<p>I’m currently looking at Mt Holyoke for a few reasons, but am not 100% sure if the school is right for me… </p>
<p>For starters, I’ve had very few female role models growing up. My mother is/was very removed from my life due to health & drug problems, and my family life has been really shakey- to be blunt, riddled with affairs. (Honestly- I’m not even saying this to be funny- anything feminine I learned as a kid, I probably learned from my two much older gay cousins, since I spent so much time with them.) As a student that wants to go into the sciences, I took an advanced science route in high school and found that my classes were dominated by rich kids that had come from nearby private prep schools (my school is a public magnet ranked #1 in the state), and even in that demographic were still male dominated. Starting my junior year, however, I had an amazing biology teacher that was a woman and got attached to her really quickly. She rekindled my love for science (most girls I know- even at my prestigious high school want to be English or Social Science majors), and I had support from her. Even with family problems, she would listen, and the fact that she shared my ethnic background (Eastern European / South American) helped significantly. She told me to look at a women’s college, and Mt Holyoke seems to be the one I’m best equipped for… The Five College Consortium appeals to me as well.</p>
<p>I think the one major turn off is the lack of men, but I’d really like to talk to someone attending the school to see if it’s really that big of a deal. (Can someone message me?) Most of my close friends are male, but surely the chance to connect with my own gender for once couldn’t be THAT bad, haha. If the school really does empower you and help build your esteem, that definitely overrides any gender problems, since those are qualities that would probably help me in life long term.</p>
<p>Rocket, everything you said is definitely important and true about an all-womens’ education. However, I am going to take your subject material and give the question a slightly different focus. Do you (and everybody else on this thread) think that single-sex at the collegiate level is a good idea after single-sex in high and middle school? There’s no doubt in my mind that all of those things applied to my middle and high school experience, and they’ve shaped me for the better. For that reason, I thought single-sex at the collegiate level was also good idea.
Now that I’m in college, however, I am beginning to have second thoughts. Does being in a women’s college have the same validity if you had the same principles in your high and middle school education?</p>
<p>I think women’s colleges have the same value regardless of your previous school experiences, but whether it is the best choice for an individual’s personal growth will depend on each individual. If you’re thinking that women’s college wasn’t the right route for you, think about transferring, but be aware that it could be the college itself as much as it could be the fact that it’s a women’s college.</p>
<p>"Does being in a women’s college have the same validity if you had the same principles in your high and middle school education?</p>
<p>Preliminarily, I think it’s more a matter of a women’s college experience (all thephysics majors are women, the machines in the gym fit women’s bodies, not the D1 fball player, all the campus leaders are female, etc.) than perspective. That said, I’m not sure there is a perfect time for a women only (or girls only) academic experience - - some (like my D) get it K-8, others get it 6-12, or 8-12 or (again like my D) in college - - each offers something unique and wonderful. What I think is most important is that a girl or young woman have the experience at some point in her life.</p>
<p>To the point that b@r!um is making about the differences in gender distribution of faculty in coed vs same sex…</p>
<p>Why does that even matter? I’m a male student. When I go to my courses I go to learn; whether I have a female or male instructor has not, is not, and will not affect their capabilities to teach or how well I understand the material. If a single sex institution wanted their students to feel a strong sense of females in the work force/academia then they should obviously hire more females. You also didn’t address the question of discrepancy in quality. </p>
<p>To what juillet said:
You merely changed your assumption to say that there ISN’T a male perspective.
Women may interact with men, but then again if we are just making assumptions couldn’t I assume the possibility that certain people deviate to single sex institutions because of their incentives to do so? So you will miss out on a perspective.</p>
<p>If you want to be around a crowd that is more focused towards a goal that is similar to yours, you’ll see that in almost any upper level classes.
If there are more science/math majors in a particular institution does that mean you are going to achieve your goals more efficiently? Does a higher majority of students graduating in a certain major directly attract better professors? </p>
<p>Every school has their own characteristics. Single sex is just another one of those characteristics of that school. Much like location,student body size,rigor,prestige etc…</p>
<p>plus i can’t help but feel as if though people ITT are actually ranking majors and studies. if a large majority of students in every college changed their tastes and started taking physics/engineering/math/chem or w/e majors that’s only more competition for you in the future. </p>
<p>a college/university is also a firm. a firm that needs money to continue running. it should act competitively and hire those best fit for the job. not discriminate and hire more female faculty members.</p>
<p>Yes, but in the past–as recently as the late 70s, early 80s at least–most colleges/universities actively discriminated against female faculty members. And against female graduate students and undergrads, thus decreasing the number of potential female faculty in the pipeline. It takes quite a while for the effects of this to work their way through the system.</p>
<p>Why do we make special schools for women?
