@moosiechica88, your description of Penn/Philly reminded me of the Harvard spoof of the Yale admissions video that was inspired by Glee. (That Yale video alone made my son cross Yale off his undergrad list. Just wasn’t in sync with his more Indie sensibility.)
I think the Yale campus is beautiful but I prefer a more eclectic look like Brown, Penn and Tufts’ campuses. I like it when all the buildings aren’t in a singular architectural vernacular. Other people see eclectic architecture and see an ugly mess, as you did. Different strokes for different folks.
I agree with @moosiechica88 about the area around U of Penn campus. It was a dismal location in 1978, when I looked it over, and it was even worse for crime and crappy public K-12 schools, racial tensions and shootings in the HOOD, in 2012 when my son looked it over. I can remember my father saying to me “these dorms look like they are from WW1”. It was so run down. Philadelphia is bad for unemployment and it shows.
OK I am ready for hate mail, but this was my visit experience in Philadelphia. We took the trains from Haverford area, into the waterfront area. Camden NJ is spilling into the area, is how I feel, and it feels dangerous on the trains there. Cleveland trains are safer, and East Cleveland makes West Phili look like a war zone, and East Cleveland is not that nice. (for anyone who is familiar with East Cleveland, which is poor, but smaller and friendlier than big bad West Phili)
There is at last one shooting a week, but usually four in Philadelphia.
Going to college in a crime-ridden, impoverished area (in my case, the South Bronx, couldn’t get much worse than that!) only added to the educational experience for me. It certainly opened my eyes to the world around me and the plight of the poor and downtrodden. I wouldn’t trade it for the world. Despite seeing all the boarded up buildings, burnt out cars abandoned along the shoulder of the Cross Bronx Expressway, trash-strewn streets and kids jumping on the hood of our car with squee-gees looking to earn a buck etc as we stopped at a traffic light, I was not deterred. Apparently it did not concern my father either since he agreed to let me go there (perhaps it would have shaken my mother had she been with us but she didn’t see the campus until move-in day).
Yes, truly urban campuses are clearly not for everyone. That’s ok…less people fighting for admission for those who don’t let the neighborhood bother them.
Ha, however, Penn has no shortage of applicants. They only accept something like 9% or less so Philadelphia crome not scaring off too many lately! . They reject 91% of their applicants. For some reason Cleveland gets a bad rap that it does not so much deserve, and Penn with its Ivy allure and big alumni following, gets all the applications. I prefer Cleveland’s decay, boarded up buildings, and drunks, myself! Its just a bit easier for Case students to get to a top Art museum or take in a world class Cleveland Orchestra concert, compared to how Penn students need to go over across the river and, I feel less safe doing that, then walking in Cleveland from Case Western to Severance Hall. So, CWRU went up after our visit, Penn down.
@Coloradomama I was really just joking about less people applying b/c clearly places like JHU, Penn and USC have never been hurting for applications! Funny you mention Cleveland, my father is a native Clevelander - he left after college for the East Coast but his entire family remains there. My sister even went to college in Cleveland, met her husband there and never left, so needless to say, I’ve been to Cleveland many times and never understood its bad rap.
I remember getting driven into Columbia U/Harlem in 12th grade, by my Dad in 1978,for a Saturday class, from New Jersey, as the subways to 116th were not great back then, and now that area is so nice and beautiful. I feel safer on Morningside Drive than in the Phili waterfront area, or close to Curtis School of Music, area. I guess each student needs to find his/her comfort level when it comes to urban environments. The area around Penn somehow sets my teeth on edge, but I guess we hit it on a bad day with lots of homeless around the train station, and felt a bit down about it. I wanted to love Penn, and I just did not love the area. School is fabulous though, and the tours there are pretty good in fact, if you drive in and don’t wander in off the train as we did. We toured Swarthmore, Haverford on the same visit, which may be why, the disparity between Main Line Philadelphia wealth and West Phili is very discouraging.
Yeah, I think anyone who loved Glee, or musicals in general, loved that Yale video. I know a friend’s son loved it and ended up at Yale.
My kid loves Monty Python, so no surprise that he loved the Harvard spoof and thought the Yale video was over the top. As I said, different sensibilities, and thankfully schools for everyone.
