This women’s college declared its doors open to nonbinary students. And more enrolled.

When Morgan O’Halloran applied to Moore College of Art & Design in 2021, they didn’t know the women’s school a year earlier had modified its admissions policy to state that it accepts nonbinary and gender-nonconforming students.

But from “whispers on the vine,” O’Halloran had heard it was welcoming to that population. And when they enrolled there that fall, they found exactly what they were looking for.

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“It’s just a really nice breath of fresh air,” said O’Halloran, 21, a junior film major from Upper Dublin who identifies as nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns. “You’re given a space to not only explore your art but also explore who you are and really come into your identity as a younger queer person. It’s really, really important to have those safer spaces.”

O’Halloran is part of the growth in nonbinary and gender-nonconforming students at the country’s only historically women’s college for art and design, now in its 175th year. They made up 6% of the freshman class that came in under the new policy in 2021. By fall 2022, they accounted for 21%, and this fall, 26%.

Cathy Young, who became president of Moore in 2022, said it wasn’t that nonbinary or gender-nonconforming students were turned away from Moore pre-policy change, but declaring their acceptance in writing opened the door wider to those populations and explicitly welcomed them. And the move aligned with the college’s mission, Young said. (The change affected undergraduate degree programs; graduate and most continuing education programs include men.)

“We’re an art and design college which means at the center of [students’] work is their sort of identity,” Young said. “And us creating a space where they can be their authentic selves — because that is where their great creative work is going to come from — is mission central for Moore.”

As more young people identify as transgender, nonbinary, or gender-nonconforming, many women’s colleges have tweaked admissions guidelines.

“It’s really driven by students ... who identify as trans and nonbinary and who want to be recognized, included, and have their needs met,” said Genny Beemyn, trans policy clearinghouse coordinator for Campus Pride, a nonprofit that aims to create a safer college environment for LGBTQ students, “as well as by cisgender female students who recognize the importance of historically women’s colleges being safe spaces for all people who are minoritized by virtue of their gender.”

In 2015, Bryn Mawr, a women’s college, modified its policy to include those “who have identified and continue to identify as women (including cisgender and trans women), intersex individuals who do not identify as male, individuals assigned female at birth who have not taken medical or legal steps to identify as male, and individuals assigned female at birth who do not identify within the gender binary.”

But Bryn Mawr does not accept those assigned male at birth who are nonbinary.

Moore College, which Beemyn said is on the more progressive end, goes further, stating that it accepts applications from any nonbinary or gender-nonconforming individual, as well as those who self-identify as women and trans women. The only people who aren’t eligible are those who were assigned male at birth and identify as male at the time of application, Young said. The college, Young said, does have alumni who transitioned to “male-identifying” during and after their time at Moore.

Moore made the change in 2020 at the request of students and after a long process that included faculty, students, staff, alumni, and the board of managers and trustees.

Iliana Flores, who graduated in 2023 with a degree in graphic design and is working in their field as a freelancer, was involved in that process.

“It was simply because the students were here, and the school knew they were here,” said Flores, who is from Jackson, N.J., and began identifying as nonbinary before the change. “It was about learning how to validate it, while honoring the school’s history.”

Flores now serves as an alumni representative on Moore’s board of managers. Because the school was so responsive to students’ concerns about changing the policy, it helped motivate Flores to stay involved.

“It felt rewarding to be able to give back and be able to do things for students at Moore,” Flores said.

Both Flores and O’Halloran said they have not encountered harassment or discrimination at Moore.

“The most I’ve gotten criticism on is some less than stellar paintings I’ve done,” O’Halloran said.

The policy change has helped to fuel an overall increase in students this year at a time when the college is celebrating its history as the first women’s art school in the United States, founded in 1848 as the Philadelphia School of Design for Women.

Nearly 400 students are enrolled this year in the college’s full- and part-time bachelor’s of fine arts program, more than before the pandemic and up about 10% from 2022, Young said, but still less than over a decade ago when undergraduate and graduate enrollment exceeded 500. (An Inquirer survey this fall of 20 local schools showed most still aren’t back to their pre-pandemic levels.) This year, 248 students live on campus, the most in Moore’s history, Young said.

The college accepted 58% of applicants this year, up from 53% the year before when it had more applications, but the school maintained that the average GPA and SAT scores of students this year were higher.

“I love that our students can call our campus safe to be in,” said Lauren Stichter, associate professor and director of art education. “I love that our students know that we are regularly getting training on how to navigate conversations around gender.”

More students are staying, too. Young noted that Moore’s freshman-to-sophomore retention rate grew to 81% this fall, the highest in nine years. Nearly two-thirds of students graduate in six years, and Moore, where the cost of attendance — including tuition, room and board, and fees — is just under $70,000 a year, boasts that 97% of 2022 graduates were employed or in graduate school one year later, almost all in their field of study, according to a survey that had an 83% response rate.

To foster that, Young said, Moore places every student in a paid internship of $1,000 that the school funds during their junior year. O’Halloran is working at the Wells Fargo Center this semester, creating videos and graphics for the Philadelphia Flyers.

The focus on preparing students for successful careers in art and design and its results are a major factor in the enrollment growth this year, Young said.

The college did more than change its policy on nonbinary and gender-nonconforming students. It established a process where students can declare their preferred names and pronouns — 30 students did this last year — and they are used in the classroom and in communication coming from the college.

O’Halloran in August changed their name from Megan to Morgan, and they said staff and students have been “super cool” about it.

“This is a huge issue for students at many universities who are being called by their dead names,” Young said.

The college also changed the name of its visionary women’s scholarship program to visionary honors scholarship. More than a third of Moore students receive the $25,000 annual award, Young said, which can accumulate to a total of over $100,000 during their time at Moore.

But Moore continues its same mission, “to empower and nurture and elevate underrepresented voices in the field of art and design,” Young said. “When we were founded 175 years ago, that was women. But now, it is women and nonbinary and gender-nonconforming individuals.”