Do we make special schools for Blacks or Asians?</p>
<p>Why should women be treated any differently from men? Are women so delicate that they need a special school or else they can’t succeed? People shouldnt go to school just because of gender. We should choose a school where people are interested in the subject, no matter the race or gender.</p>
<p>Lets be honest here. Statistically, men are better then women at Math and Sciences. Now if you seperate them into different schools, then naturally the classes for women will be slower and they’ll lag behind. To make the education system equal, each student should be treated the same, no matter their gender.</p>
<p>And btw, this is coming from a girl…just saying</p>
<p>LaCielle. I have so many problems with what you are saying it isn’t even funny
First, there ARE “special schools” for African Americans. They are called Historically Black COlleges. Both they and women’s colleges were born at a time when the education opportunities were not equal.</p>
<p>And, if you’ve ever met a Smith woman, you’d see she’s far from delicate. She just wants an environment designed so she can thrive, and that’s a woman’s college.</p>
<p>Last, men AREN"T statistically better at Math and Science. Men and women simply learn differently and when the majority of math and science teachers are male, they aren’t going to be able to teach it in a way a woman can succeed. It isn’t about pace, or easing the class, just presenting the material differently. When I took Calc, there were two sections-1 taught by a woman and 1 by a man. Most of those in the women section seemed to thrive more because the presentation was more conducive to how women learn. And our professor did NOT slow down the course, we actually covered more material than the male professor did, just differently.</p>
<p>The fact is, LaCielle, men and woman are not treated differently. Men still have a great deal of advantages. Smith and other women’s colleges try to give women these same advantages. That’s how we make the system equal</p>
<p>LaCielle, the fact that your post is “coming from a girl” makes it that much more appalling. You should stand behind your fellow women and not perpetuate such oppressive stereotypes.</p>
<p>1) The male perspective is the prevailing perspective - you don’t need to talk to a man to find it, because it is all around. The overwhelming voice in policymaking and the media is male; western culture is incredibly dominated by male interests. I talk to so many young girls (and adults too!) who think the word “feminist” is a derogatory term. While many people may think men and women are equal, blatant gender discrimination may be less common but it still exists in pervasive ways that young girls frequently internalize and don’t even understand how they are playing into an oppressive system. </p>
<p>2) If you want to talk about losing a perspective by being all female, you could also talk about losing perspectives by attending college in general - as much as colleges try to provide financial aid and attract students from all backgrounds, the overwhelming majority of Americans cannot or will not seek traditional tertiary degrees at all, let alone degrees at a liberal arts college. Your college experience will not be representative of the country or world at large. That being said, women’s colleges are known for being more racially, ethnically, and socioeconomically diverse than many of their co-ed liberal arts peers, and for engaging students more effectively across lines of difference. They are also considered more “transfer-friendly,” and attract many transfer students of traditional and non-traditional age (see programs like the Frances Perkins, Ada Comstock, or Davis Scholars, among others) who add very different perspectives as well.</p>
<p>*For more information about this and other benefits of women’s colleges, there are many statistics about student engagement, success, and happiness in the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) study from the Indiana University Center for Postsecondary Research. Here are the relevant conclusions from NSSE: [Women</a> Students at Coeducational and Women?s Colleges: | The Women’s College Coalition](<a href=“http://www.womenscolleges.org/perspective/nsse-study]Women”>Women's College Coalition | Directory of Women's Colleges & Degrees)</p>
<p>I’m the OP and my views have been broadly misrepresented in this thread, but I’ll take a jump at countering the most recent post anyway.</p>
<p>1) Absolutely. However, as a female (and feminist!) student at a coed LAC, I haven’t ever felt like the men in my classes have drowned out my voice. Usually the contrary, actually–the discussion-based humanities classes I’ve taken have been primarily female in composition. But my French class in one semester was all-female, the next semester had 2 guys; people definitely commented on the difference, and it was a positive experience to have both genders represented.</p>
<p>2) Indeed, attending any college–especially an elite, private liberal arts college–is “losing perspective.” But given this equal baseline for all LACs, single-gender and co-ed, why add to the perspective narrowing with yet another lost perspective? (There are good reasons that a single-sex education is better for SOME students. Often those reasons may overrule the con of a lost perspective. Just don’t pretend that there isn’t a perspective being lost.)</p>
