<p>I wouldn’t call these Princeton Review rankings “inaccurate”. </p>
<p>It’s true that “quality of life” can be subjective; but, they still reflect the general morale of the student body of a school. </p>
<p>The morale isn’t entirely about the facilities a university provides either. Some universities simply attract more optimistic/pessimistic individuals than others.</p>
<p>Agree with the above post, but will add that happiness or QofL is mostly a matter of finding the right kids for what the school offers and then doing what it is doing well. So, for example, if school A is in the country, 60% of the student body is greek, and everyone is happy – that in no way means that a city kid who shuns greek life is going to be happy there just because it has a high QofL rating (miserable more likely) … although it might suggest that if that type culture is attractive to you, that school is probably doing well keeping that type of student happy.</p>
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<p>False. The crime rate in Morningside Heights (which extends more than “a couple of blocks north of Columbia/Barnard”) is lower than on the Upper East Side. Continuing north, the crime rate in Central Harlem is now significantly lower than in Midtown South, the Lower East Side, East Harlem, the South Bronx, Hunt’s Point, Tremont, Bed-Stuy, Brownsville, Bushwick, East New York, and a number of other NYC neighborhoods; in fact, it’s pretty close to the citywide average. Crime in Harlem has declined by a little over 80% since 1990. And many Columbia graduate students are moving into regentrifying areas of greater Harlem like Sugar Hill, near the City College of New York campus. Lots of people associated with Columbia do their grocery shopping at the Fairway market in West Harlem, an area Columbia is redeveloping with a massive new addition to its campus. Lots of Columbia and Barnard students are involved in community service projects in various Harlem neighborhoods and go there regularly.</p>
<p>As for “most dangerous on the East Coast,” Baltimore, Washington, Philadelphia, Boston, Newark. Hartford, New Haven, Bridgeport, and Providence all have higher crime rates than New York City, in most cases double or triple. The murder rate in Boston is double New York’s; Baltimore’s is roughly 5 times New York’s. The rate of forcible rape in Boston and Baltimore is triple that in New York; in Philadelphia it’s roughly 5 times New York’s rate. </p>
<p>You’re just propagating 40-year-old stereotypes that no longer reflect the facts on the ground.</p>
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<p>Why all those “false” screams? What are a couple of blocks? Fwiw, take a look at the maps of NY … where does Barnard and Columbia end on the northern part of Morningside Heights? Where does Harlem starts? </p>
<p>And Central Harlem is not only to the Northwest on MH, but also due West as it starts at the edge of Central Park. </p>
<p>[Map</a> of Central Harlem – NY Bits](<a href=“http://www.nybits.com/manhattan/central_harlem/central_harlem_map.html]Map”>http://www.nybits.com/manhattan/central_harlem/central_harlem_map.html)</p>
<p>Plenty of people do find the location of Barnard/Columbia attractive and interesting. Others might not find living in New York City in general and especially in areas close to Harlem that appealing. Some do not see any danger in walking urban areas at night. Others might be frightened at the sight of a hooded man! </p>
<p>Similar discussions can arise about many urban campuses such as Penn’s, JHU’s, Berkeley’s, and plenty of others. In the end, there are statistics and there is the subjectivity of the people looking at the “facts.”</p>
<p>PS Crime has indeed gone down tremendously in the past years, but the numbers were still high ten years ago. Below are the figures for the 32nd Precinct.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/crime_statistics/cs032pct.pdf[/url]”>http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/crime_statistics/cs032pct.pdf</a></p>
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<p>The northern most border of Columbia is 120th street. Take a walk for 3 blocks north on Amsterdam and make a left on 123rd street. Do this after 9:00 pm on any night. 9/10 times you will not return to Columbia without making a stop at the hospital, if you are lucky…</p>
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<p>Xiggi: I’s a recruited aflete at the Ivie leegs, don’t ax me where. Nobody reading no essay here, bro! Don’t matter what I lays down, see? Colloqu-what? I do 4.4 time in wet shoes, thas’ what I’m sayin’ and thas all they need to know and want to know. See you in Cambridge, man!</p>
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<p>Oh, please. I lived in that exact neighborhood for many years and walked that exact route many times, and never once landed in the hospital. That’s just ridiculous.</p>
