<p>How did everyone like them? Good, bad, boring? I had a great time and am definitely coming to Yale next year.</p>
<p>some of the best days of my high school career....</p>
<p>I'm really disappointed I couldn't go. What was it like?</p>
<p>I loved it. However, my parents are worried about crime and the area. any suggestions?</p>
<p>Well, if you visited, you would've noticed that the area where everything goes on is quite safe, well illuminated, and constantly patrolled. It's also pretty nice and has a wide range of shops and amazing restaurants.</p>
<p>New Haven is not the city it was 10 years ago and you should look at the hard statistics, which indicate falling crime and that the area around campus is safer than many of the areas surrounding rival schools.</p>
<p>Not to come to Yale for security reasons is, put simply, illogical, and a lack of recognition for the great efforts made in the last years.</p>
<p>Byerly, as the harvard troll, why are you here on the yale boards? I doubt very much you would like it if I started to inundate the harvard boards with its campus crime statistics, which are currently worse than yale's. Yale's campus crime rate has dropped over the past ten years as has new haven's. Though you seem unable to admit it, New Haven has undergone a renaissance and is continuing to improve, year after year. Yale is as safe as any college situated in an urban campus. The same "don't stray from campus at night" can be said of Harvard, Penn and Columbia. All students who attend college in a city need to employ street smarts, at night especially.</p>
<p>For an old comparison of on campus crime rates, you'll see that yale is average when it comes to other urban campuses. And the crime rate at yale has dropped even more since these figures were made.<br>
<a href="http://www.stalcommpol.org/data.html?*%5B/url%5D">http://www.stalcommpol.org/data.html?*</a></p>
<p>and you shouldn't paint such a rosy picture of cambridge either:
<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=508901%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=508901</a>
<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=509605%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=509605</a></p>
<p>That's odd that you said that no murders occurred in cambridge in 2005.<br>
<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=506138%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=506138</a></p>
<p>"and amazing restaurants."</p>
<p>dude, we are talking about new haven here.</p>
<p>but back to bulldog days...it was an amazing experience</p>
<p>New Haven has amazing restaraunts</p>
<p>BTW. New Haven does have amazing restaurants. You name it, they got it. Although, I must admit they are a bit deficient in good Chinese, but the others more than make up for it :)</p>
<p>With an enormous amount of murders (close to 80), Boston actually had a significantly higher murder rate than New Haven did in 2005. The Boston area is seeing historic highs in violence; New Haven has seen a crime drop similar to New York's and the downtown area has gentrified as a result, with hundreds of expensive restaurants and million-dollar luxury lofts/apartments moving in.</p>
<p>Also, 100% of New Haven's handful of murders were solved because all of them involved acquaintances killing each other, usually boyfriends or girlfriends, or were drug-related. In contrast, only about 30% of the over 70 murders in Boston last year have been solved - there were many more random crimes, including several drive-bys (also mostly drug-related).</p>
<p>Murder rates for smaller cities fluctuate, so it's harder to compare them. For example, Cambridge actually had 6 murders in 2003, giving it a murder rate just as high as New Haven's. But murder rates for cities are pretty useless because murders happen in some areas of cities, but not others, and the land area defined as the city can change depending on when the area was settled.</p>
<p>Overall, as Harvard's own STALCOMM website shows, Harvard has a higher crime rate than Yale (and has for a while). Located in the downtown area of a major city, Yale is a more urban campus, meaning there are more people around and more activity at later areas. There are numerous 24-hour restaurants and shops in the area. In contrast, Harvard's campus is less urban and can be very secluded, quiet and dangerous not just late at night, but even early in the evenings.</p>
<p>So how about that....Crimison....? LOL (Byerly...LOL)</p>
<p>As the parent of a Yale junior girl, I'd like to reassure any parents out there who are worried about the crime in New Haven.
My sheltered suburban-raised daughter flew off to New Haven three years ago, very naive and somewhat sheltered, so naturally I was worried. How would she know which areas were safe? Was the campus itself a problem, and would her lack of experience with cities make her an easy target? </p>
<p>One of the first things required of students when they come to Yale is a half-daylecture about campus safety. They talk about the safest ways to negotiate the city (things which apply to most cities), particular areas that are not safe, and what to do if you find yourself in an unsafe area or situation. They all learn the number to call for a security escort, and they're told about the dangers of leaving campus at night alone. </p>
<pre><code>This is her third year, and she has yet to have a problem. She has learned to handle and safely negotiate urban areas, and because of that, I feel much more confident having her travel to other cities and other countries around the world (which she has since done on her own) .
</code></pre>
<p>In general, kids don't go wandering around late at night off-campus alone. (on campus is very safe, as yes, the gates are locked) There are very few cities where traveling alone after dark is wise. But they DO go out constantly, but there are always friends to go with. The kids frequent off campus restaurnats, and yes, there are many, many excellent ones, and they go to the theater off campus, but rarely do you see students alone. Who wants to dine at a restaurant alone, anyway? </p>
<p>Had my daughter gone to college in a suburban area, or a small isolated campus, she would still need to learn how to travel safely in a big city. Yale gave her the opportunity to learn among the company of her friends, many of whom also haven't lived in a city.
They learn where to go, when to to go, and what to do if they find themselves in a pickle. It's part of their education, and it's been great!</p>
<p>You raise two good points. </p>
<p>First, honestly you're safer in a city, given the lower incidence of deadly car crashes. Suburban and rural campuses are actually the most dangerous, by a significant factor. Furthermore, given how suburban and rural campuses tend to be more secluded, often they have crime problems as well since students are easier targets. Crime gets more publicity in cities, but you have to remember there are a lot of people there. Car crashes aren't as interesting so they don't get publicized as much. After a few days, you stop hearing about them, whereas a murder (such as the Harvard student who killed her roommate) gets talked about for decades afterwards. But people are dying left and right in car related accidents - over 100 per day - and many of them are college students. In contrast, only about 20 college students are murdered each year on campus, almost all of them by people they know (i.e., other students). That means a college student is 100-200 times more likely to be hurt or killed by a car, or while driving a car.</p>
<p>Secondly, as you point out, most of the world's population lives in cities and smart people learn how to navigate them. Since most people live in cities, unless you are a hermit you're best off learning about them because chances are you'll live there one day.</p>