These issues are no different than at any other U. My experience is the more diverse a university is the “more” self segregation there is as students look for, and find, peers with similar backgrounds and interests.
Anecdote:
I used to go to a local state school – and a very diverse one, at that (the majority of students were Asian). Greek life was there, but was fairly new and had little presence on campus. I had absolutely no trouble making friends or striking up random conversations with fraternity brothers.
Transfer to Vandy. In one of my discussion sections, I was the only non-white, non-Greek on my table, and it was pretty clear that the Greeks knew each other. Since we were all in the same class and working on the same problem set, I figured I’d join in on the conversation and ask them questions. What response did I get? Stares. It was as though I wasn’t even there.
I know this is just one experience interacting with Greeks, but they gave a very bad first impression. I was shocked by how cliquey they were. Granted, one of my coworkers this summer is in a frat (and VERY MUCH fulfills a lot of the stereotypes) and we turned out to be very good friends. Nevertheless, that first experience made me be wary of Greeks in general. At times, the whole Greek system makes it feel like high school, with a clear “in” crowd that conforms to one specific type of person.
I guess the difference between these two schools is how much influence Greek life has in the overall social scene on campus. The more influence it had, the more cliquey and divided the environment felt.
Vanderbilt seemed rather (voluntarily) racially segregated when I went there 20+ yrs ago with seemingly few interactions between white and black students socially. I can’t imagine it has changed all that much.
And I agree it still seems to be very cliquey Greek vs. non-Greek from what I have heard from currently enrolled students I know.
You can’t imagine it has changed that much? In 20+ years? Vanderbilt? Are you serious???
From what Juvenis said, no.
It may have gotten better academically, but there are a number of posts from disgruntled Indian, Asian, and AA students in this forum about feeling excluded based on their race.
I will certainly not disagree, however, with the fact that Vanderbilt has become more selective in the last 20 years. That is not a point of contention.
What you’re seeing on this forum is a result of A) response bias and B) availability heuristic. There are plenty of examples of diverse students finding themselves well integrated into the Vanderbilt community. This is pretty obvious if you’re actually on campus – you certainly see students of various ethnicities in Greek life, in leadership positions, in clubs/orgs, in bars and parties, immersed in several social circles. They evidently don’t feel the inclination to make a CC account and post about their positive experience; they probably consider their experience pretty “normal” and don’t have any red-flag raising stories to tell. There are only about four of us here who post regularly about Vandy so take your survey of this forum with a grain of salt…
I certainly agree that Vanderbilt isn’t perfect and the community has a lot of work to do. The school’s application pool continues to self-select as Caucasian so that’s not helping the matter. That said, this school has come a looong way culturally in 20+ years…
I agree with Pancaked. There are many diverse students who are very involved on campus and well integrated into the Vanderbilt community. As an Asian international student, I have found it easy to join several student organizations, hold leadership positions, and become friends with a wide variety of students. However, I do agree with some of the comments about Greek life, but then again, you will find cliques wherever you go. Many students self-segregate and thus it would be unfair to single only certain social groups. Your Vanderbilt experience is what you make out of it. Making a small effort of reaching out to people, becoming more involved on campus, and not letting preconceived notions/stereotypes guide you will go a long way. Don’t fixate on a few negatives (which are present in EVERY college), and instead focus on making use of the plethora of opportunities Vanderbilt offers.
The matter of self-segregation almost always seems to be directed towards minority communities. Chances are that if your life experiences were highly negative (or non-existent) as a child with certain cultural communities then you may not feel comfortable reaching out as an adult to other cultures. So the term self-segregation as it is used in lexicon makes no sense because minority communities could turn it around and apply it to non-minority communities.
Our family has had both positive and negative examples of social interactions related to diversity. My son who is AA has lived in two different neighborhoods 800 miles apart consisting of mostly Caucasians. The first neighborhood consisted of PHDs, business managers, and other young professionals. These parents would not allow their kids to play with my son for all sorts of bogus reasons. To this day he still feels that that was his only racial issue growing up. When we moved 800 miles away he was made to feel welcome from day one. So everyone’s circumstances are not the same as some would have you to believe. If you are an AA or a Caucasian in the former you may not be inclined to befriend the other group.
My son was accepted to Vanderbilt and other similar schools including Emory, Rice, and Cornell. He attended the MOSIAC event held in March during his senior year in HS and had a wonderful time. He believes had he attended Vanderbilt he would have had an overall positive experience. He did notice that the social interactions among the different racial groups were quite limited however. Not really sure how this could be addressed if it is deemed a minority issue.
He attended and graduated from Cornell recently with an engineering degree. He performed well academically and we are very pleased with his education. As I am sure would happened had he attended Vanderbilt.
