We haven’t visited the school yet but its engineering program seems to be a good fit for my son. My husband is adamant that he isn’t going there because its in Newark. Thoughts?
My son will be starting at NJIT this fall. We went through new student orientation and had a presentation by an NJIT police officer. He said in the 3 years he has been there, there have been no violent crimes on campus. They have their own police department. Honestly, I feel safer having my son at NJIT than at Rutgers New Brunswick. Of course, if you travel off campus, they are at their own risk, as with any college that is in a city. But I don’t feel that NJIT is at any higher risk than other colleges in a city setting. Once you visit, you will see that it is a very condensed, nice campus. Nicer than I thought it was before I visited.
My son is starting his third year at NJIT and lives on campus. I agree with @snoogiemom above about the campus. Also, the area around the campus keeps improving. The light rail station is on a campus street, and easy to get to Newark Penn Station to go anywhere. We too were apprehensive about the area (we live only 10 miles away!) at first, but don’t see it as any worse than New Brunswick .
The university itself is a smaller community with smaller classes. They don’t even have large lecture halls for huge intro classes! The career office is helpful and there is plenty of support for tutoring etc. for students seeking it out. The STEM classes have been fine and rigorous, my kid says. The English and humanities classes are weaker. However, students can take Rutgers Newark courses (right next door) for upper level courses in those areas if they wish.
It’s worth a visit - I would not let preconceived notions about Newark get in the way of at least checking it out.