Women's Colleges

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Last year, I got a lot of Smith propaganda in response to my high PSAT scores as a sophomore. Because it was a women's college, I initally discarded it because there were no boys. But the more I read about all women's colleges, it seems that there are many advantages. And I should keep an open mind.</p>

<p>I searched for other postings on this issue but couldn't find them. Maybe we could start a discussion that would cover both the pros and cons to single-sex education. </p>

<p>Also, I'd appreciate if somebody could put together some sort of list of women's colleges (and their locations) that are strong in the sciences. Extra points awarded to those with a biochemistry major, as that's my interest of the week!.</p>

2

<p>well, i know at Wellesley, you can take classes at MIT - might be good if you're into science</p>

3

<p>I just searched collogeboard.com, and this is what I found (four-year women's colleges w/ biochemistry majors).</p>

<p>Agnes Scott College
Decatur, GA </p>

<p>Barnard College
New York, NY </p>

<p>Cedar Crest College
Allentown, PA </p>

<p>Chatham College
Pittsburgh, PA </p>

<p>College of St. Benedict
St. Joseph, MN </p>

<p>College of St. Catherine
St. Paul, MN </p>

<p>College of St. Elizabeth
Morristown, NJ </p>

<p>Converse College
Spartanburg, SC </p>

<p>Georgian Court University
Lakewood, NJ </p>

<p>Immaculata University
Immaculata, PA </p>

<p>Mary Baldwin College
Staunton, VA</p>

<p>Mills College
Oakland, CA</p>

<p>Mount Holyoke College
South Hadley, MA</p>

<p>Mount St. Mary's College
Los Angeles, CA</p>

<p>Regis College
Weston, MA</p>

<p>Rosemont College
Rosemont, PA</p>

<p>Russell Sage College
Troy, NY</p>

<p>Scripps College
Claremont, CA</p>

<p>Simmons College
Boston, MA</p>

<p>Smith College
Northampton, MA</p>

<p>Spelman College
Atlanta, GA</p>

<p>St. Joseph College
West Hartford, CT</p>

<p>Sweet Briar College
Sweet Briar, VA</p>

<p>Trinity College
Washington, DC</p>

<p>Wellesley College
Wellesley, MA</p>

<p>Wells College
Aurora, NY</p>

<p>Smith, Mount Holyoke, and Wellesley are the three that I had already known were strong in the sciences. I hope this helps!</p>

4

<p>Thanks.</p>

<p>Anybody for the pros-and-cons thing?</p>

5

<p>I applied to Smith. I was extremely leery when I visited because I am not overly artsy and not a real liberal either... I felt very welcome and it seemed like a great environment. Plus, Smith is in the 5 college consortium (sp?) and the other schools in it are equally respected for their differences. I think I've gotten my partying/guy chasing/guy obsession out in high school and I think that having a really focused group of women to learn with during the week and saving the male distractions for the weekends is a good thing. I'm still not sure I'm completely comfortable with the idea but I am definitely considering it... I'm waiting to see if I get in and what my fin aid package is.</p>

<p>Good luck to all.</p>

6

<p>You might ask this same question on the parents board. Several parents have children who are freshman at Smith, and, from their reports, seem blissfully happy. Like you, most didn't think about an all-female school at first - but Smith made them offers they couldn't refuse and it has worked out very, very well.</p>

7

<p>The first thing my mom's friend said (a woman who works with colleges as part of her job) when she heard I was looking at Smith was, "oh but that's a lesbian school!" I think she just meant that it has that reputation, but...yeah.</p>

8

<p>I'm not a science major, but I am a junior at Smith who's taken a few math-type courses (and have many science-major friends). I'd be glad to answer any questions you have...feel free to post back!</p>

9

<p>Well, Yale is that gay school, right?</p>

10

<p>Yale has the largest and best funded Gay Studies program in the country, with a large number of gay scholars. As such, they attract a large gay student body - there are easily as many gay students at Yale as lesbians at Smith. </p>

<p>But the issue for many people is not that there are lesbians, but that all those resources are devoted to WOMEN. Imagine a college where the academics are as good, and in some areas, better than that offered at the Ivies, with more spending per undergraduate student than at ANY of the Ivies, all of it devoted to women? Now that's threatening.</p>

<p>But it does have that long lesbian history of Barbara Bush, Nancy Reagan, and Julia Child. Sciences are big at Smith. It has the only female engineering school in the country, and a substantial amount of undergraduate research (especially in biology). 40 students each year are offered STRIDE scholarships, which are paid research assistantships for the first two years - no Ivy can match it. </p>

<p>My d. is one of those who is blissfully happy - and turned down Williams and a bunch of other places to be there - Smith simply had more.</p>

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<p>Funny how women's colleges get branded as lesbian schools, isn't it? The former president of Smith noted how preoccupied the public is with what women choose to do with their own vaginas, be they part of the 'free love' 60's and 70's or the gay accepting 90's and 00's. And I do work with a gay guy who went to Yale, lol.</p>

<p>I like women's colleges because they have a particular mission to make leaders of women. And women get a chance to practice being leaders.</p>