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. I can’t speak about Vanderbilt, but I know my sister often felt unwelcome at Notre Dame. That’s why the “I too am Harvard” movement (which spread around the country to schools including Notre Dame) sprung up. Yes, schools like UA may have a lot of African American students, and yes, you may not have to deal with any overt racism, but as a black student you just can’t ignore the subtle things that make you feel like an outsider looking in.
And with all due respect, being Asian at one of these schools is not comparable to being black. At all.
To chime in on the topic of integration as another current student, I also agree that it really depends on what type of social life you are looking for. Do you want to go to lots of diversity activism events around Nashville? If so, following that passion of yours may lead you to inadvertently meeting and making friends with mostly other minority students whose life experiences have also led them to feel passionate about diversity activism. Do you want to be involved in a cultural group, whether it be the south east asian groups like AASA or PISO or AA/HB Greek Organizations? If so, once again you may self select into a group that is made up of more minority students. However if you meet your friends via your commons house or your major or really any activity that doesn’t have a specific cultural message inherit in the mission statement, you are likely to have a diverse group of friends. I know plenty of people both friends of mine and in activities I am involved in who are minority students that have never brought up any of the issues raised here. We even had a program in which a facilitator was looking for our commons house to discuss experiences of racism or difficulty integrating on campus, and the only people that were able to come up with an example of a negative experience were some of the international students.
All in all, Vanderbilt is a vary diverse place filled with students united by their passions academically and in their activities far more than they are divided by anything else. I have found campus to be full of people reveling in this exciting time when we are all surrounded by young people from across the country and across the world all at this same critical juncture in our lives.
It would do all of the prospective students well to heed @Pancaked 's advice and remember that you have a tiny tiny fraction of 6000+ undergraduates posting on CC and that many of those students, myself included, feel that our experience of diverse social lives and easy integration is normal. It is not until we read these posts online filled with posters who attended Vanderbilt 20 years ago talking about racism in an era before the progressive national university of today or the anecdote of one or two unhappy students that we feel the need to share our own positive experiences.
My D had instances of being in class with a number of members of a men’s athletic team. When she was placed in a group with some of them, they also just talked to each other and did not include her in any way. When groups of people have a common bond, they tend to feel more comfortable with each other. Part of growing up is realizing that you have to move beyond your own comfort zone and work with all sorts of people - and there are certainly students at every college that are not yet at that point in their lives. Some 18 year olds will recognize that they are being exclusive; others will not. It’s not always intentional. And it happens everywhere.
I would also share that some of the cultural organizations do a disservice to their members, heavily marketing and even coming door to door on move in weekend, advertising “alternative” cultural programming to students of their ethnicity ie the Asian organizations offering a potluck on main campus for Asian students on one of the first nights of school. While the offer is very kind, it takes minority students away from the unified Commons experiences and events going on at those times. This has a negative impact because, silly as it sounds, the beginning of year long relationships form out of dinners, games, and conversations on those first nights even if they are just hanging out and introducing themselves to everyone on their floor. These efforts to draw incoming minority students in to different organizations does create a safe space, but also divides students before the year truly begins and can result in non-minority students meeting and forming relationships among themselves simply because they were the only ones always together and not off at a minority specific event sometime in the first few weeks.
While it is certainly possible to be very involved in culture specific activities and still enjoy “mainstream” life, every hour spent in the company of a single minority group at these events is time you aren’t forming relationships with diverse peoples. Simply, it doesn’t make sense to go to all minority events and then complain that interactions between the races is a problem at Vandy. If you don’t define yourself by your race, no one else will either.
^ I think that makes sense on the surface, but really depends. Many schools (including mine) have a lot of easy (the only truly difficult one is maybe some groups of international students, who may already know each other from the start so are cliqued up in the beginning) cross-ethnic interaction (in fact it was ranked decently high by PR which I take with HUGE grains of salt, but okay…) and it definitely works like you said with organizations marketing themselves. However, it doesn’t have to end up like you say if the campus culture is more oriented toward “cultural awareness”. I think what makes the cross-ethnic interaction high at many schools is the fact that “others” also participate in these minority oriented events in incredibly high numbers such that it creates no real schism between the sponsoring group and those who fall outside the ethnic group it appears to be targeting. Basically, if the school or various elements of it promotes multi-culturalism, then the negative effects of that situation are blunted. I remember how often faculty members (not of the “host ethnicity”) would promote and even attend such events. There are also things like pre-orientation trips that intentionally address it. I think, if students were left to themselves and there was no larger “force” promoting multi-culturalism, then yes, most schools would have that sort of phenomenon and negative consequences (if high cross-ethnic interaction is indeed considered positive) resulting from “alternative” clubs. Also, I think that is just it. At most schools (probably including Vandy but I wouldn’t know) such clubs are not considered “alternative”. They are very much a part of the ethos and social fabric of the school. I feel that would only be true for Vanderbilt if Greeklife and reslife activities were indeed “dominant” in a noticeable way, in which case Vandy wouldn’t be alone. Places like Dartmouth are supposedly similar in that regard. However, overall, that theory only holds up if “outsiders” aren’t really attending the events you mention in decent numbers, in which case that is a different issue altogether.
