<p>I've narrowed it down to the three big ones -- College of Charleston, Clemson, and USC. Which of these (or any others you may know of in SC) are the most gay/lesbian-friendly?</p>
<p>Also, what are other good, more well known gay-friendly colleges in the South?</p>
<p>Hardly any places in the south are tolerant of gays except some large cities like Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas. So try colleges in large cities.</p>
<p>I know that the south isn’t very well known for tolerance of gays, but when applying to colleges I’d rather have at least one or two safe bets in-state, or close to it. </p>
<p>So I guess what I really need help with is deciding which college is the lesser of the evils. If I did have to go to an in-state school, I guess I would just try to do exceptionally well and then transfer somewhere else.</p>
<p>The concept of “liberal” in the South is what might pass for “moderate” farther north, but I think you’d find the vibe at College of Charleston to be far less conservative than at USC or Clemson. It, and its hometown, attract people from other parts of the country and my sense is that that tends to bring C of C a greater appreciation of diversity.</p>
<p>I’m sure the students at Davidson must be pretty sophisticated.</p>
<p>If you are determined to stay in the south, Atlanta would be (by far) your best bet. Look into Georgia State - it’s dowtown, which is adjacent to midtown - midtown is the center of gay life in Atlanta. Also consider Emory. Emory is in Decatur, but it’s close to gay-friendly neighborhoods such as East Atlanta Village, Little Five Points, and Virginia Highlands.</p>
<p>LGBT?</p>
<p>what exactly does that stand for… I get the Lesbian Gay but what about BT?</p>
<p>you sound like a ■■■■■.</p>
<p>forget college…move to Key West or San Francisco.</p>
<p>Bisexual and Transgender/Transexual</p>
<p>
Both Duke and UNC Chapel Hill have thriving LGBT communities, if you have the stats to get in, and are most likely your best bets. UNC Greensboro and Guilford are also LGBT-friendly and much less difficult to get into. </p>
<p>Emory and most of the Florida schools would also be worth checking out.</p>
<p>A few more resources…</p>
<p>[The</a> Advocate College Guide for LGBT Students](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Advocate-College-Guide-LGBT-Students/dp/155583857X]The”>http://www.amazon.com/Advocate-College-Guide-LGBT-Students/dp/155583857X)</p>
<p>[Colleges</a> with LGBT centers](<a href=“http://www.lgbtcampus.org/directory/]Colleges”>http://www.lgbtcampus.org/directory/)</p>
<p>[LGBT-Friendly</a> Campus Climate Index](<a href=“http://www.campusclimateindex.org/]LGBT-Friendly”>http://www.campusclimateindex.org/)</p>
<p>The University of Georgia was the first major university to have an openly gay person elected president of its student government association: Jody O’Connell was elected SGA president in 1975. Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, has prominent openly gay alumni. I don’t think the south is as anti-gay as many posters on this thread would presume.</p>
<p>The poster wants a gay friendly college. Why does that make him/her a ■■■■■ jdjaguar? Sounds like you have a bit of a problem with gays and lesbians when you want them isolated in SF or Key West.</p>
<p>C of C is the best bet in South Carolina</p>
<p>What is Key West?</p>
<p>Depending on how academically qualified you are you might want to look into Rice, hear in Houston the whole gay thing is not nearly as big an issue as it might be in other parts of the south.</p>
<p>I don’t know much about South Carolina, but I know that North Carolina schools attract a lot of northeastern students, so they tend to be more liberal (and I’m not even really trying to stereotype here - I think it’s obvious that northeastern students are MORE LIKELY to be liberal than southern students).</p>
<p>I agree that Atlanta has a lot of gays, and is very welcoming.
New Orleans, of course, is gay friendly. In Florida, the following cities with colleges have sizeable gay populations: Tampa, Fort Lauderdale, Miami. I think that Orlando probably is gay-friendly, too, due to its large arts/entertainment community. Tallahassee also is a liberal city that is gay-friendly.</p>
<p>In naming cities with a more open-minded culture, we seem to be picking out places that have attracted a population that’s not all originally from the South. NO and Miami, for example, are geographically Southern, but their populations are not culturally typically Southern.</p>
<p>jdjaguar, there are five in my family; four of us are righthanded, and one of my daughters is lefthanded. I’m glad that my lefthanded daughter isn’t constantly told to leave the life she knows and hide in a limited number of places where lefties are tolerated.</p>
<p>I would suspect that the College of Charleston would provide the most accepting environment of the three SC colleges you mentioned. The city of Charleston itself has a fairly substantial gay population and I know that many of our gay friendsand acquaintences here in NY enjoy spending part of the winter there. I realize that merely by being located in Charleston doesn’t make C of C GLBT-friendly (It is the home of The Citadel after all), but I suspect some of the attributes that attract gay and lesbian adults probably hold some attraction to GLBT college students.</p>
<p>Since the OP’s request was for financial and academic safeties in-state for South Carolina, we should assume that there is already a familiarity with LGBT friendly out-of-state and private schools, such as Emory. Of the three in-state schools you mention, the only school with an active LGBT or GSA organizations is USC. That said, from my visit there, I think that CofC would be welcoming and friendly even without an official LGBT designation.</p>
<p>Also note that many states have reciprocal tuition exchanges or reductions for contiguous neighboring state, which reduces out-of-state tuition to more manageable in-state rate. You may want to check out what your home state, or immediate neighbors have to offer.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>You could say exactly the same thing about the traditionally more liberal cities like New York, San Francisco, LA, etc. People have been drawn to them from all over the country/world. They’re no more “typically” Northern or Western than urban centers in the South are southern.</p>