A new study says more female freshmen at American colleges identify with the political left than ever before.

It also shows the biggest gap politically between freshmen women and men.

The study comes from the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). Started in 1966, the study polls freshmen at four-year colleges and universities around the country. Last year, the study gathered information from nearly 138,000 students at 184 schools.

HERI asks students how they identify politically: liberal, far left, conservative, far right, or moderate (“middle of the road”).

Traditionally, most students identify as "moderate."

But last year, when the 2016 U.S. presidential election between victor Donald J. Trump and Hillary Clinton occurred, 41 percent of the female students identified as liberal or far left.

This was the largest percentage of young women identifying as liberal in the more than 50-year history of the study.

By comparison, just 29 percent of males identified as left leaning. HERI says the difference has never been bigger.

Around 27 percent of male students and about 18 percent of female students identified as right-leaning this time.

Why the difference?

Kevin Eagan, a professor of education at UCLA and managing director of the HERI, says there were more liberal male students than females in the 1960s and 1970s. The number of female college students identifying as liberal has been steadily increasing since the 1990s.

Eagan says the number of young people identifying with a political party has much to do with the political leadership of those parties. For example, when conservative Republican Ronald Reagan was president in the 1980s, freshmen showed large decreases in the number of liberals.

Eagan says he believes that many young women identified with Hillary Clinton because she was a women and leader of the liberal Democratic Party.

Trump likely pushed women to the left through his negative actions and statements about women, Eagan said.

"With a candidate last year on the Republican side who was characterized by the media, perhaps rightfully so, as misogynistic and not really supportive of women,” he says, “I think that that just served to exacerbate this trend that we’re seeing related to women … shifting their political perspectives.”

Nesha Ruther, a freshman at the University of Wisconsin last year, says she does not identify as liberal simply because the Democratic presidential candidate was female.

Ruther says she first voted for independent and liberal senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders, in the primary elections that decided who would represent the Democratic Party in the presidential race. She says she liked his views about ending police violence against African-Americans and raising taxes on the wealthy.

But after he lost, Ruther grew concerned about Trump’s calls to reduce access to abortion and support for healthcare services that mainly serve women. So she supported Clinton, she says.

Ruther, who studies English, gender and Jewish studies, is a registered Democrat. She says women choose liberalism because it addresses issues that affect them, such as equal pay for equal work, and laws affecting reproductive health.

“Liberalism … is more appealing to women because it is a movement that is for progress,” she says. “So it’s not the way things have been previously, and in that way it is more geared towards the empowerment of women, the increased social mobility of women.”

Changes over time

Hans Noel is a professor of government at Georgetown University in Washington, who says most women are not liberals, and points out that 61 percent of white women without a college degree voted for Trump. But younger women who identify as feminists want to support politicians who support women’s rights, he says.

The political right in the U.S. has grown increasingly conservative, especially on issues like access to birth control, Noel says. And the political left has grown more feminist.

“What it means to be liberal, conservative, what it means to be Democratic or Republican, it evolves and changes,” he says. “It’s not like that suddenly being liberal has been pro-feminist. That’s been around for a while. But that’s certainly been a highlighted issue in the last several years, and particularly the last election.”

Noel adds that colleges and universities typically support more liberal ways of thinking. Younger women will side with the political movement that supports them, he said.

But he adds, it is important to note whether young people express their political beliefs at the voting polls: While people between age 18 and 35 represent 31 percent of U.S. voters, only about half of them voted in 2016.

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Ruth Chane, a computer science major from Ethiopia, writes about her experiences settling into student life at Whitman College in the U.S. state of Washington.

"The community at Whitman College made sure I felt welcomed even before I stepped foot on campus," she says.

Read her essay here.

In The Student Life, the student newspaper for the Claremont Colleges, a consortium of five liberal art colleges and two graduate schools in Claremont, California, student Rochelle Lu writes about readjusting to her Shanghai home after spending a semester in the United States.

Read the full story here.

Cedarville University in the U.S. state of Ohio says it’s got more than 140 international students representing 44 countries.

Here, the school interviews Jonathan Sutton, director of international student services. He talks about his job and the opportunities for international students on campus.

Read the full article here.

Morehouse College, a private, historically Black liberal arts college in the U.S. state of Georgia, offers a guide for international students interested in attending the school.

Among the tips to apply and thrive at Morehouse:

• Take advantage of the school’s orientation program
• Turn to the school’s Center for Academic Success for tutoring, support and more
• Immerse yourself in campus life via clubs and societies

Read the full article here.

WASHINGTON — 

The administration of President Donald Trump said on Monday it will review Columbia University's federal contracts and grants over allegations of antisemitism, which it says the educational institution has shown inaction in tackling.

Rights advocates note rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias since U.S. ally Israel's devastating military assault on Gaza began after Palestinian Hamas militants' deadly October 2023 attack.

The Justice Department said a month ago it formed a task force to fight antisemitism. The U.S. Departments of Health and Education and the General Services Administration jointly made the review announcement on Monday.

"The Federal Government's Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is considering Stop Work Orders for $51.4 million in contracts between Columbia University and the Federal Government," the joint statement said.

The agencies said no contracting actions had been taken yet.

"The task force will also conduct a comprehensive review of the more than $5 billion in federal grant commitments to Columbia University."

The agencies did not respond to requests for comment on whether there were similar reviews over allegations of Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias.

Columbia had no immediate comment. It previously said it made efforts to tackle antisemitism.

College protests

Trump has signed an executive order to combat antisemitism and pledged to deport non-citizen college students and others who took part in pro-Palestinian protests.

Columbia was at the center of college protests in which demonstrators demanded an end to U.S. support for Israel due to the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel's assault on Gaza. There were allegations of antisemitism and Islamophobia in protests and counter-protests.

During last summer's demonstrations around the country, classes were canceled, some university administrators resigned and student protesters were suspended and arrested.

While the intensity of protests has decreased in recent months, there were some demonstrations last week in New York after the expulsion of two students at Columbia University-affiliated Barnard College and after New York Governor Kathy Hochul ordered the removal of a Palestinian studies job listing at Hunter College.

A third student at Barnard College has since been expelled, this one related to the occupation of the Hamilton Hall building at Columbia last year.