Are Dartmouth Students More Conservative than the Ivy Average?

Just One Question: Former Dartmouth Editor-in-Chief Tig Tillinghast '93:

NOT ANY MORE, APPARENTly at least according to a poll taken by the Ivy League student newspapers shortly before the November Presidential election. Students at all eight schools were asked for their likely ballot choice. I made up an index by dividing the percentage of Clinton supporters by the percentage of Bush supporters and found that Brown University had the highest "liberal index factor," with about a 9, and Penn had the lowest with about 2.5. Dartmouth's was a 4, with three Ivies above it and three below (Cornell didn't get its poll done on time). When I was down in Philly in late January of this year, the other Ivy editors expressed surprise; they had unanimously predicted that Dartmouth would be the most conservative school. You can't blame them; four years before, a similar poll showed that, while a majority of Dartmouth students supported Dukakis, the support was the lowest in the Ivy League. And a higher proportion of Greeners supported Bush back then than at any other Ivy school. Go figure.