AAC Campuses

[dbmill]

We stayed a couple blocks away from the USF campus during the women's basketball final four this past April. One afternoon we decided to do a drive through of the campus to see what it was like. There are a few nice scenic areas, and being a bird watcher I was quite thrilled when our car ended up about 10 feet away from a Sandhill Crane as we drove by. The campus itself is HUGE with large nondescript modern buildings with lots of space between them. A student trying to get from one end of campus to the other on foot for classes would be a real chore. The UConn campus is not exactly small, but it is fairly compact when compared to the USF campus. USF has enough greenery but the campus itself is not a exactly a thing of beauty.

 

[Waquoit]

How many have you been to? Which one other than UConn was your favorite?

Who are we talking about again?

 

[epark88]

I drove through Tulane once, but I've only visited Temple. It was nice enough - it made my final two as far as college choices go - but I picked Storrs over North Philly.

Fun fact: Temple's campus is about 5-6 blocks from a neighborhood called The Badlands. Other than a couple of places across the river in Camden (where my dad lives), it's the most dangerous neighborhood in the entire metro area. I'm pretty sure Temple has dramatically improved it's environs over the years, but it would still be prudent to not venture too far from Broad Street in general, and east of Broad Street in particular...

 

[DarthGrumpy]

Yeah I've been in Boston/Cambridge for a few years now and know the exact areas you're talking about. Ruggles and that upper part of Huntington and down to Mission Hill look more sketchy than they really are. I think it's because not long ago they really were bad areas. still happens because you're still a city, but if you walk X distance from NEU and land in a sketchy area, you could walk X distance from any other Boston school (besides BC) and find yourself in another bad area.

My wife went Northeastern in the mid 90's and it was OK, robbery was the main issue. Heading up Huntington got bad fast though, especially around the housing project (Heath?). Today, it's not that bad. Most of the bad stuff is now way up Blue Hills Ave or down in Murderpan. The areas around Temple and UPenn in Philly and around NJIT and Rutgers-Newark in Newark are a lot worse.

 

[Redding Husky]

Storrs = Mayberry

I would think that's a selling point to parents. I'm a parent of a college student and I'd feel pretty good about sending my child to Storrs.

 

[kibblesnbits]

Storrs = Mayberry

I would think that's a selling point to parents. I'm a parent of a college student and I'd feel pretty good about sending my child to Storrs.

Students need to be aware of safety anywhere they go. Among my immediate family we've been to a mix of urban, suburban and small town schools and the only time we've had a problem with crime was my apartment being robbed while in grad school at Cornell. Urban schools are generally safe on campus but can have issues when you get farther away. Nonetheless they are usually OK if students act prudently. My older daughter's grad school dorm at MIT was about three blocks from the campus and directly across the street from the Cambridge homeless shelter, but other than the occasional ambulance pulling up to drop off or pick up a "resident" there was no indication of problems with the location. My younger daughter is at Northeastern and lives in the massive new dorm they built on the far side of the Ruggles train station. In effect, the campus now surrounds the station (they are also building a massive engineering center on Columbus Ave. next to the station) so it has become a lot safer. I told both daughters to take appropriate precautions and they've loved their urban experience. With both kids I put in a pitch for UConn (I'd like to save $30K per year as much as the next guy), but they wanted to try city living. It's quite a change from CT suburbia.

 

[freescooter]

Been to Navy. Nice but Army and Air Force are both much nicer. Tulane is in my opinion hard to beat. ECU looks like it was designed by the guys who built East Germany. It's that ugly.

 

[BoatShow]

Students need to be aware of safety anywhere they go. Among my immediate family we've been to a mix of urban, suburban and small town schools and the only time we've had a problem with crime was my apartment being robbed while in grad school at Cornell. Urban schools are generally safe on campus but can have issues when you get farther away. Nonetheless they are usually OK if students act prudently. My older daughter's grad school dorm at MIT was about three blocks from the campus and directly across the street from the Cambridge homeless shelter, but other than the occasional ambulance pulling up to drop off or pick up a "resident" there was no indication of problems with the location. My younger daughter is at Northeastern and lives in the massive new dorm they built on the far side of the Ruggles train station. In effect, the campus now surrounds the station (they are also building a massive engineering center on Columbus Ave. next to the station) has become a lot safer. I told both daughters to take appropriate precautions and they've loved their urban experience. With both kids I put in a pitch for UConn (I'd like to save $30K per year as much as the next guy), but they wanted to try city living. It's quite a change from CT suburbia.

I've had a couple friends do grad school at NU. With their massive grad and undergrad enrollment that area is fairly gentrified. In visiting them many times in places on Kilmarnock in the Fens and right on Huntington I've never feared for my self or my property.

 

[Fishy]

ECU, Temple, UCF and USF.

They're fine. Nothing special.

Had I known at the time we'd be in a conference with those schools, there would have been more vandalism.

 

[RedSoloCup]

ECU, Temple, UCF and USF.

They're fine. Nothing special.

Had I known at the time we'd be in a conference with those schools, there would have been more vandalism.

I like how your subtlety has increased over the years.

 

[DarthGrumpy]

Students need to be aware of safety anywhere they go. Among my immediate family we've been to a mix of urban, suburban and small town schools and the only time we've had a problem with crime was my apartment being robbed while in grad school at Cornell. Urban schools are generally safe on campus but can have issues when you get farther away. Nonetheless they are usually OK if students act prudently. My older daughter's grad school dorm at MIT was about three blocks from the campus and directly across the street from the Cambridge homeless shelter, but other than the occasional ambulance pulling up to drop off or pick up a "resident" there was no indication of problems with the location. My younger daughter is at Northeastern and lives in the massive new dorm they built on the far side of the Ruggles train station. In effect, the campus now surrounds the station (they are also building a massive engineering center on Columbus Ave. next to the station) so it has become a lot safer. I told both daughters to take appropriate precautions and they've loved their urban experience. With both kids I put in a pitch for UConn (I'd like to save $30K per year as much as the next guy), but they wanted to try city living. It's quite a change from CT suburbia.

My wife went to Northeastern and lived in an apartment right off of Gainbrough. Felt safe except for the time over winter break when her apartment was broken into, standard smash & grab. The other side of Northeastern by Ruggles to be a lot worse; but it has improved a lot since Northeastern began to expand across the tracks towards Columbus Ave and the 'new' Boston PD headquarters located just 1/2 block away at Ruggels & Tremont also helped. There was talk many years ago that Northeastern would build a new football stadium there to replace the high school field they have in Brookline. of course, that has not stopped some old locals from complaining.

 

[UConnNick]

Houston, SMU, Tulane, Navy, Cincinnati, Tulsa and USF.

SMU has the best co-ed scenery, hands down, and one of the best college football stadiums in the country. Houston's campus is OK but it's bounded on two sides by inner city blighted neighborhoods with shotgun houses. Their brand new football stadium is impressive, and looks far larger than Rentschler, even though its got the same seating capacity. Tulane is in the Garden District of NOLA, enough said, although their BB arena is a glorified high school gym, and their brand new football stadium is more reminiscent of the recently constructed major league soccer stadiums around the country. The Naval Academy is in a great location and has an impressive campus. Cincinnati is a non-descript jumble of totally disparate architectural styles from random eras, and their 1915-era football stadium should be blown up for a complete do-over. Tulsa is a very small school, but it's located in Oklahoma's best large city. It's another school that should take a wrecking ball to its football stadium. USF is your typical huge state school with no particularly redeeming architectural personality.