<p>^ Let me expand on that thought.</p>
<p>There’s a very nice Italian restaurant at 123rd & Amsterdam called Max SoHa. I used to go there frequently, sometimes as much as once a week, with my wife and two young daughters, then walk home along 123rd street. It was often 9 or later as we made our way home. Not a single incident. It’s safer than Baltimore, or New Haven, or New Orleans, or DC, or Philadelphia, or Atlanta, or Nashville, or Houston, or South Bend, or Boston, or Durham, or San Francisco, or Los Angeles, or Portland, or Tuscaloosa, or Austin, or a couple of hundred other U.S. cities.</p>
<p>New York City’s crime rate is now below the national average for communities of ANY size, and it is by far the safest big city in the United States. The crime rate in Morningside Heights is below the citywide average. That means you’re more likely to get mugged in Green Bay, WI, or Lawrence, KS, or Santa Monica, CA, or Irving, TX, or Sioux Falls, SD, or Lincoln, NE than in Morningside Heights.</p>
<p>Such ill-informed nonsense.</p>
<p>[Columbia</a> University in the City of New York](<a href=“http://www.columbia.edu/cu/publicsafety/alerts.htm]Columbia”>http://www.columbia.edu/cu/publicsafety/alerts.htm)</p>
<p>The New York City Police Department has notified us that on November 19, 2011 at about 2:05 a.m., two students were the victim of a robbery on W. 122 St. near Amsterdam Avenue. The victims were talking when they were approached by two males. One of the suspects displayed a firearm, while the second took the purse of one of the victims. The suspects fled south on Amsterdam Ave. in a black sedan.</p>
<p>On November 21, 2011 at about 11:50 p.m., a student was the victim of an attempted robbery on W.114St. between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. The student accompanied by another person was accosted as she was walking on the north side of W.114 St. towards Broadway. The suspect pushed the victim against a fence, threatened her and demanded her I-phone. When the suspect learned she did not have an I- phone, he fled east towards Amsterdam Avenue without taking any property. The suspect is observed on video walking back and forth on W. 114 St. prior to the crime. Moments earlier, he followed a student into Ruggles Hall but left the building immediately. If you observe this person on the street, call the police immediately by dialing 911.</p>
<p>goldenboy – If the South is indeed “known for its drinking culture,” as you put it, then the image that the rest of the nation has of the South is terribly skewed. Sure there are drinkers, just like in the rest of the country, but we also have a right significant percentage of rural Protestants, among others, who abstain for religious regions. Growing up as one of those rural Southerners a mere generation ago, I had never seen anyone drinking alcohol before I went off to college.</p>
<p>Duke is well-known in NC for having a heavily Greek/drinking culture. It is also known as having a large percentage of non-Southerners. Certainly, Duke is a very fine academic institution. However, I would recommend reading the entire 1992 Founders’ Day speech by the late Reynolds Price, an esteemed NC writer and professor in Duke’s English Department. He died in January after spending 50+ years on the Duke faculty, and he was revered by those who knew him. Here are some excerpts:</p>
<p>"I even try to believe, admittedly with a frozen smile, the annual announcement by our admissions office that this September’s crop of freshmen is more beautiful-in-mind, body and soul – and better equipped to meet the faculty’s challenge than any previous generation. But beneath the grin I’m unavoidably recalling my certainty that the 5,000 Duke students of my undergraduate years – the early 1950s – gloried in a proportionally greater number of absolutely first-rate student minds and that fruitful personal exchanges between teachers and students were far more common in those days.</p>
<p>"Anyone in search of face-saving explanations for our gradual dilution of that splendid compound might say that the 1950s were more propitious years for white middle-class public education in America. They were also years in which, as Mr. Duke clearly intended, the university more easily wooed and won the exceptionally intelligent, ambitious and almost never wealthy white students of its own region – both the upper and deep South.</p>
<p>"Despite recent efforts to repair that neglect, the ongoing absence of so many of those most promising Southerners – of every race and degree of income – is partly owing to a breakdown of regional boundaries throughout the nation and partly to our steeply rising tuition. But most sadly the absence of those young Southerners among us is owning to this university’s inexplicable loss of will to find the means of supporting those needy students of North Carolina and the South who have earned the right to come here but cannot. I date that loss of will to the early 1960s.</p>
