When trying to figure out which college is the best choice for you in terms of affordability, sports, and reputation, most students fail to consider diversity as one of the factors that can have a positive impact on your college experience. Diversity in public colleges has a lot of benefits for the students allowing them to learn in an environment where diversity of race, gender, ethnicity, religion, age, socioeconomic status and sexual orientation is not only present but continuously encouraged. So what are the benefits of a diverse college?

You meet unique people

A diverse college allows you to meet new and unique people from all walks of life and hence helps you gain a better understanding of people behavior and ideas since you socialize with people who are different from you. You also get exposed to new cultures and traditions that would otherwise be foreign to you. This will not only make your experience fun but also help you gain a keen knowledge of different philosophies and experiences from other students.

Diverse Classes

A diverse college is also diverse in the classes offered especially for first years. The diverse student and teaching body mean that classes have to be diverse too in order to cater to uncommon demographics. Such classes are interesting and give a different view into various subjects and hence enrich a student’s learning process.

Expansive Thinking

Due to the association with students and lecturers from diverse ethnicities, sexual orientation and socioeconomic statuses among others can help you develop the ability to take into account different varied views and experiences in your studies and associations. This can make you a great problem solver and decision maker hence making you a great job candidate due to lack of tunnel vision.

Preparation for a career in a global society

A diverse college enriches your worldliness, knowledge base and self-awareness as well as expanding your appreciation for multiple perspectives and critical thinking enabling you to work better with people from diverse backgrounds.

Which Public Colleges Are The Most Diverse?

How do you tell that a college is diverse? Is the student population balanced, consisting of Hispanics, Blacks, Asians, Whites and students of other ethnicities? While that may be the case in some public colleges, it may not be reflected in some faculties, in the teaching body and in the various representative organizations present in the college. However, a college which allows for diversity in all of the above is a great learning place where students will tend to learn a lot from the different experiences of the diverse members of the college’s community.

According to bestcolleges.com, which uses the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) a measure of diversity in a certain setting such as a college environment, the top universities ranked in terms of diversity includes Stanford University which takes the cake in terms of diversity. It is followed by the University of California-Los Angeles, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Columbia University in the City of New York, Rice University, University of Southern Carolina, Stony Brook University, University of California-Berkeley, New York University and Emory University among others.

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