Recent Alumna & Interviewer Open to Questions!

Colleges and Universities A-Z Barnard College
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<p>lorraine, I’m pretty sure that NYU is as LGBTQ-friendly as Barnard, and if anything NYU’ers are probably more “out” or flamboyant, just because NYU is in the village… there’s probably more stuff like gay bars & clubs in that area. Maybe there will be a greater percentage of lesbians at a women’s school like Barnard… but the point is that you are going to find the same issue at just about any school, or at least any school in the northeast. </p>

<p>Keep in mind that a straight roommate might have a boyfriend hanging out in the room all the time & even spending the night, perhaps quite frequently… and perhaps more than one guy (though hopefully not any more than one at a time). So you could have a gay roommate and find yourself very relieved down the line that you aren’t ever waking up to seeing a guy sleeping in the other bed in the room. </p>

<p>In any case, Barnard will generally honor specific roommate requests, so while you can’t control who they might assign as your roommate if you leave it up to them, you can request to room with someone you meet at an admitted student event or via facebook (assuming the request is mutual, of course). My d. did that – in hindsight perhaps not such a good idea for a variety of reasons – but it is a possibility if you are really concerned about finding someone compatible.</p>

<p>I would note that NYC is a very diverse and very, very crowded place. You really are not going to be happy there unless you develop a very tolerant attitude – you don’t have to approve of what other people do, but there is no way to avoid contact with people doing all sorts of stuff or leading all sorts of lifestyles that may not be your cup of tea. It helps to also have a sense of humor about everything – I mean, you can run into some pretty strange people on the subway.</p>

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<p>I’m so late on this, but thank you for the response!! Also, one more itty bitty question (that I’ve already asked, like, a MILLION times because it’s how I’m picking the college but I want your take): what is the English program like (particularly the Creative Writing tract)? What’s the caliber of writers (student, staff, etc) like?</p>

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<p>Hi dolphins3636! Quick question is about the meal plan; my friend’s sister is a very happy Barnard student but she was explaining to me how the meal plan is mandatory for all students. My only concern is that I’m Jewish and keep kosher; do you know if there’s a lot of vegetarian/kosher options available? Is the food good? :slight_smile: Thank you!</p>

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<p>I have a question regarding the LGBTQ community: When I told my friends that I was going to visit Barnard today, they said some very stereotypical comments about there being a lot of lesbians/was I going to become a lesbian if I went there? If I go to Barnard, I want to have the reputation of going to a great school in the middle of NYC, not that I went to a school with an active lesbian population (not that that bothers me, but I’d rather people know Barnard for its great academics). Has that ever been an issue when you told people you went to Barnard?</p>

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<p>Also, one more thing: If I went to Barnard, I’d have to rely heavily on financial aid. I don’t come from a very wealthy family so it would be tough for me to have a lot of spending money. How expensive is it to be a college student at Barnard? I’m worried that I’d be stuck in the dorms while other people spent money on expensive shows or restaurants that I couldn’t afford.</p>

<p>Thanks so much! :)</p>

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<p>Rebecca, Barnard has an entire kosher plan that even includes a shabbas service & dinner – it is described here - [Dining</a> Services at Barnard](<a href=“http://www.barnard.edu/dining/]Dining”>Dine On Campus) and [Welcome</a> to CampusDish at Barnard!](<a href=“http://www.campusdish.com/en-US/CSE/Barnard/]Welcome”>http://www.campusdish.com/en-US/CSE/Barnard/) – it does cost more than the regular plan.</p>

<p>Roughly 1/3 of Barnard students identify as Jewish and there is a significant number of orthodox Jews, plus there is a close affiliation with the Jewish Theological Seminary – so I think that Barnard takes the needs of its Jewish students very seriously. The Hillel people are great, by the way – my daughter didn’t connect with them until her senior year, unfortunately – because once she did make the connections she made some great friends plus she ended up working for them, which was a great boost for her finances.</p>

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<p>Full disclosure – I am a very GLBTQ-friendly person, but straight with a straight daughter who graduated from Barnard. Her BFF from Barnard is bi, but most of her friends are straight.</p>

<p>I understand that our attitude isn’t the same as a Conservative Texan, but I don’t think she cares who her friends sleep with as long as they’re not self-destructive. It would be like caring if her friend was dating a blond or a brunet.</p>

<p>If your roommate is a lesbian, she’s not going to hit on a straight young woman who isn’t interested in her; why would she? If you feel uncomfortable you could dress in the bathroom. You also might find that someone very different from you might become your best friend. Think how exciting and life changing that could be.</p>

