<p>(University of Oklahoma)</p>
<p>I was planning to transfer to OU for monetary reasons, but I've recently felt like it may be more important to me to find a school where I can really explore myself and be in an environment that makes me happy. I want to be around people who are extremely open and non-judgemental (for once), and where there is a significant gay community. I have my doubts whether I'll find that anywhere in Oklahoma, but I am hopeful!</p>
<p>I’m gay and plan on attending OU when I graduate high school, and I’d like to know this as well. I know that they have an LGBT organisation, but that seemed pretty pitiful, judging by their website. I might attend an out of state college, just so that I can experience a more accepting environment. God forbid I get a better education as well :P</p>
<p>OP said:
I want to be around people who are extremely open and non-judgemental (for once), and where there is a significant gay community. I have my doubts whether I’ll find that anywhere in Oklahoma, but I am hopeful! </p>
<p>To answer your question, my nephew attends Oklahoma City University, and there seems to be a sigifnicant gay community there - many are studying music, musical theatre, etc. It is also private and more expensive, unfortunately.</p>
<p>ljuvlig, I’m right there with you! It’s soo frustrating trying to find information about this… I’ve e-mailed OU’s GLBTF organization at the general address AND specifically to the president, but haven’t been answered yet… It’s been a few days now.</p>
<p>As far as going out of state, I feel kind of lost… It seems that my only choices for the most gay-friendly environments are prestigious schools (Duke, UCLA, Penn, Stanford, Princeton, etc.) or schools in liberal areas that may not even provide the education that OU could (but for 5x the money). Here are some links that might be helpful, though you may have already seen them:
[AdmissionsAdvice.com:</a> Gay-Friendly Colleges](<a href=“http://www.collegehunt.blogspot.com/2006/09/gay-friendly-colleges.html]AdmissionsAdvice.com:”>http://www.collegehunt.blogspot.com/2006/09/gay-friendly-colleges.html)
[Gay</a> Sports Blog: Top Gay Friendly College Football Schools](<a href=“http://sports.gay.com/2009/07/top-gay-football-atmosphere-colleges.html]Gay”>http://sports.gay.com/2009/07/top-gay-football-atmosphere-colleges.html)
[Test</a> Prep: GMAT, GRE, LSAT, MCAT, SAT, ACT, and More](<a href=“LGBTQ-Friendly Colleges | The Princeton Review”>LGBTQ-Friendly Colleges | The Princeton Review)</p>
<p>college_query, thanks :). I guess it makes sense that Oklahoma City would be more gay-friendly than Norman or Stillwater :P. I’m not big on the religious schools, but I’ll definitely look it over.</p>
<p>Edit:
Here’s the only older thread I found about this:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-oklahoma/557230-being-gay-ou.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-oklahoma/557230-being-gay-ou.html</a></p>
<p>And here’s a review about OU’s diversity (It got a C-):
http:// college prowl er .com/university-of-oklahoma/diversity/ (no spaces)
The comments on that one are kind of helpful, too (white, conservative, Christian majority), and it mentions a “Gay Pride” category further down.</p>
<p>Why do you think that such out-of-state schools wouldn’t given you a better education? OU is by no means super prestigious. I mean, they let ANYONE in, and my brother had more awful professors than he did good ones. I’m going to do everything in my power so that I DON’T have to attend OU, but in the end, if that’s what it comes down to, I suppose it won’t be so bad. I’d just like to go to college in a large city at a well renowned university, like the University of Texas in Austin.</p>
<p>It’s not that I think OU is prestigious, but that schools like Ohio State or Oregon seem to be about on par, or even maybe below, OU’s level of education. I’m trying my best to do good research, but it’s impossible to sift through good and bad information. I read good things about gay-friendliness of these campuses, but when I look at actual comments from students, nothing is mentioned about it at all. On CollegeProwl er, I have yet to see one student’s comment about diversity mention sexual orientation. It almost makes it seem like they aren’t any more gay-friendly than OU, which I think can’t be true :P.</p>
<p>Well, my brother attended OU, and he said that like within the first week of his first semester there he had seen a lot of flyers and such for the LGBT group’s first meeting. He also said that someone had written about it in sidewalk chalk on the sidewalk, though such forms of advertising are probably commonplace at colleges around the world. He also said that the bookstore sold issues of The Advocate; I’m sure you know what that is. If not, it’s the most popular LGBT-interest magazine around.</p>
<p>I’m starting to sweat it less and less. 'Cause look at it this way; even if the atmosphere isn’t OMGAMAZING, Oklahoma City is just like 20 minutes away. So, make some friends (females are good for this) and perhaps even some males, presumably from the gay club, and go clubbing in OKC, if that’s something that interests you. It interests me :b</p>
<p>I’d suggest we meet up, but I’m only a sophomore in HS, so I won’t be attending OU for another 2 or so years :P</p>
<p>Heck, we should meet up anyway! Hah! Jk ;P. You don’t go to OYP, do you? (Lol)</p>
<p>You sure changed your mind pretty fast about OU! 