<p>About women’s colleges being more diverse than their peers–that depends on the particular women’s college, on the type of diversity, and also on who is considered a “peer.” If one considers peers by acceptance rate, the top women’s colleges have very different peers than if one considers them by SAT median or by various outcome measures.</p>
<p>For example, Smith does an amazing job enrolling Pell Grant recipients (~25% of the student body). But Swarthmore does an amazing job enrolling students of color (almost 50% of the student body). Neither school can match the other on both statistics.</p>
<p>Women’s colleges are indeed transfer-friendly, especially to non-traditional students. I applaud that. I would also argue that being transfer-friendly for traditional students is a bad thing, because it means that more original first-years are transferring OUT.</p>
<p>In conclusion: women’s colleges are GREAT for lots of women. But not all of them, not even all of the ones who are queer/feminist/liberal/shy. They have real disadvantages that should be acknowledged and weighed.</p>
<p>The original question was about why someone would choose to attend. To choose a women’s college is not to say that there is anything wrong with a co-ed institution, and I don’t want it to seem like my commenting in favor of a women’s college is in any way delegitimizing your experience. </p>
<p>Also, to clarify, the use of the word “peer” simply meant “other baccalaureate institutions granting four-year liberal-arts degrees.” Schools are grouped by the types of degrees granted and the style of education administered. There exist 4,000 undergraduate schools in this country. Of those, 600 are colleges. 112 are strictly liberal arts. You can drill down more deeply to sort regionally, by size, by particular program, by how competitive admission is, etc. But my use of the term indicated the 112 strictly liberal arts schools in the US. (see [The</a> Sisters](<a href=“http://www.thesistercolleges.org/as/hied.php]The”>http://www.thesistercolleges.org/as/hied.php)) </p>
<p>I chose to attend my college because of a specific academic program, its location (both in being suburban/rural and located in a consortium) and its diversity. I was also drawn to the alumnae network, the commitment to social justice, and the emphasis on community. Other schools, co-ed and single-sex, could have fit that criteria - but I “clicked” with this one, and it just so happened to be a women’s college. I started out indifferent, then became fascinated, and eventually fell in love with my institution. Would I have been so happy at any women’s college? Probably not. Being single-sex was a key component but not the defining characteristic. </p>
<p>Women’s colleges are certainly not for everyone. Fewer than 1% of high school women will even consider attending. The important thing to remember is that everyone is seeking something different in college, and there is no one college experience that is more “real,” no single way of defining “social life,” and no one-size-fits-all definition of “higher education,” either.</p>
<p>Me? Safety, higher number of women would increase the number of queer women present, so dating is something too, and I went to a high school for kids on the Autism spectrum and there are A LOT more guys on the Autism spectrum than women so I was one of fifteen girls at my high school and I didn’t learn how to bond with women as well as I should have, so I thought a womans school would help with that.</p>
<p>One would naturally assume that a student would have a broader range of friends at a large, coed university but oddly I think that my D has found that broader range by attending a small, women’s college. At school, D’s friends are straight, gay, bi, US students, international students, wealthy students and those that struggle financially, athletes, artists, dancers, men & women (school is part of a consortium). I think if D had attended a large, co-ed university she would have gravitated to a group of students very similar to her - gay, female, athletes. She’s having a wonderful experience and is already bemoaning the fact that she will have to graduate and leave in two more years.</p>
<p>I realize this thread is more than a month old, but as the product of single sex high school and women’s college, I would like to add some thoughts. I was fortunate to attend an excellent girls’ school where I was challenged and respected intellectually. I attended a women’s college primarily because it was a financial safety. I had the advantage through a consortium to take classes at a nearby coed LAC, and did not feel particular loyalty to my college. However, the experience of a women’s education prepared me for the male-dominated field of law. I had grown up to see that women were capable of anything they put their minds to – the editor of the paper, the star athletes, the brilliant students, were all female. Once I got to law school, and into the workplace, I had greater faith in myself and my abilities. As a lawyer for 25 + years, I have seen that women are far too ready to doubt themselves in professional circumstances. Any cushion against that hesitancy is valuable, and I credit my women’s education with supporting the conviction, in competitive fields, that I was as talented and capable as my peers.</p>
<p>Midwest, as a NortheastDadofaDaughter, I think you captured the distinction of a women’s college quite well. My D is certainly not shy and can be very strong willed, but we are sure her choice of a Women’s college will be a great place for her to shine brightly, and later take her place in the world… And her lawyer Mom is certainly in agreement!</p>