<p>From my observations, Barnard is not as aggressively queer as Smith, but it’s more style than substance.</p>

<p>Barnard has Orthodox Jewish women, religious Islamic women, fashionistas, small town farm girls, lesbians, sunny Californians (Hi calmom), many girls from Texas (my D had two in her frosh suite), etc., etc. There is not one dominant culture. I don’t think you’ll find it too anything, except perhaps too driven. It’s not the place for very laid back folk who only want to party.</p>

<p>Calmom is exactly right – with an open mind and a good sense of humor you should be fine in the environment. I think you can stop worrying about this.</p>

<p>A lot of the talk about lesbians is humor; not that lesbians are humorous but some juvenile straight guys seem to think it’s a funny thing to joke about. I know that some of DD’s friends and acquaintances from HS teased her relentlessly about it. But that spoke about them, not Barnard.</p>

<p>We are proud of our open-mindedness in NY, and we are trying hard to get a same-sex marriage bill based in the NY legislature. So far, no luck. I think that is something to worry about. I hope we prevail soon.</p>

<p>On another subject, the creative writing classes are wonderful and the support for writers is stupendous.</p>

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<p>thanks! barnard sounds wonderful :)</p>

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<p>Yup, I’d like to echo that question about cost of living. The stereotypes I’ve heard about Barnard are a little different, more along the lines of rich Jewish girls. I’m relatively Jewish myself, so no issues there :), and neither rich nor poor, but I’ve always been the girl who paid for my own clothes and earned my own spending money, so I expect I’ll continue to need to earn money for everything (outside of the meal plan) along those lines. Are most people just sort of enjoying NYC on their parents’ dime or starving students or somewhere in between? </p>

<p>I’ve never even been to any sort of private school, so I’m totally going off stereotypes for that too :).</p>

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<p>Another mom of a Barnard grad jumping in here:</p>

<p>Re the cost of living question: our D always had a work-study job while attending Barnard and she sometimes had additional jobs TAing or tutoring privately. She earned extra spending money that way. Many of her friends had jobs as nannies/baby sitters that paid quite well. One actually accompanied a professor and their children to Europe for a conference! So you will find many students who are most certainly NOT just “enjoying NYC on their parents’ dime”! There are all sorts of students to be found at Barnard. </p>

<p>I would also add that my D comes from a Southern Protestant family and absolutely LOVED her experiences getting to know and live with women who were raised very differently. Her first-year suite included a young woman who was an Orthodox Jew, and she loved learning all about their traditions and culture etc. </p>

<p>I think that Barnard does a great job with the questionnaire that you will complete for first-year housing, in “matching” roommates who have not known each other previously. I know my D was thrilled to get to know these girls and loved living with them her first year. It’s a fantastic opportunity to broaden those horizons and, IMO, that is a large part of what college should be about!</p>

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<p>

We’re foggy Californians…</p>

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<p>does anyone know how important the subject tests are? I didn’t have any time to study and I know it will be pretty awful b/c from the few practice questions I’ve done, they are very hard. my SATs are ok for barnard, my gpa is a little low, and I’m scared these will put me in the ‘no’ pile :(</p>

<p>anyone know how important they are, or are they for class placement or something? thanks!</p>

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<p>Lorraine, have you thought about taking the ACTs? I’m not sure if there’s still time - done with my testing, haven’t been looking at the dates. But if so, then you can submit those and leave your subject tests out of it…</p>

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<p>thanks but I did good on my SATs and not so good on the ACTS (I did great on all sections but science b/c I just couldn’t make myself do the science part! I didn’t even do that section and I got a 25 so maybe I would’ve done well but I’d already taken the SAT and knew I did okay…ugh looking back I should’ve just suffered through it but oh well!! ugh I’m mad about it but its my fault…) </p>

<p>I haven’t had any free time to study, so I’m just barely looking over stuff tonight (I take the US history, spanish, and literature SAT IIs tomorrow.) and I’m freaking out b/c I have one chance and thats it! I just wish they took only the SAT…I’m so worried my low scores will make them reject me…oh well I should’ve done the science part on the ACT. If I’d known it would’ve gotten me out of the SAT IIs I would have!!</p>

<p>Thanks for the advice! I guess I’ll just study for 2 hours and hope to do okay tomorrow!</p>

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<p>^Good luck!</p>

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<p>aw thanks jbubbles!! are you applying to Barnard too?</p>

