Reaching an Invisible Minority: A Survey of Admissions Department Leaders\u27 Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Student Outreach Efforts and Campus Climate in the Upper Midwest

Lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) students face challenges and barriers to higher education that heterosexual students do not. Many of these challenges are rooted in negative high school experiences of LGB youth, such as social stigmatization and family rejection. Additionally, LGB students have historically been excluded from admissions office outreach considerations. This has resulted in structural and symbolic barriers in secondary and post-secondary institutions. These barriers limit LBG student access and also limit available resources to support the successful transition to higher education institutions. Higher education admissions leaders have a unique opportunity to reach out to and actively support LGB students in their transition to college. Higher education admissions department leaders were surveyed about the role of institutions and admissions departments in creating proactively inclusive and welcoming environments for LGB students. The leaders indicated an overall need for institutions and admissions departments to be welcoming, but stopped short of endorsing many specific, proactive measures that target LGB students. Admissions leader educational achievement levels, years of admissions work experience, non-white identity, and non-heterosexual identity were positively correlated with an overall sense of responsibility to LGB students. Admissions department leaders also indicated that the university as a whole, as opposed to their specific admissions department, had a greater responsibility to LGB students. At the institutional level, mid-to-large institutions in or near mid-to-large cities that were religiously unaffiliated, public, and with a bachelor\u27s degree as the highest degree offered were positively correlated with an overall sense of responsibility to LGB students. Demographic breakdowns of responses, both institutional and respondent, indicated patterns helpful in targeting diversity initiative resources and sharpening admissions department diversity action policies