Hey there! I’m new here and I am definitely attending Vassar next year as a freshman. I read an article that was really concerning to me about the apparent “overwhelming liberal influence/radical liberalism” at Vassar:
http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/19079/
(Yes I am aware that the news source is right-wing and probably bias).
Basically, the article states that on a guy’s first day in campus how he met with his student fellow group who participated in talks about the patriarchy/ rape culture/ how all men contribute to rape culture and even how assigning somebody a gender at birth is “violence”.
Just to clarify - I am definitely liberal and would consider myself open-minded, but I don’t consider myself an “SJW”. I believe in social equality for everyone, but I don’t believe in an inherent patriarchy/ rape culture/ the all-men-are-pigs mentality that the article seems to think is at Vassar. I love political/social discussion, but I DON’T want my college experience to be dominated by politicized overtones.
For anyone who attends Vassar: how true is the article, in your experience? If this is true, does it bleed into the classes (do history classes, for instance, have an OVERT political agenda)? How accepting is the student body of people with different social/political beliefs - would I be shunned for not being “as” liberal?
My D (who is a live-and-let-live soul, definitely not an in-your-face person) loves Vassar, but I wouldn’t recommend it for my nephew. That’s because he is so conservative that he sees many forms of tolerance as a political agenda and Vassar would just not be happy for him. Just seeing a gay couple makes him flinch. So, no, Vassar is not for everybody.
I read the article, and I can see why it gave you pause. There are indeed a few hints of an agenda on the author’s part all right. I noticed that one of the commenters said ‘yes there were some (whackadoodle) people there, but it was always interesting and it was a great experience’.
History classes- or English or any of the others my D has taken- do not have an overt political agenda. I don’t like the claim that a Political Science teacher routinely spent a lot of class time on snickering matches at conservative political candidates, but honestly I would be surprised at any PoliSci class in the country that didn’t have a certain amount of political jokes in the heat of an election campaign- probably more against liberals at Bucknell and against conservatives at Vassar- but it should not be wasting class time or at the expense of students in the room.
Anyway, that’s a long way around saying, most of the students are what you might call normal liberal. There are of course there are some farther out there, but no you won’t be ‘shunned’! And btw, the military veterans who have come onto campus over the last 2 years (https://admissions.vassar.edu/apply/yellow-ribbon.html) have settled in very happily, and one would not see them as likely to be super-liberal 
Another public service announcement masquerading as a question?
@collegemom3717
Thanks, I definitely feel better about it now! I kind of freaked out when I saw the article, but considering the source… yeah, I shouldn’t be too worried.