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<p>haha and I think the fact that I’m on cc at 9 on a friday night shows how obsessed I am with getting into Barnard…I know I don’t have a great chance, but I want to get in so so bad…ahhhhhhh</p>

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<p>lorrainedelis: Obviously since I am a lesbian, it’s never been a problem for me to room with a straight girl, but you have to remember…you don’t check out every guy right? Lesbians aren’t checking out every girl. It really wouldn’t be weird, I promise. I’m not too sure what you mean by “too LGBT” but again, college will be as much or as little of something as you want it to be. If you don’t want to get involved in LGBT stuff, you won’t have to!
I don’t know about the timing of on-campus interviews, but I know that alumna interviewers only get contacted to interview someone after their application is turned in.</p>

<p>shay33: I played rugby for the Columbia University Women’s Rugby Football Club, and I was in Everyone Allied Against Homophobia, the Russian Conversational Club, and the Columbia University Linguistics Alliance. I also volunteered as a pre-test counselor for the Gay Health Advocacy Project (it’s part of the Columbia University Health Services and does free HIV tests as well as counsels students about STIs and also deals specifically with LGBT issues). I was also a mentor with the LGBT family tree for the Columbia Mentoring Initiative which connected LGBT first-year students with LGBT alumni as well as current students. I also was paid as an undergraduate researcher through Columbia for a year. </p>

<p>There are many girls at Barnard who dance; Barnard has a really good dance program. I never took any dance classes but I wish I had! I wouldn’t be too concerned about becoming overwhelmed with activities- people understand how busy you can get so if you want to drop out of a club or something no one will look down upon you.</p>

<p>calmom: I really wouldn’t say that Barnard has a greater percentage of lesbians than any other school…</p>

<p>smartundecided: Barnard has an excellent writing program. Creative writing is housed within the English major, and I actually never took a creative writing class so I can’t really comment on it too much. However, Barnard has many famous writer alumnae, among them Jhumpa Lahiri and Anna Quindlen.</p>

<p>rebeccar: I’m a Jewish vegetarian, and never had a problem with the food. I don’t actually keep Kosher but I’ve heard that they have awesome Kosher food. You have to select the Kosher option when you get the meal plan so unless you chose that you aren’t allowed to eat the Kosher food. The vegetarian food was great, I had no complaints. There’s a HUGE Jewish population at BC/CU so they’re very good about that. You can also go eat at Hillel if you want- Cafe Nana is great!</p>

<p>jcdancer9: People will always say ignorant things like that about women’s colleges. (My theory about that is that people are afraid of strong women…) There is a large and vocal LGBT population at BC/CU. If anyone says something to you about it and it bothers you, just ignore them. But it’s nothing to be ashamed of! Straight women, gay women, bi women, rich women, poor women, white women, asian women, etc, all go to women’s colleges/Barnard. It’s a diverse group, and that’s what makes it great.</p>

<p>Raspberi & jcdancer9: It can be cheap, or expensive…It all depends on what you want to do. There’s plenty of free stuff to do in NYC, so I wouldn’t worry too much. Most people at Barnard are not seeing Broadway shows or going out to dinner every week. You will encounter rich Jewish girls. You’ll also encounter first-generation students who are paying for college themselves. Again, Barnard is very diverse and you will find a group that you can feel comfortable with, don’t worry!</p>

<p>lorrainedelis (again :slight_smile: ) : The subject tests are about as important as the SAT/ACT is. It’s not as important as your HS gpa, but it’s somewhat important.</p>

<p>Sorry I took so long to reply to everyone! Grad school’s been keeping me busy… :)</p>

<p>Let me know if you have any more questions or if I didn’t fully answer yours!</p>

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<p>thanks dolphins! I’m not that worried about the gay thing anymore now…haha I hope you don’t think I’m a homophobe! I’m just not used to it :)</p>

<p>well I bombed the subject tests, so Barnard is definitely very iffy now, but I’m still obsessed with it, so here goes:
I just read the post about the way Barnard girls are treated and it really really freaks me out. If I went to Barnard I’d want to feel like I went to a top-tier school! Its so hard to get into, and its very presigious…so I wouldn’t want to be put down or feel ‘less.’ and the ‘Barnard to bed, Columbia to wed’ things irks me too. How are the [mostly] feminist women at Barnard considered slutty? I just don’t see why that’s (one of) Barnard’s stereotypes…is that even a little bit how it is? so unfair!</p>

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<p>Thanks for your responses! :)</p>