Looking For Love On Campus?

WASHINGTON—Howard University girls sure aren’t happy about being the majority. Many of these ladies struggle to find romance on a campus filled with females. Frustrated by the lack of testosterone, these women are looking for love off campus.

According to collegeboard.com, women make up 68 percent of first-year students at Howard, meaning males only account for 32 percent.

“One guy kind of hinted that Howard was mostly females, but I didn’t believe him,” says Dominique Rice, a sophomore majoring in mathematics at Howard. “I thought it was going to be easy to find someone,” she says.

Jonquilyn Hill, a freshman majoring in broadcast journalism at Howard agrees. “I kind of knew that there weren’t a lot of guys, but I thought there was more than this.”

Because the ratio is against the girls at Howard, Rice and Hill have looked for options off campus at other universities like American, George Washington, and Georgetown. But Rice says, “There’s nothing there.”

Collegeprowler.com reports that females make up 62 percent of the student body at American, while males make up 38 percent. Georgetown and George Washington have a male ratio the reaches the 40’s, but the statistics only get worse if the ladies are looking to date within their race. African-Americans make up only 5 percent of the student body at American, 7 percent at Georgetown, and 6 percent at George Washington.

While black males may be scarce on college campuses in D.C., men of all races are showing lower rates of college enrollment nationally. ACE Center for Policy and Analysis, an organization that represents accredited institutions of higher learning, reports that in 2007, 45.1 percent of women aged 18 to 24 were enrolled in college, almost 10 percent more than the 36.7 percent of males in the same age group. Statistics are even lower for African-Americans. ACE reports that in 2007, 38.6 percent of black females aged 18-24 were enrolled in college, compared to only 27.8 percent of black males in the same age group.

Paul Dickens, a senior in Howard’s School of Medicine has no problem with the off-balance male-female ratio. He says that he knew there were plenty of girls before he came to Howard, but they weren’t really on his mind when he was thinking about coming here. But he did take notice of all of the beautiful women during homecoming. “This is the place that Biggie was rapping about. I knew I made the right decision,” he says.

He also says that he does not have to try to meet women; he just meets them randomly on campus. “I mean, I meet them anywhere. I’ll be in the library or in class, just random places like that.”

And despite the lack of men on campus, the ladies say that they never go out of their way to meet guys either.

“I don’t go out of my way to talk to guys. I might talk to them if we’re at a party or if we have mutual friends,” says Kandis Wallace, a freshman majoring in broadcast journalism at Howard.

The freshman girls agree that they are not looking for serious relationships right now. They are finishing up their first semester of college and believe that there is plenty of time to meet someone.

“I don’t have any serious dating expectations right now. A movie every now and then would be nice, but nothing serious,” says Hill.

College may be the time to meet “the one.” A study done by the Yale Center for Research on Inequalities and the Life Course show that the number of married college educated African-American women is on the decline.

Rice understands that her time is now. “If I was at a school with more guys, I think I would have found someone by now,” she says.