Dartmouth, Gay friendly?

warblersrule
Wed, 14 Dec 2011 11:32:20 +0000

Alexandre:

Athough am certain that the Dartmouth student body and administration is accepting of, and welcoming to, gay students, I think options will be lacking. Dartmouth has fewer than 6,000 students and Hanover fewer than 15,000 residents. One would be better off going to a larger university in a larger town.

My thoughts on the matter are divided, hence why I recommended a couple of similar universities in my earlier post. On the one hand, gay students are attracted to Dartmouth for all the same reasons straight students are – the cohesive student body, the beautiful rural campus, the focus on liberal arts, etc. For some gay students, wanting a small rural college like Williams may well trump limited dating opportunities, and a school like Berkeley would simply not be an option. Recommending colleges merely because they’re in a large city, as goldenboy seemed to (Columbia? really?), trivializes other very important factors in the college selection process. I’m gay but would take a college like Bowdoin or Haverford over UCLA or NYU any day. Admittedly, the US has enough colleges that I think slightly larger or slightly more urban versions of Dartmouth are available.

On the other hand, it is true that small colleges often run the risk of being accepting but having insufficient critical mass. I have criticized LACs for this before. After all, typically only 50% of a college is male (40% at some), and only about 10% of those at a typical top college are gay or bisexual (Yale is something of an outlier at 20%). About 5% of the total student body would therefore be viable options for a gay male – at Dartmouth, around 200 guys. When one factors in that many of these are closeted or in relationships, the figures don’t look that great. Size is not everything, of course; the Ivy with by far the most complaints about a limited gay dating pool is oddly enough the much larger Cornell. Personally, I’d say Dartmouth is just barely big enough to be a viable option for an LGB student. Others wanting more options may differ.

I think the best option for the OP is to go straight to the source and talk to people at Dartmouth, either through the [LGBT advisor](Home | Office of Pluralism and Leadership) or the [gay-straight alliance](http://www.dartmouth.edu/~gsa/).