In many college search and selection threads, you read about students who like a school, but end up crossing it off their list because of the surrounding area. Sometimes the surrounding area is crime-ridden, or urban blight, or farmland, or middle of the woods. It’s hard enough to find the right college, so eliminating one because of the surrounding are seems extreme to me. So my question to current college student and recent grads is: Does/did the surrounding area of your college matter?
I’ll give an example from my son’s search. He is very interested in Temple for their engineering program and their merit-based financial aid. These two factors make the school very attractive to him. But almost everything we read about the school focuses on the “sketchy” surrounding area. Seems unfair to me, but that’s why I’m starting this thread. By the way, we’re from NYC and he travels by subway to the Bronx for HS every day so it would take alot to make him feel an area is “sketchy.”
Yes, every college is different, I’m just looking for opinions on whether or not the surrounding area of your school made a difference in the whole college experience. Look forward to hearing from you.
Safety is certainly a valid concern…
As for rural/urban, if you know you’re not going to be happy in a certain type of environment, why keep it on your list? If people can choose colleges based on sports, or perceived attractiveness of students, or dining halls…environment isn’t too silly.
Our son is going to Temple next year and we don’t have any worries about safety. From all accounts the security is excellent and extends into the surrounding area. When we lived in NYC my wife worked in the South Bronx and I worked in East New York, so we have experience with gritty urban neighborhoods.
I don’t think either of our sons would choose a school in the middle of nowhere unless it’s a “college town” environment.
It matters very little. Students rarely leave campus. Students in cities rarely do the things they expect because of time constraints and financial constraints, theirs and their friends, and competing activities on campus which are often free.
Kids don’t understand that small towns around more rural schools are excellent at catering to student needs. They have evolved around the schools and the needs of students.
It is all romance to be honest. I have eight neices and nephews all in college, one son in Maine in college and one going next year. Three of my neices are going to city schools or schools right near cities and they admit that the locations are really not defining their experience in any way. The one in Miami is the most disappointed. The one in DC could take it or leave it and the one in Philly sort of just shrugs about it. My sister and wife call this “Carrie Bradshaw Syndrome” and it applies to boys as well.
I was at a track meet at MIT in February and sitting outside I asked a group of students if they go to Boston and they said basically no. Too busy, too broke and very little interest.
You will find some of the highest freshman retention rates at rural schools or not so exciting locations.
@OnTheBubble Exactly the input I was looking for. Thank you.
Could not disagree with previous comment more strongly…perhaps it depends on the kid. Mine went from an area with a lot to do to a college campus in what is mostly a tourist area; very beautiful and somewhat rural with lots of cute restaurants and bars, but not a ton else for college students to do. She in fact was very unhappy there and ended up leaving after a year. I don’t think she gave enough weight to how important having the culture and activities that she had taken for granted while living at home would be to her. Students do in fact leave campus once in a while 
Agreed with what has been said here. Obviously you want the college to be in a decently safe surrounding neighborhood, but you honestly become so wrapped up in your classes and clubs on campus that this doesn’t matter so much.
The only time it might matter is for getting artists/lecturers to come to campus (if it’s super remote, you may not get the best acts for concerts because it’s out of the way) or if you’re really into going to bars. Personally, I came from NYC and then went to Cornell which is in Ithaca, and I was perfectly content with the Commons, small collegetown, and easily accessible bus home. You get used to the small but familiar options for nightlife and it allows you to be more a part of your campus culture, because people aren’t Ubering into the city or going home every weekend.
To our family, it does matter. What can you walk to from campus? Are there inexpensive places to eat within a block or two of campus? Something to think about at least. @STEM2017 your kid sounds pretty city-savvy and that’s great, it will give him more choices. Our sons, not so much, especially the younger one. So that he won’t be limited to just what’s on campus, we do stroll around the surrounding areas to see what else will be fun to do nearby. Sometimes there is a bit of a buffer around an urban campus that our sons have been OK with, sometimes they’re just not comfortable. So for us, surrounding area tends to mean within walking distance.
@youcee Yes, I agree but rural schools have those small towns to walk to and some are in-town schools like Dickinson and Gettsyburg or right next to town like Bucknell, St. Lawrence, Bowdoin, Bates, Dartmouth, Cornell, etc. There are very, very few schools that are truly isolated.
When I was in college, I had no car, studied all the time, and left campus maybe once a week on Sunday night to eat dinner. Maybe and off campus party on Sat or Sun. I loved it and really had no concept of “the surrounding area.”