@RenaissanceMom Dying laughing at the Harvard spoof of Yale video. As for Penn, those boarded up houses the reviewer saw are probably worth half a million or more if they are in close proximity to the University. I wish I had bought one of those ramshackled houses in the early 90’s when they were available for a song. Back when I was at Penn, it was much grittier. Two of my professors had incidents where they were robbed on/hear campus, and both attempted to chase down the robbers. One successfully tackled his robber and recovered his wallet, at the cost of a few stitches to his head. The second attempted to chase after his car as it was being stolen. I never had any issues with crime there, except once, years later, my wallet was nicked at a campus Starbucks.
@moosiechica88 You’re horribly exaggerating negative aspects of Penn. I have no idea why other than to get attention.
No student attending Penn has any concerns about safety or the homeless. Your comments are also rich with hypocrisy given you sent your son to New Haven, which legitimately is a dangerous place to live (9.5% violent crime rate versus 1.0% in University City).
Look, I went to Penn and am happy that the area has gotten better since I was there in the 90s (and I’ve seen it recently enough—a couple years ago—to vouch for it being better), but can all the outspoken Penn defenders just stop it with the outright denials that there could ever be anything like a boarded-up building or somebody falling-down drunk next to campus? Seriously, the astonishing level of defensiveness is not doing the school any favors here.
I don’t have any connection to Penn other than living in Philadelphia. I went to Temple in the late 80’s. I don’t care if people don’t like either of these schools or Philadelphia or cities. I’m certainly not defending Penn, lol. But facts are important. I understand what North Philly and West Philly were like in that time. I also know what each campus is right now. I also know what the city is like right now. To imply that the Curtis institute is in some horrible area when it is located in Rittenhouse square is just silly. To say that Camden is creepy over the river in to the Philly is silly. That area is Old City, Society Hill and where Independence Hall is located.
Penn and Drexel have been buying up their area. Penn sponsors a k-8 public school that has made their neighborhood hot. Those homes are half a million and up so parents can be in the catchment. Yes, there are boarded up buildings. Yes, there are homeless people.
This thread needs to have a “no rebuttal” clause - these are personal opinions and as far as CC goes, people still are allowed to have opinions without checking with statistics, crime facts, etc. If you want a fact-checked thread, please go make another thread and let us get on with the non-fact-based-opinions.
@amandakayak , again, like a school/don’t like a school. Like a city/don’t like a city. I don’t care. But facts actually do matter. People correct information on this thread all of the time.
I’m amused that city folks (friends or friends of my kids) often come to our farm and worry about our safety when we go out on our night walks - alone - no dog or mace or whatever.
I think folks get used to their environment and assume other environments are something to be super wary of mainly because they are different or they get their facts from news spurts or Hollywood, not at all thinking about how those concentrate on only the bad things or how vast of an area it might cover.
For that matter, when we went to Jordan to visit my studying abroad son I can’t count the number of times people told us they’d be praying for our safety. Even my dad asked me why we’d go there (or let him go) telling me, “I thought you were the smart one in the family!” Finally my hubby wrote a response to one such comment (on FB), “Thanks, we have to fly through Philly, PA!” and listed the average stats from both Amman (ancient Philadelphia) and Philly. Amman is much, much safer. That said, we didn’t feel “unsafe” in either location.
Bad things can happen anywhere - or not. We, personally, don’t stop living out of irrational fear. Our trip to Jordan was awesome - as was his study abroad.
Just for the record, the shooting that @moosiechica88 referenced (that took place in 2016) occurred at the intersection of 52nd and Sansom. This is 12 blocks west of the western edge of the Penn campus, not the “couple blocks” that was suggested. I parked on 38th Street across from Wharton a couple of months ago while visiting my daughter and don’t recall any boarded up buildings. Then again, I wasn’t looking for any. All facts here, not opinion.
@Creekland, we get similar comments from family and friends about our son studying in Beirut, and our planned visit in June to see him. I tell people the most dangerous part of our trip will be driving to the airport!
And yes, let’s not beat a dead horse any longer. I will delete any more posts on the subject.