<p>I'm currently a high school student in San Francisco considering applying to Rice. I really like the size of the university and the residential college system, but coming from one of the most liberal places in the country I was wondering how conservative (relatively) Rice is. </p>
<p>From what I’ve read it is moderate, not either very liberal or very conservative. </p>
<p>Politics are pretty fringe at Rice. By that I mean political clubs are small or nonexistent, and students generally don’t talk about politics for fun. That’s somewhat anecdotal, but I’m confident that it applies pretty generally. Religious clubs are popular on campus, but the atmosphere around them is really healthy, so don’t worry about any religious stratification. </p>
<p>Any general conservatism in Houston is somewhat far removed from Rice’s campus. You don’t really feel it. Plus, there are a lot of liberal aspects to the city (commonly cited example is the gay mayor). </p>
<p>Rice is smack in the middle of Rice Village, which actually kind of reminds me of San Francisco- more than the rest of Houston anyway. It’s walkable (unlike pretty much everywhere else) and has all sorts of small cafes and shops. It’s also where KPFT (the super-liberal radio station) is based. The residents (in my experience) tend to be young and liberal. Plus Houston is one of the most liberal cities in Texas: besides the mayor, there’s a thriving gay community in Montrose, and Harris County (which includes Houston and the surrounding suburbs) actually went for Obama in 2012 (by 2 points, but still). And in some literature Rice sent me a couple years ago which listed their student groups, I saw Young Democrats but had no similar group for the GOP. That could be either because Democrats felt defensive and outnumbered or simply because they had more support. It is a university, after all. But there’s now a Republican group too. Tellingly, Rice also hosts the Baker Institute, one of the few nonpartisan think tanks in the US. Jfking01 is right: most of the conservatism is centered in the suburbs, a long way away from Rice. Of course there’s going to be conservatives, and there’ll probably be more than at say Berkeley, but that just adds some variety and it’ll be educational! That’s no reason to overlook a great school.</p>
<p>Rice is very apathetic. Most people stay out of politics and don’t really care to be involved in it much. You have a fringe group of vocal left wingers and a even smaller group of righties (who aren’t that vocal from what I remember).</p>
<p>I wouldn’t worry about it.</p>