<p>“So for more than three decades, that failure has not only sent most of the best Southern high school graduates elsewhere – especially to Chapel Hill where the Morehead Foundation skims a drastic share of the cream of the state, the South and the nation – it has also deprived us of the benign role so explicitly intended for us in forming the future leaders of our time and place.”</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>"Then walk your attentive self through the quads. Stand at a bus stop at noon rush-hour; roam the reading rooms of the libraries in the midst of term and the panic of exams. Lastly, eat lunch in a dining hall and note the subjects of conversation and the words employed in student discussion. (I’m speaking mostly of undergraduates, but not exclusively.)</p>
<p>"Try to conceal your consternation at what is often the main theme of discourse – something much less interesting than sex and God, the topics of my time. If for instance you can eat a whole meal in a moderately occupied Duke dining hall without transcribing a certain sentence at least once, I’ll treat you to the legal pain reliever of your choice. The sentence runs more or less like this, in male or female voice – ‘I can’t believe how drunk I was last night.’</p>
<p>“Considering that the social weekends of many students now begin – indeed are licensed by us to begin – at midday on Thursday and continue through the morning hours of Monday (as they never did in the old days of ‘country club’ Duke), maybe the sentence is inevitable – at least in the bankrupt America we’re conspiring to nurture so lovingly and toward which we blindly, or passively anyhow, wave our students.”</p>
<p>And, as part of his recommendations for change:</p>
<p>“We’d take firm steps to move out briskly every fraternity and sorority among us; they would not return. I was once a member of a fraternity that survives on this campus. I enjoyed the laughter in the days before alcohol became our grim solvent; but the uses of such organizations – play and violence and the occasional charitable project – are automatic functions of an animal species as social as our own. And our present fraternities and sororities, grotesque relics as they are of 19th century small rural colleges, have long since ceased to serve any role not better served by means less expensive, in every sense, of the university’s time and life-blood. Worse, they’re our main force for division and waste – waste of the crucial youth of our students and what their elders might learn from them.”</p>
<p>That speech was made nearly twenty years ago. The latest report I hear from Duke students is that the Greek/drinking culture is still dominant, and that parties with themes like “CEOs and Corporate Hos” and “progressive” parties ([Duke’s</a> party scene in spotlight’s glare - Education - NewsObserver.com](<a href=“http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/01/22/936442/dukes-party-scene-in-spotlights.html]Duke’s”>http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/01/22/936442/dukes-party-scene-in-spotlights.html)) still go on. Mr. Price loved Duke University. Imagine how those who don’t have the same affection for it must view it.</p>
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<p>so your home was west on 123rd street from 123rd and Amsterdam?</p>
<p>oh, ok…I see</p>
<p>then shame on you for putting your family at risk in such a manner!</p>
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<p>Well, I suppose it was only a matter of time before this turned into a battle of the police gazettes. I guess, New Yorkers are just stupid for living in such a dangerous city; I guess, the sidewalks are impossible to cross at Christmas time because the tourists who come here are just a little bit daft in the head and would rather get their thrills taking the New York City subway at night than parachute jumping, hang-gliding, or getting into a three-way car collision on the Santa Monica freeway. That’s it. Eight million New Yorkers have it all wrong.</p>
<p>^^
Why is it so hard to maintain a modicum of balance? </p>
<p>On the one hand, nobody should think that Columbia and Barnard are located in an area where assaults are daily occurences. On the other hand, however, pretending that they do not happen on streets such as Amsterdam is misleading. As the “gazette” shows, two incidents that directly impacted students happened in TWO days in November of 2011. Those are facts and not non-sensical drivel from 40 years ago. </p>
<p>And, again, in the end, it comes to individual preferences and individual tolerance for potential danger. To each his own! </p>
<p>Eight million New Yorkers do not have it all wrong. They made the choice to live in that city. That does not mean that everyone is envious of their choice.</p>
