There are numerous reasons students choose a historically black or women’s college — many offer first-rate academics, small classes and easy access to professors. In addition, tuition at H.B.C.U.s has traditionally been lower than at other institutions. But few doubt that recent interest is related to the current political climate.

Marybeth Gasman, a professor of higher education at the University of Pennsylvania, has been studying H.B.C.U.s for decades. She estimates that until three years ago, she would receive about eight phone calls and emails yearly from students and parents asking about such colleges, with questions typically related to academics and whether it would hurt a student’s future choices to choose an H.B.C.U.

“In the past three years I’ve received between 80 and 100 a year,” she said. “Nearly all those phone calls or emails or Facebook messages ask one question: ‘Do you think it would be better for my child to go to an H.B.C.U. in the current political climate?’ Students ask, ‘do you think I will be safer at an H.B.C.U.?’ To me, this has really been powerful.”

The growing interest in historically black and women’s colleges plays into the debate about “safe spaces” on university campuses — an ambiguous term that some see as a way for students to feel both emotionally and physically secure, while others view it as catering to a generation of “snowflakes” who melt under the slightest disagreement or negativity.

Research from the Gallup organization shows, however, that graduates of H.B.C.U.s tend to report better college experiences than African-American students at mostly white colleges and are almost twice as likely to agree that their university prepared them well for life outside of college. And other research found that women’s institutions — more so than coed ones — have created a climate “where women are encouraged to realize their potential and to become involved in various facets of campus life, inside and outside the classroom.”

A common criticism, which students can hear from family, friends and counselors, is that they are choosing to attend a place that doesn’t reflect “the real world.”