<p>I've heard from a lot of people of schools that are accepting of gays, but not which schools actually HAVE a lot of gays, can anyone help me out with this?</p>
<p>New York University.</p>
<p>Vassar…a lot of LACs…</p>
<p>Smith, Mount Holyoke</p>
<p>The OP has was asking for schools with “large” gay populations. LACs typically have 1,000-2,000 students. Of those, 100-200 will be gay. I doubt the OP had that in mind when he asked for schools with large gay populations. I would say:</p>
<p>Cornell University
New York University
Pennsylvania State University-University Park
University of California-Berkeley
University of California-Los Angeles
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Pennsylvania
University of Wisconsin-Madison</p>
<p>Oberlin might have greater than 10% as Alexandre suggests even though it is a small LAC.</p>
<p>Large Universities
I wasn’t very impressed with the gay scene at Cornell when I applied for grad school. Ithaca is small, and from all accounts, Cornell has a lot of closet cases. Admittedly, one student said Ithaca College has a more prominent LGBT population. I’ve met gay students from most of the top universities, and only Georgetown and Hopkins get similar complaints about a lackluster LGBT scene. Penn State is very supportive of LGBT students on paper and has excellent institutional policies, but it too has far fewer out students than you’d expect. Due to sheer size, it is a bit better than Cornell, however.</p>
<p>Among larger schools, I would certainly add UNC Chapel Hill, USC, and UT Austin, all of which have very large and thriving LGBT populations.</p>
<p>Small/medium Universities
Small/medium privates are often more than large enough to support a healthy LGB population. This is especially the case when the population is disproportionately large, as it is at Yale (20% of men are bi/gay). Particularly good ones include:</p>
<p>Brown University
Columbia University
Duke University
Emory University
Harvard University
Northwestern University
Stanford University
Tufts University
University of Chicago
Washington University in St. Louis
Yale University</p>
<p>Dartmouth, Princeton, Rice, and Vandy are very supportive but do not have quite as many gay students as the others. As noted above, I’ve heard many complaints from Georgetown and Hopkins students/alums, but as always, I recommend students go directly to the source. I am exceedingly fond of Wake Forest, but I would not recommend it to a gay student.</p>
<p>American, Boston U, GWU, and U Miami are the best options among less selective private universities. Tulane may also work, though I would place it a notch below in terms of gay life.</p>
<p>Liberal Arts Colleges
Unlike universities, a large LGBT scene at LACs can be difficult to find. I recommend choosing LACs that are either:</p>
<p>(1) In large cities - Macalester, Lewis & Clark, Occidental, Trinity U, etc.</p>
<p>(2) In consortiums - Amherst/Hampshire, Pomona/Mudd/CMC/Pitzer, Swat/Haverford, etc.</p>
<p>(3) Large enough to support a good gay population - Oberlin, Vassar, and Wesleyan are the most notable</p>
<p>If you’re female, most women’s colleges would be a good place to look.</p>
<p>^ warblersrule, is there a reason (other than oversight) that you excluded Penn from your small/medium universities list? It seems consistently to top national rankings of gay-friendly schools:</p>
<p>[The</a> Daily Pennsylvanian :: Penn tops gay-friendly ranking](<a href=“http://thedp.com/index.php/article/2011/07/penn_tops_gayfriendly_ranking]The”>Penn tops gay-friendly ranking | The Daily Pennsylvanian)</p>
<p>45 Percenter, Penn is absolutely fantastic for LGBT students. In terms of institutional support in particular, it’s second to none. </p>
<p>I didn’t include it, along with Berkeley, Michigan, NYU, and several other gay-friendly schools, because it was already suggested by Alexandre in post #5.</p>
<p>^ Ahhh, got it. Your post seemed so comprehensive (as yours usually are), I didn’t realize you were just supplementing Alexandre’s. :)</p>
<p>I would throw in another vote (from personal experience) for Lewis and Clark, we’re a rather small school if you’re looking for a large population in terms of numbers but if you’re looking for a large % of the population then it’s a good choice :)</p>
<p>The University of Virginia gets a bad rep sometimes for being conservative, but among a lot of the LGBT population here, it is known as UVGay. The environment is generally pretty accepting and because it is a larger college, there are bound to me more. Unfortunately there does seem to be more closer cases</p>
<p>Thanks a lot to everyone who replies, especially Warblersrule. I’m a guy, so no all girls colleges for me, and also, not really interested in LACs, I’d be fine with a small university though. Schools I like so far are Rice, Tufts, WashU, and 5C Consortium (either Harvey Mudd or Pomona). Anyone care to comment on those?</p>
<p>and more comments on those schools?</p>
<p>I have seen on a lot of threads that Tufts has a very active lgbt group and The Advocate ranked Tufts as one of the “top 20 gay-friendly campuses”: [Tufts</a> E-News: Tufts Hailed As Gay-Friendly Campus](<a href=“http://enews.tufts.edu/stories/233/2006/08/28/TuftsHailedAsGayFriendlyCampus]Tufts”>http://enews.tufts.edu/stories/233/2006/08/28/TuftsHailedAsGayFriendlyCampus) . Also, since its in Massachusetts (the first state to legalize gay marriage) I would assume their won’t be much discrimination. I don’t know much about the other schools except that since Rice is in Texas which has always been labelled as being a very conservative state at least some discrimination will be seen. But I don’t know just how accurate that claim is especially since I have never been there so don’t take my word for it. WashU is seen as very gay-friendly though: [WUSTL</a> scores top ratings as LGBT-friendly campus | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis](<a href=“http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/22611.aspx]WUSTL”>WUSTL scores top ratings as LGBT-friendly campus - The Source - Washington University in St. Louis)</p>
<p><a href=“http://opa.berkeley.edu/surveys/2011ProfileNewBerkeleyUndergraduates.pdf[/url]”>http://opa.berkeley.edu/surveys/2011ProfileNewBerkeleyUndergraduates.pdf</a> says that new 2011 freshmen at Berkeley responded to the survey as:</p>
<p>86% heterosexual
3% gay/lesbian
3% bisexual
5% queer/questioning/unsure/other
(implies 3% no answer)</p>
<p>New 2011 transfers responded as:</p>
<p>78% heterosexual
5% gay/lesbian
5% bisexual
5% queer/questioning/unsure/other
(implies 3% no answer)</p>