But regardless of the specificity of Baylor’s current policy, many LGBT students are uneasy. “As a bisexual woman in the Baylor community, I am very much in the closet to everybody that I am not good friends with here, just to minimize backlash,” said a Baylor student named Ariel, who requested that her last name not be used.

And at many colleges, students can still be kicked out for being in a gay relationship. In 2013, Danielle Powell was expelled from Grace University in Nebraska when the school discovered she had been in a romantic relationship with a woman. Other schools express disapproval in more creative ways. For example, last year, the writer Eliel Cruz was allegedly told by administrators that he couldn’t sell cupcakes to raise money for homeless LGBT youth because such “perceived advocacy” of LGBT people would conflict with the mission of Andrews University in Michigan.

Even though some conservative schools are trying to find a compromise between their convictions and prevailing cultural norms, this posture often effectively creates two sets of rules: one for gay students, and one for straight students. For example, at College of the Ozarks, ranked by U.S. News as the No. 4 regional college in the Midwest, the student handbook explicitly forbids “touching, caressing, and other physical conduct of a sexual nature with a person of the same sex.” Yet heterosexual students at the same school are allowed to date and show affection as long as they abstain from sex.

Likewise, at Messiah College, ranked by U.S. News as the No. 5 regional college in the North, heterosexual couples are expected to refrain from sexual intimacy, but they can openly date. Meanwhile, gay students have to follow different rules. According to the handbook, “students who experience same sex attraction or identify as gay or lesbian are expected to refrain from ‘same sex sexual expression’ as it is embodied in culturally contextual practices (e.g., identifying as a couple or exhibiting expressions of physical intimacy).”

What happens if students break a rule against same-sex dating? At Messiah, situations are addressed “on a case-by-case manner that respects the dignity, privacy, and welfare of the person, in conjunction with the Christian identity and commitments of the college,” said Carla E. Gross, a spokesperson for the school. “This process is consistent for all behavioral standards and expectations established by the College—not just sexual behavior.”

Gross noted that, as a Christian college, “Messiah’s institutional approach on human sexuality is based on the authority of scripture as we understand it and is rooted in the traditional teaching long held by the Christian Church—including Messiah’s founding denomination, the Brethren in Christ.” She emphasized that the school’s community standards are related to same-sex behavior, not orientation.