If I ever actually get a response from anyone in the GLBTF club, I’ll make sure and update this thread.</p>
<p>I used to live in Oklahoma and have bunch of friends attending OU - there does not seem to be that much of a problem. Yes it is in the bible belt, but most likely, people will leave you alone. It’s not like they are going to hit you with a bible or something, don’t worry about it. OU is a big school and you’ll find your ground sooner or later.</p>
<p>No, I don’t go to the OYP often. I live in Muskogee and since I can’t drive yet, it’s hard to make the 30 minute trip.</p>
<p>Here’s the response I received from OU’s GLBTF organization:
</p>
<p>It sounds like he sent you a thoughtful, honest reply instead of being all “rah rah, our school’s perfect” about it. Good for him.</p>
<p>*she/her
;)</p>
<p>Whoever gave you the response was being honest; I’m happy about that. The only thing about OU is their financial aid is **** if you aren’t a national merit scholar. I really hate it. My parents make about 60k per year so we don’t qualify for OHLAP, so the only thing I have going for me is any scholarships I can get, FASFA, and a LITTLE amount of money that I get for being native American. Once I get my SAT/ACT scores and final GPA, I’m gonna see if there’re any colleges I can go to for the same amount or even less (which is understandable, seeing as how expensive OU is for an instate school). There’s no way in hell I’m going to go to OSU, but OCU might be an option. It’s in Edmond, as I’m sure you know. I don’t know if it has the sufficient courses for what I want to do, though. I want to teach English as a second language, and OU probably can give me that, but I dunno about OCU. One thing I thought was awesome about OCU is that it has a forensics program. I’ve never seen that in any college I’ve looked at in Oklahoam (granted, there aren’t many competent ones).</p>
<p>I don’t think I have the answers for you, but I don’t know where you got the idea that OU was expensive! It’s like one of the cheapest schools in the nation! OU’s OUT-of-state tuition is far less expensive than most schools’ IN-state. At least, that’s what I found when I was looking through the “gay-friendly” schools. But I seriously don’t think I saw any school on my entire search that was cheaper than OU :P.</p>
<p>What!? Okay, tuition alone is 16k. That’s for an in-state student. Room and board is 7.5k. Then figure in your books and spending money. Thankfully, OU has a nice meal points system, and in all of its flaws, its cafeteria has the best food EVER! Not to mention there’s also a taco bell, some caf</p>
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</p>
<p>Oops! That’s what I get for assuming. ;)</p>
<p>After attending OU for almost a semester, I would say that the atmosphere is not typically hostile towards gays, but I wouldn’t recommend OU for any reason to someone looking for a gay-friendly school. Yes, there are plenty of LGBT supporters, and an inspiring amount of people showed up for a candlelight vigil held in honor of the recent gay suicides, but I wouldn’t feel particularly comfortable being openly gay around the student body. There have been a couple incidents that I know of, one where the pride flag for the GLBTF organization was stolen at an overnight event, and another where the poster for the candlelight vigil had been torn down and trashed on my floor before the event had occurred.</p>
<p>The GLBTF student organization is definitely active and can introduce LGBTs to a supporting community on campus, but to be honest, it’s kind of full of misfits. By that, I mean they just would not and do not fit in with the general student population, which is overwhelmingly conservative and religious.</p>
<p>In the end, I think I could have been much happier at a different university. To anyone looking for a more gay-friendly one, I can’t give personal accounts, but I would recommend researching and/or visiting U-Michigan, Penn State, and Ohio State.</p>
<p>
[quote=ljuvlig]
Thankfully, OU has a nice meal points system, and in all of its flaws, its cafeteria has the best food EVER! Not to mention there’s also a taco bell, some caf</p>
<p>^Yeah, that’s EXACTLY how it is at UMCP. Using cash in the diners is a better deal than buying a meal plan - purchasing the meal plan upfront should save you money, not cost extra!</p>
<p>I think it’s unfortunately a state school/public school thing for there to be a lot of hidden fees/ways to skim off some extra operating money.</p>
<p>That’s a very insightful response that you got from the girl in the LGBT group. I think it articulates very well both the good and bad sides of being gay at OU, and indirectly shows off a very fair, intelligent activist community.</p>
<p>I don’t go to OU nor am I familiar with it, but one thing I would caution the OP against is factoring gay life into his college decision too much. I know we all went to highschools where we were like the only gay kid and we could never get a date and it was terrible and whatnot, but it’s really easy to let the “gay aspect” get in the way of you thinking clearly about other aspects of your uni experience. For instance, I thought I wanted a really big school (so there would be lots of gay people, duh!), but being at a really big school, I realized (way too late) that I would have done much better at a small liberal arts college. I know a lot of gay people here but I feel like I would have known just as much anywhere…I’m not the type to have more than a handful of people in my “posse” so it was really unnecessary for me to have anything more than a close knit community.</p>
<p>I don’t say that in relation to OU specifically, because it seems there may be other concerns about conservatism overall, poor academics overall, etc. but just some advice for any gay kid looking at universities…keep things in perspective. Anything is going to be better than high school, pretty much. You don’t have to roll out the red carpet and go NYU or bust ;).</p>
<p>If you’re looking for a good school that’s gay-friendly, come to UT instead. :P</p>