@Cheeringsection Common Data sets (where available) will identify the numbers of students in different ethnic/racial groups, and the searchable NY Times study/tool on economic diversity is helpful as well. The reports I’ve seen say that Denison is about 35% multi racial, and 20% Pell grant eligible as well as 20% first gen. Here is the NY Times study on economic diversity.
Even if a school has diversity numbers, it doesn’t mean the school is a big melting pot. My daughter’s school had the numbers, even has 30% international students (many were white), but when I asked her if she interacted with the international students she said it was often hard because of the language issue. D is Chinese but doesn’t speak Chinese or any of the dialects.
LACs, especially more rural ones, often struggle with diversity. On the other hand, as mentioned above, at larger schools with more numbers, groups can tend towards self-segregation. So, pros and cons of both.
@zline Getting ready to take our last kid to Columbia for move in on the 20th. We are also from VA and had in-state options, as well as Penn State, but SC really sold us on Admitted Students Day. They also give wonderful merit scholarships, something Penn State didn’t, so it made it pretty easy to choose SC. Given he is my 3rd, we have looked at 30+ campuses between sibling visits and travel baseball. It’s funny what resonates with kids - mine thought UGA and Clemson were just okay. I think he likes the mix of campus/city that schools like SC and Wisconsin provide. Had he gotten into Wisconsin (he’s a legacy), he might have chosen Madison over Columbia. Having said that, I am a firm believer that things work out the way they are supposed to - I don’t think he could have handled the weather in Madison. 
@twoinanddone you are spot on with your comment about numbers not necessarily reflecting how the campus intermingles. So many of these selective campuses tout diversity but once there you realize it’s broken down into segregated clubs for each ethnic group. Praying that D18’s school of choice intermingles those groups and that they are more of a vehicle for cultural awareness than division and separation.
@lastone03, my nephew is also headed to USC after being sold during the Admitted Students Day as well. He’s now totally invested and very excited whereas before he was…“meh”. I saw pictures of his condo, I mean dorm. Are you freaking kidding me? 4 bedroom/4 bathroom suite, 50" tv in his common room, pool in courtyard, etc. The trouble with amenities like this is he’ll likely take a step back once he graduates - lol.
@twoinanddone and @ASKMother I completely agree with your points that having good diversity numbers doesn’t always mean that the students interact. I just saw Emory on a list of schools with a lot of Diversity and I don’t think that the students there interact as much as that would imply, based on what I have heard.
Does anyone know of any schools that have both strong diversity and strong interaction between the ethnic groups? Is this even something that could be measured? I’m trying to help a biracial (half African American, half White) student now who is looking for that very thing…he toured BU and Northeastern and felt they weren’t diverse enough. Any suggestions anyone?
Thanks.
We just dropped off my daughter, a junior transfer to Beloit College in Wisconsin yesterday. I was amazed at the diversity for such a small Lac. Yes, everyone interacted with each other. Nothing to measure, it was obvious by observation.
Saying this her first Lac was Illinois Wesleyan University which had very little diversity. I remember on their tour of campus we asked the question about diversity and the guide actually said “we have diversity here, there are a lot of Catholics and Protestants” when we stopped laughing to ourselves we pushed him and said we mean racial diversity and he replied “I had lunch the other day with a student from China”
Nice campus and school but no real diversity even if they work towards it.
FYI, this freshman class at Beloit was stated as the most diverse internationally also. Nice campus and very good merit FYI.
@Knowsstuff thanks for that. I have actually been thinking that he might be better off at an LAC because the smaller student population may make it easier to interact. He is visiting Swarthmore soon and if he likes it I might suggest he look at other smaller LAC’s with the diversity numbers to see what he thinks (as Swarthmore is a big reach for anyone!).
Thanks.
Np. In the Midwest Knox is interesting also. We have been there. Evidently you are out east. College that change lives book should have many in your area.
At many schools diversity and interactions are a function of which activities the student gets involved in.
@collegemomjam , check out haverford as well. Earlham and Grinnell might fit the bill.
Multi-racial probably matters less if the student identifies, or feels identified with, one more than the other. (Thinking of a friend of DS who said “if I get pulled over by the cops, I don’t know how much it will matter if I tell them my mom is white.”)
Even if self-segregation occurs socially, diversity is still a huge plus as one learns from different perspectives in the classroom discussions.
@collegemomjam Rutgers University has excellent diversity. I am on campus all day and evening classes finishing up my business degree and there is every ethnicity you can find. Love hearing all the languages being spoken. Everyone is very friendly and interacts with each other…they even talk to this old mom haha. It’s really cool to continually observe people who just want friends and look at how a person acts over anything else.
But it is very big so might not be what your looking for there.
It’s pretty hard to find diversity at an LAC. A few standouts on our tours Macalester, Grinnell, Mt Holyoke.
Rice is actually pretty diverse, at least based on the statistics they post. I’ve never visited though so I’m not sure.
@collegemomjam my D18 and I visited about a year ago and both loved the school and found it to be VERY diverse. She decided not to apply only because she wants to dual major in Chemistry and 2ndary Ed. While Rice has absolutely above average STEM departments (so many pre-med and biomedical engineering/research) there wasn’t as clear of a path for Teaching added in, not as easy as other top schools she was looking at.
Our first trip was to Western Mass to the Five College Consortium. We spent various degrees of time at each school but it is easy to see all five in a day. You could most likely see all five in an hour it you don’t stop. We toured Mount Holyoke, drove through Hampshire, walked around Smith and Amherst and drove around U-Mass ( were my wife and I met ). If not interested in a few of the schools it’s still good to see the proximity of the other towns and schools as they are interconnected with the PVTA, a free bus system connecting all 5 schools.
We visited a couple of LACs this summer. We really like Amherst, Hamilton and Oberlin. We met some of the professors there and they are enthusiastic about students. This is what attracted us to LACs.
@Knowsstuff Beloit College? Sounds like a diploma mill.