12

<p>What I was interested in when D was visiting women's and coed colleges was the percentage of tenured women professors but somehow I never got that information...</p>

13

<p>Anecdotally speaking, everyone I know who graduated from single-sex colleges feel like that they made the right choice. I have female friends who graduated from Smith and Mount Holyoke, and male friends who graduated from Wabash and Rose-Hulman (when Rose was single sex). Without hesitation, all of them say that they would make the same choice again. Of course, there is a great deal of self-selection concerning single sex institutions and those students who are uncomfortable with their choice probably transfer out relatively early in their academic career.</p>

<p>From what I can gather, one of the big benefits of a single-sex college is the lack of certain social pressures. This allows students to feel more comfortable in expressing themselves in a free and honest manner, which in turn builds self-confidence. I know, it sounds kind of touchy-feely, but this is the best way I can describe it.</p>

<p>While this question should probably be the subject of its own thread, does anyone have a theory on why the number of female only colleges so vastly outnumbers their male only counterparts? While I may be missing a few, I can only really think of three all male colleges left (Wabash, Hamden-Sydney and St. John's in Minnesota). Collectively, we are talking about roughly 4,000 students at male only institutions. The number of students at female only colleges has to be 10 to 20 times that number. Just curious.</p>

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<p>I can only speak for one - Williams - my alma mater, which I attended just before it went co-ed. There they decided they needed to get larger. Amortizing fixed costs over 1,200 students left them much in a rut, with no way to improve without massive infusions of new capital. Going co-ed was also thought as a way of upgrading certain academic areas which were traditional weak, but in which women would be interested. (This worked in some areas - Williams had NO studio arts before women got there, now they are at least okay, if not hugely strong; and not in others - foreign langauges are still very weak.) It also allowed them to secure parts of the alumni base who only had XX offspring. Fact is Williams had no particularly strong reason to be all male to begin with - it was just tradition.</p>

<p>Same had been true of the women's colleges. They weren't "women's" colleges, but simply all-female versions of the male ones. Some, like Vassar, could never figure out how to be anything else, and went co-ed. The transformations (when they occurred) happened in the 1970s. If you want to read about what happened, it a hold of Jill Ker Conway's wonderful book "A Woman's Education" - she was Pres. of Smith for 1975-1985. It was only at this point that they began to think systematically about the educational needs of women AS WOMEN, rather than simply being a Williams or a Yale without a football team. The Smith of today looks virtually nothing like what Smith looked like in 1970.</p>

15

<p>Women's colleges give women the opportunity to assume leadership in all areas without having to beat men at their own game by being more aggressive or self-promoting. I imagine that more is acomplished by consensus than cut-throat competition. Although nowadays fewer women may need this environment to excel, it probably does help them still in the sciences where expectations about women may be lower. Also it fosters non-competitive community solidarity among women on the social scene.</p>

16

<p>In my family women's colleges were the only acceptable way to be educated......none of us gave it a second thought......that's just the way it was.....My sister is 3rd generation Smith......and I graduated from Wheaton (Mass.) when it was all women......in the 70's.......Its true what the posters on this board are saying about the lack of social pressure and the friendships that develop in an all female environment are very very tight.....We'd road trip to Dartmouth, Princeton, Trinity, etc. and hotice how the women seemed to be vying for the mens' attention and didn't seem that friendly with each other.......(no flames please, just my experience)...but the downside is that its a coed world.....and you'd better get used to dealing with the men that you'll be with in the boardroom. (or operating room or courtroom) so why not start right away?</p>

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<p>One thing to note about Barnard is that it's not completely single-sex. The close affiliation with Columbia brings a lot of men to campus and classes, and brings you to theirs. So take that into consideration, either as a pro or con depending on your perspective.</p>

18

<p>Folks might enjoy this Conway interview:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.powells.com/authors/conway.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.powells.com/authors/conway.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

19

<p>I understand the appeal and advantages of being educated at an all women's college. Dke, what you say has been echoed to me by literally everyone else I have ever met who has been educated at an all women's college. Even though there has been a decline in the number of all women's colleges over the past 30 years or so (with Wells being the latest casualty), there are still a fairly large number of all women's colleges around.</p>

<p>I guess my question is why are all male colleges almost extinct? In my conversations with people who have graduated from all male colleges (most of them Wabash grads -- I am from the Midwest), they sincerely believe that their institution fostered a stronger sense of camaraderie and friendship than they could have achieved at any coeducational school. They also indicate that without the distractions of the opposite sex, they are free to concentrate more fully on academic achievement. Why is it that only approximately 1,000 males each year make the choice to enter all male colleges, while many, many more females make the choice to enter all women colleges?</p>

<p>p.s. I apologize to the 26 brave male souls at Deep Springs College – I missed you when I was originally listing all male schools.</p>

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<p>In some cases it made economic sense to admit women. In the case of the service academies, going co-ed was ordered by Congress, and soldiers know how to obey orders. In other cases it was just a case of social evolution --> college had come to be viewed as something that should be open to all, not just young gentlemen. And in some of the the remaining holdouts such as the VMI or The Citadel, women sued to be admitted and won the suits.</p>