<p>In response to a comment above, Columbia is not in Harlem. Second, Harlem today is a really beautiful place. Its historic beauty has been restored. Lots of gorgeous churches, parks, restored rowhouses AND friendly people. Take a walk there before you attack it.</p>
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<p>The silliness of these remarks apparently knows no bounds. JamieBrown made the ludicrous and patently false claim that if you walk on 123rd St after 9 pm you’ll end up in the hospital 9 times out of 10. That is clearly not the case. When I lived in that neighborhood 8 years ago (not 40), I walked that street with some regularity and had zero incidents. The crime rate has only gone down since then. I did not claim crime never happens in that neighborhood. I clearly stated just the opposite, that the crime* rate<a href=“i.e.,%20the%20number%20of%20crimes%20per%20capita,%20implying%20that%20there%20clearly%20is%20some%20crime”>/I</a> is lower there than in most neighborhoods in New York City, and NYC’s rate is lower than that of Boston, and New Haven, and Philadelphia, and Baltimore, and Washington, and on and on. </p>
<p>So far this year (through 11/27/11), according to NYPD stats, there have been 88 felony assaults in the 26th precinct which includes Morningside Heights and a big swath of West Harlem (Manhattanville and part of Hamilton Heights, up to 141st St). Likely fewer than half of those have been in Morningside Heights proper. In contrast, in the tony Upper East Side 19th Precinct, generally considered a “safe” neighborhood, there have been 104 felony assaults over the same period. In Greenwich Village (6th precinct), 105 felony assaults over the same period. East Village (9th precinct), 128 felony assaults.</p>
<p>I repeat: Morningside Heights has less crime than most areas of New York City, by far the lowest-crime big city in America. Quoting incidents from a police blotter without proper factual context is just about the most ridiculous form of argumentation there is.</p>
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<p>What appears to know no bounds is your inability to correctlty quote someone and address the issue raised in that particular quote, as well as display a modicum of courtesy. If you want to debate a different post, please have the courtesy to quote THAT poster. </p>
<p>Is that too much to ask?</p>
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<p>The forty years remark was in direct reference to your earlier line: “You’re just propagating 40-year-old stereotypes that no longer reflect the facts on the ground.” </p>
<p>The police blotter was in direct reference to "It was often 9 or later as we made our way home. Not a single incident." The reports from Columbia police showed incidents in the same area in the past weeks. What kind of context do you expect? Police reports from 8 years ago? Pluuzhe! </p>
<p>As far as crime statistics, I provided some for the 32nd Precinct in answer to crimes in
Harlem. This was in reference to crimes NORTH of Morningside Heights, an issue raised in a prior post. </p>
<p>/sigh!</p>
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I’m sure there are people at Duke who dislike it, yes. I myself felt a little out of place my freshman year. I was a southerner not into the “drinking culture” (I never drank under 21 and rarely over it), fairly poor (my sister and I are/were on Pells), and fairly nerdy (Chicago was my #1 choice in high school). Shockingly, I managed to find my place at Duke and thoroughly enjoy my time there without resorting to levels of debauchery that would make a maenad blush. </p>
<p>The problem with you or anyone else writing about “the social life” at a college is that social scenes at any college (Liberty U aside, perhaps) are not monolithic things. </p>
<p>Yes, there are people at Duke who drink. Recent surveys indicate that about 65-70% of Duke students drink at least once a month, and 30-40% binge drink. High figures, admittedly, but surprisingly slightly lower than the national average. You are right that many southerners are conservative and abstain from drinking, but many of those people gravitate toward schools like Harding and Baylor rather than the more mainstream universities like Vandy and Wake. Certainly all southern flagships have copious amounts of alcohol consumption – I’m pretty familiar with Tennessee and Ole Miss, and both universities make Duke look like Carrie Nation. </p>
<p>There is a sizable minority of people at Duke who don’t drink, either for religious or personal reasons. Most of the ones I knew loved their time at Duke. Many of the people who do drink take it no further than grabbing a drink with a friend at the Dillo. What do these students do with their free time? Well, how I spent some of my non-party weekends:
[ul][<em>]working backstage in a theatre production
[</em>]concerts in Chapel Hill
[<em>]bowling and laser tag with friends
[</em>]DDR competition (sponsored by a frat, no less!)