@bernie12 I think there is room to come to the middle on both sides. While I agree that faculty modeling and and a cultural awareness bent can help make “alternative” clubs integrated in to the social fabric, I also think in some ways the clubs have to reach out and welcome non-minority students. In the specific case of Vandy, the larger cultural events (Dwali, SACE, Holi, etc) throughout the year really are well attended by students regardless of their ethnicity and provide simply another way for people to expand their horizons and have a fun time while meeting diverse students. However, those are not what I was referring to. My complaint with the current design of those clubs is the specific targeting of minority students to minority only events. For example, the second night after move in many floors, VUcept groups (orientation groups), and Houses (aka dorm buildings at Vandy) go to dinner together and then all come back to their living areas to socialize. While trivial, these dinners start to set patterns for the year of who tries to eat together, who you talk to in your area, etc. Since students cannot select their hall, VUcept group, or House, these groups are inherently diverse in the best way. However, cultural groups come to the dorms and recruit students away from these diverse integrated activities into single ethnicity events. For the next few lines, I will use the fictitious Vanderbilt Indian Students Society as an example. It isn’t a choice of the non-minority students not to attend, as the groups do not come with fliers saying “all students welcome, please join us in room ### for a traditional Indian dinner put on by Vanderbilt Indian Students Coalition” but instead the groups use demographic information to specifically target Indian students. Representatives from the organizations will go specifically to an Indian student’s room, invite them to this dinner, and will not invite or acknowledge the non-Indian students. While it is up to the individual whether or not to attend, if they go they will end up at a dinner full of other Indian students selected by their ethnicity to attend the dinner, and will likely meet them again at the follow up dinners and small events only publicized by the groups at these meetings. Meanwhile the rest of the students from the floor/VUcept/House will be having a dinner in which ethnicity wasn’t even a factor, simply the random chance of being placed together. However the problem arises when it isn’t just one cultural organization that utilizes this practice, but all of them. When every ethnic organization on campus is having specific and exclusionary targeted programming at the beginning of the year when relationships form, people have a higher chance of making stronger relationships with people who are like them. This is one way in which the racial divide appears independent of any cultural or university force, besides the culture of targeting first year students. While it would require non-minority student to take the invitation and show up, right now the organizations don’t even offer the choice.
@RedHawk99 : So you are basically claiming that the “microevents” are problem spots at Vandy? Yeah, that’s what I was alluding to…I was saying that even smaller events had good “outside” attendance. I was referring to smaller events we had like “Taste of Africa” or impromptu dinners at smaller venues such as a dorm parlor. Those had extremely high “outsider” turn out perhaps likely because we had those groups reaching out more and they would indeed invite all the friends of other ethnicities simply because they wanted people to turn out. Also, free food should always promote more integration :). But you paint a much clearer picture of what is going on with your description overall. That is weird, because my school is considered cliquey, but I guess it isn’t more so along ethnic lines. Maybe it could be differences in what is emphasized during orientation weeks as well? Because I would claim that there are naturally some ethnic cliques (as in they start off that way and the “main group” may be of the same ethnicity), but they aren’t as solidified and are extremely fluid/branch out and include others more easily. Seems as if there is more integration in general based on your discription, and I don’t know why that is…maybe just flat out numbers? But you have as many Latino and AA’s as we do now. The major difference is the larger % of Asians (which includes Indians and Pakistanis).
Also, yes, I would say that the targeting you mention doesn’t happen and again, it may be difference in numbers. If a group is that much in the minority, they may just target themselves intentionally whereas I think, if in high numbers, for the hypothetical you cite, it would more likely be taken for granted that other Indians are attending because many already know each other. Their goal would be to get their other friends there. There is no need for them to create a “space” because they are in such high numbers. You could tell things were more open as each year, even the most popular Indian dance team would have like 2 non-Indians and in fact, my Chinese friend led the group one year. The same is repeated for groups that are predicted to be all AA (the two non-Greek organizations that put on step shows not only have 2-3 non-AA’s but several token non-AA’s). Clearly something different is going on to make more comfortable breaching what would otherwise be a boundary. I think the self-targeting you describe plays a role, but I don’t know if I would blame any such hypothetical group…seems a very delicate situation.
