We all know about the schools that make the news for students’ political activism but what would you guys say are the least politically active, social justice minded schools?
Personally, I applied to schools heavy on the activism but my brother is a rising junior who couldn’t care less and would never want to attend a protest or march on Washington. He’s liberal and cares to an extent but isn’t interested in the whole up in your face social justice warrior thing. He doesn’t mind its presence but absolutely doesn’t want it to dominate student life or significantly contribute to the overall campus vibe.
I’m trying to put together an initial list of schools for him to start visiting over the next year but it’s difficult since I have to start from scratch and I appreciate any suggestions you all can give me. Disregard costs and stats as he doesn’t have any test scores quite yet but he’s a good student so he should have a decent shot at most places when the time comes.
Every school is good for non-activists. Even at the most stereotypically “social justice” schools, the majority of students aren’t activists. @thisgirlcodes
Generally, a student can ignore political activist activity if s/he is not interested.
If a student wants less political activist activity, then colleges with more commuters, older students, and students in pre-professional majors are likely to have less of it (except perhaps if there is some local-to-the-college triggering incident).
Well, I see you’ve added the “generally” qualifier, but I don’t think I can accept this sentence as written.
While it is true that individuals can choose their own path, decide when and where they will be, and to some degree to whom they will listen, an environment with visible, encouraged and consistent “activism” absolutely will have an impact on a person, especially a person trying to avoid it.
The route to class, the opportunities for casual social interaction, the nature of sanctioned and non sanctioned school events and speakers, the social pressure associated with one’s new peers - all these and more have the potential to disrupt the choices and experiences of someone.
We can discuss whether it is “good” or “bad” or “neither”, and also “how much it matters”, but I think the potential impact is there, and is as much a consideration of fit as is the weather or the bathroom arrangement in the dorms.
In answer to the original question, again in very general terms … large research institutions, usually public, would trend toward the least politically active, and also would have that activism diluted by shear size…
I went to a large public research university with a lot of political activism, but it was easy to ignore if one was not interested in it.
However, the least political activism is probably not at large public research universities with large populations of resident 18-22 year old students, but at commuter-based locally-oriented public universities.
Hehe, if you attend Berkley as your screen name might imply, then you understand you attended THE MOST politically active large state research university, one that is not representative of the whole. Also, note, that although you could ignore it, people with a sensitivity to it may have found that aspect off-putting.
I stand by the claim that a large public university is the least politically activist in nature. Adding the “commuter school” tag to it would obviously make it even less politically active, as it would be less socially active in general…
For some reason, I don’t see commuter schools fitting the OPs profile.