Reports I have read say that the average college student studies less now than ever. So I imagine the surrounding area is important (plus these hundreds of clubs every school seems to have) to occupy all that free time.
A lot of kids seem to have an idealized image of college life. A combination of Friends, Sex in the City, and some interesting classes on the side. I’m kidding (a little) but most schools nowadays are such nice facilities that anyone should be able to maintain interest for 8 months a year at nearly any of them.
@WISdad23 Bingo. That is my neice in Miami.
It matters. But people have different preferences and tolerances. My friend’s S was at Temple and she was fine with the area in/around campus. But do your own due diligence – visit and see if you feel that the campus area is well patrolled etc. But with your S already comfortable in an urban environment I think he will be just fine.
@OnTheBubble the beaches are better in Miami than Nebraska. I have found that students study more effectively at Starbucks near beaches too.
If someone is going to be living in a place for 4 years - aged 18 to 22 - they are going to explore the area. There
will usually be an upperclassman willing to drive there. I would not send my kids to a school that I thought they would be in danger if they stepped off the campus, because they will.
My son went to a school in Connecticut 10 years ago. Found out there were crack dens and other bad spots a couple of miles from campus. He left after the semester was over. Partially because of what he found in the area and other reasons. Since then, any time we looked at a school for another one of my kids, we drove a couple of miles at least in each direction.
The bottom line is that many (not all) kids will want to go and explore when they have their first taste of living on their own with no parent over their shoulder telling that what they should or shouldn’t do.
But Nebraska has better wind… 
I went to college a long time ago, but I think I still have a relevant response.
I went to Wesleyan. Downtown Middletown was a 10-15 minute walk from campus. It wasn’t cute or exciting, but it was useful. I could buy stuff I needed. I’m fairly sure that if the only way to run an errand off-campus was to have access to a car or have to rely on a shuttle, I would have found that annoying. So when my 9th grade son says he doesn’t want to go to a school in the middle of nowhere, that makes sense to me.
Obviously, what people want, what seems appealing and what doesn’t, will vary person to person. But no, caring doesn’t seem extreme to me. I think it should be a factor that gets weighed along with all the others. For instance, despite the fact that I didn’t want a city school, refused to even consider Barnard, Brown was my second choice after Wesleyan despite being in Providence because it had so many things going for it that they outweighed the urban setting, plus Providence isn’t Morningside Heights.
I am with @GoldenWest -disagree strongly that it does not matter. My older D was at college in a remote small town after living in a large city for years and found it stifling and insular, while surrounded by lovely scenery (she chose it in part for the proximity to outdoor activities). When she fell ill one weekend, was not ill enough for an ambulance but could not take “the” taxi" so had to ride “the” bus-and it only passed by every 30 minutes. Coming from a city with many, many buses and light rail, this was too much for her and she left at the end of the year.
Temple seems to have a lot of detractors over the “sketchiness” but my D applied there BECAUSE of the surrounding area, as it was heavily minority and she felt more included than in her own hometown. I suspect “sketchy” in this case sometimes-not always, but sometimes, stands for “not like us”.
My niece left a small town for a large city for college and found the availability of so many cheap or free things to do OFF campus was her favorite part of living there. Her cousin, OTOH, chose a small college in a small town and moved to a small town after graduation. They each found exactly what they wanted.
MY younger D chose a small college in a large city, but with a specific population, and the surrounding area means a great deal to her. She wants access to cultural events, her religious denomination and her preferred food that would not be available in many places.
So there are some examples of why it DOES matter for some students and why just anywhere would not have worked for them.
@STEM2017 Take your son to visit Lehigh and Lafayette. Both are close to NY for a day trip, both have engineering and both have merit, but they are much more selective than Temple so the merit will be harder. However, they are excellent for need based money if that is important. The point is to see if he thinks those locations are OK. They have classic quad campuses set off from town. Villanova also is strong in engineering and not very far either. Just see what he thinks.
@OnTheBubble We toured Lafayette and Villanova. Loved them both. I really liked Easton and explained to my son that it’s a nice balance between big city NYC and tiny town, USA. Villanova’s proximity to Philly is really nice, too. Ran out of time for Lehigh. That’s our next trip.
It will come down to merit-aid from those two. A lot of merit-aid.
We’re more focused on SUNY and OOS state schools with generous merit-aid. But that’s for another thread.
OP, if your son takes the subway to Bronx Science, then being at Temple wouldn’t be too much of a different experience. “Sketchiness” is all relative. If you are used to urban environments, it take a lot more to scare you than someone from outside of the cities.