[<em>]wine/art night at the campus art museum
[</em>]board games with friends
[li]campus movie showings[/ul][/li]I can’t say that alcohol isn’t a pretty big part of many Duke students’ social lives, and nobody would confuse it with Swat or Brandeis. As I noted in another thread, most students are more enthused about tailgating than actually attending football games. On the other hand, it is absolutely untrue to imply, as many do, that the only options at Duke are either to participate in Animal House-style drinking and partying or to feel like a social pariah. There are MANY social alternatives, and yes, it’s possible to head to a party with friends for some dancing without getting blitzed. </p>
<p>As for your comments about your campus visit, they very much surprise me. I rarely walked across campus without bumping into at least a couple of people I know, a bit surprising considering Duke’s 6000+ students. Certainly most people I know would wave and greet friends or people they know (including professors). I won’t dispute your account, of course, but I do wonder if you were visiting at a particularly stressful or busy time of year (e.g. midterms or finals week). The friendliness of the Duke student body typically gets glowing reviews in the CC college visit reports, and 90% gave it a 4/5 or 5/5. I’ve cited several comments in [another</a> thread.](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/13184735-post20.html]another”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/13184735-post20.html)</p>
<p>The problem with judging colleges on a single visit is that you get a snapshot view of the school. I first visited Carolina many years ago on a rainy day late in December, for example, and most of the students I met seemed preoccupied/spacey. I got to know the university very well over the years, however, and it’s definitely one of my favorite colleges these days. I was similarly turned off by the students at Davidson when I first visited, but I absolutely LOVED it when I visited again for admitted students days.</p>
<p>warblersrule – I appreciate your well thought-out, very diplomatic reply to my post. I know that all Duke students can’t be labeled as “party animals”. A students I know who is there now, a non-drinker, has really struggled socially, but he has found his place in the congregation at Duke Chapel – his niche.</p>
<p>One of the problems is perception. Duke is very much perceived among many people in North Carolina as a academically rigorous party school. I am very pleased every time I read about Duke students who are actively condemning behaviors on the Duke campus, such as heavy drinking and parties degrading women, that contribute to that perception. Students and faculty at ALL schools know that negative behaviors, even if not by a majority of people, can contribute to a school’s reputation. Most Penn State students (I hope it’s the vast majority of them) must be so ashamed that the image of their school has been tarnished by both the football program and the rioting students – and other colleges’ problems pale beside Penn State’s. UNC students and faculty who supported Chancellor Thorpe have certainly been embarrassed by those Rams Club members who called for the Chancellor’s firing because he fired Butch Davis.</p>
<p>It’s important for people at all universities to work to create a new, more positive image for their school when that image has suffered. For example, football has become a problem at UNC, and there should be a call to rebuild the whole program. I’d recommend closing it and starting from scratch, but that won’t happen. Likewise, I think Duke should look at Reynolds Price’s recommendations for change and implement some of them. Stopping the “progressive” parties, whether outright or by kicking students out who participate, would be a great place to start in addressing some of Duke’s image problems.</p>
<p>In North Carolina, Duke’s reputation in certain areas is stellar. Duke Medical School puts out some of the nation’s top medical specialists, particularly in opthalmology and cardiology, and Duke Hospital is one of the best in the country. Also, a lot of Methodist churches around here are staffed with Duke Divinity graduates.</p>
<p>Again, thanks for the kind response. I checked this website today, expecting to have been hammered. If you hammered me, you did it very nicely.</p>
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<p>Marsian - Duke actually has implemented many of Reynolds Price’s recommendations from 1992. In the early 1990s, there were open kegs on the quad for everybody to drink every Friday…I could not even imagine that now. The university has also eliminated tailgate, sponsored more classy (and heavily attended, I might add) parties in the library and art museum, encouraged more intellectual dialogue outside the classroom by implementing various residential communities, purchased homes off campus and sold them to single families to discourage off campus partying, etc. Some find these changes positive; others disagree. Everybody obviously has a different view on what the priorities of their school should be.</p>
<p>If you compare the Duke party/drinking culture to a typical state school, it’s not even close - the state school has Duke beat by a ton. Even a great state school like Michigan - and I’ve been to several parties at both. (Nearby neighbor UNC’s parties/Greek system also blows Duke out of the water from a crazy partying standpoint. Although UNC is a larger school, so perhaps those that want to avoid it can do so more easily) I would agree that Duke tends to attract more “social” (you can take that how you want) individuals than perhaps CalTech/UChicago, but the Duke student body is quite similar to that of UPenn and Dartmouth and after having visited, I don’t see the party scene between those three schools much different at all. Dartmouth may be the most pronounced actually due to its fraternity houses and more isolated campus. I knew many people at Duke who were in fraternities who didn’t even drink at all; and they loved it. I’m sure Reynolds Price’s view in the early 1990s extended beyond that of the Duke community and would have applied to college campuses nationwide. Clearly, all schools could improve their intellectualism. In the past few decades, Duke’s student body has shifted fairly dramatically, though.</p>
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<p>Tuscaloosa?</p>