Also, this is a key question: How integrated is Greek life there? Not just for AA’s but anyone else (non-white students). Ours is very integrated (as in so called “white” frats are actually pretty much mixed even in terms of AA’s despite AA Greek orgs). If Vandy’s is fairly diverse racially, then I suppose whatever their strategies are could in theory serve as a model for non-Greek organizations or (not suggest the two are completely separate though) campus life in general if those issues you cite are indeed an issue.
@bernie12 I think the kind of diversity at all level of events is the direction Vandy is moving, but that we are still at an interesting crossroads. The student population is diverse, the University has made integration and social justice a main focus, and yet students still come to campus with the expectation of some level or racism and segregation, even if it s at the back of their mind. I think that the history of the school sets up a self fulfilling prophecy to some extent, where people are afraid of branching out for fear of rejection or being ostracized. It is visible in both our lower numbers of minority students who choose to rush (and at least for the girls, as long as they go through the process they will get a bid to a panhellenic sorority) and the low numbers of non-minority students that go to more intimate minority events. While I think in both cases, people would and do welcome those brave enough to take the first step regardless of their race, there are still some mental walls that have yet to be broken down. Greek life is integrated, as I don’t know of any fraternity or sorority without at least a few non-white students each year, as I said before the number of non-white students who rush is low. The fraternities recently put together a new inclusivity agreement which is targeting both ethnic as well as economic and sexual orientation diversity. I think this kind of affirmation of welcoming attitudes that were already existent for the most part is doing a good job of opening the doors to more diverse organizations. Our Multicultural Leadership Council has also been in the talks of trying to do more collaborative events with non-minority themed organizations which, while currently top down, I believe will help diversify those organizations and events as well. I think it may still take a few years to overcome the stereotypes and expectations many students have upon arrival, but I think overall Vandy is moving in a positive direction and minority students in the most recent class of 2018 seem to have far fewer struggles and complaints than the outgoing seniors did last year, a trend I believe the class of 2019 will continue when they start this fall.
@RedHawk99 : Well, it sounds like Vandy should become better and better in that arena. Usually top down initiatives are a huge indicator of that and are in response to student angst over such issues. And honestly, Vandy was not the only major southern school struggling with such issues. I know to get the top down initiatives, it took student protests of LGBT and minorities in the 1980s and 1990’s to trigger them at Emory. The other “magnolia league” schools kind of just got lucky and I think the location can at least partially explain it. Rice and Emory are in Houston and Atlanta respectively for example and those two cities are generally a bit more progressive meaning that as soon as those schools started to even glimmer (much less than shining like they do today), they were going to begin attracting a diverse populous that more or less matched the attitudes of the metropolitan areas. Duke benefited from rising in the prestige brackets earlier than the rest of us so had to deal with the issues at an earlier stage as their population began to diversify quickly as well (regardless of their city). Either way, I don’t think Vanderbilt is in such a bad position but I suppose one could argue that shedding some of the stereotypes is exacerbated by how big Greeklife is (though it mainly seems large among women, 1/3 males vs. like 1/2 women). Many would argue that Greek life can be great but that it shouldn’t be that penetrable (as in 1/4-1/3 of any gender group is more than enough) depending upon the other attributes students, alums, and admins. want to see further develop on the campus. Again, seems Dartmouth is trying to deal with these issues but less in the context of multi-culturalism and race and more so intellectual environment (Duke has always been working on that as well, and Emory I think is trying to deal with the same issues too). As they say: “The struggle is real!”
I am really now considering not applying to Vanderbilt. I Want to be in a fraternity and this school’s fraternity seems extremely exclusive to white people. It is academically strong. I don’t know about its engineering department. But social life is very important and as a black male I don’t want to enter a school where I only will have other black brothers. My current school is so diverse and most of my friends are Latinos and Whites. Schools like stanford, usc, Pomona, Cornell U Miami… would I believe allow me to be in a fraternity. Dating is also a big thing for me. I don’t discriminate based on color but if I am not going to be able to get white girls or get judged, I don’t want to be any part of it. I am not sure about the dating thing: Do you guys see interracial dating or hookups?
If you are truly interested in Vanderbilt and just concerned about race relations – apply, get accepted, and then visit 
Talk to African American students about their experiences. If you aren’t able to visit, perhaps contact the Black Cultural Center and try to connect with a current student. Vanderbilt actually has a higher percentage of African American students than Stanford:
http://facts.stanford.edu/academics/undergraduate-profile
http://admissions.vanderbilt.edu/profile/