Conservative States are Losing Queer College Students

Anti-DEI legislation and conservative bills are losing colleges queer students, according to a poll from the Art and Science group.

The poll showed that 28% of students have ruled out a college exclusively for the states politics. Seventy-five percent of liberal students and 66% of conservative students cited state politics as one of the reasons for not choosing a college. Of those students, two thirds did so on their first pass before more deeply considering certain schools.

“Colleges are increasingly being seen as political places, and so it makes every sense that students would be aware of this as they’re making decisions about where to enroll and that they would factor that into whether or not this is an institution they want to apply to,” says Brown Center on Education Fellow Katharine Meyer said about the poll to The Hill.

The poll noted that 62% of students thought schools should stay neutral on political issues, yet 49% also think schools should take a stance on issues “when important to students.” This was in the winter and spring of 2023 and 2024 respectively, as schools around the country saw students protesting for universities to take a stand on the Palestinian genocide.

The poll noted that New York and California were the states most often mentioned by conservative students, and Texas, Arizona, Tennessee, and Florida were the ones mentioned by liberals. There was little difference between potential students on either side, with the exception of LGBTQ+ students, who were much more likely to avoid a state for anti-LGBTQ+ legislation.

“There are states that have made a decision that universities, public ones, can’t have DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) offices, or these restrictions on abortion, and there are various examples like that that the schools really don’t have any control over, and it may matter to people,” says UC Santa Barbara economics professor Dick Startz to The Hill.

Schools like Florida and Texas have bans on DEI initiatives, like affirmative action, in colleges. Oddly enough, however, conservative students were more likely than liberals to think schools should give preferences to students across many dimensions, including to increase ethnic diversity.

“This seems to be symptomatic of how polarized the country has become on many things, and one can understand why people make these decisions, but it’s kind of a shame that we’ve got ourselves into this situation,” Startz says.