gay-friendly"
   depends on perception. I'd be willing to bet that there are quite a
   few public colleges that have funded gay and lesbian programs but
   where gay students don't feel particularly comfortable. And there
   could be institutions at which lots of little identity-politics-driven
   organizations don't exist but students of many kinds study comfortably
   alongside one another. In any case, potential applicants now have at
   least two resources, compiled using complementary methods, to draw
   from.

References

   1. http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/08/25/campus_gay_point_average/
   2. http://gayorbit.net/?p=5364
   3. http://www.princetonreview.com/college/research/rankings/rankingDetails.asp?categoryID=2&topicID=24