You need to visit USC rather than relying on mental pictures provided by your imagination and by posters on the internet (including me). I personally have an attractive 20-year-old daughter who is a junior at USC. Before she applied, I also was frightened by the descriptions of the “surrounding area.” I was shocked by what I saw - about 500% better than I was led to expect. Also, first your daughter has to be admitted. I’d worry about whether she should go to USC after that happens.
Don’t trust people on the internet. I know there is one CC poster kept refer to area around USC as ground zero. It think her son was rejected from USC or not receiving enough financial aid to go there, otherwise he would have gone to school near ground zero.
Get to know the neighbors
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=z_q1GeSMHOKA.k0R1n-5IU098&hl=en_US
^ You can “get to know” similar neighbors at the University of Pennsylvania (Ivy League!) and many other urban campuses. If you don’t want an urban experience, don’t apply to USC, Penn, NYU, BU, Miami, etc etc etc. Go to western Massachusetts.
If by “similar” you mean 1/10th in numbers, then yeah, I agree with you.
None of these universities have anything like the 110 corridor. Ain’t nothin’ but a g thang, yo.
@Ynotgo You make it sound like you believe African Americans are inherently dangerous…
Hello all. I’ve lived in the area near USC for a long time, so I can provide some info.
The USC area isn’t in the nicest place of LA, but it could be FAR worse. Just don’t go out of your way to find trouble, and learn some street smarts, and you’re good 
Having an athlete at USC, I spent a lot of time there over there last four years, including using his apartment when team was traveling. Also have a daughter going off to college, so understand that side as well. I have a love/hate with USC at times over this issue. It is not your storybook campus neighborhood that’s for sure. So you are giving up that Dartmouth/UCLA/Stanford type college experience where safety isn’t a huge concern strolling around at night. At USC, it is a huge concern at night. Not that it can’t be overcome with smarts, but you always need to be on guard. I have been discouraged at the safety patrols that are supposed to be visible, I can be there three days/nights (just was) and am in and out a lot, and saw no patrol person, then the next time see one here or there. I do believe there are more incidents of smaller crimes - thefts, robberies, break-ins, snatch and runs - than people realize/discuss - those are annoying. For the huge endowment they are raising and sitting on, I do not believe they are putting enough into campus and off campus safety. More words/emails than actions.They rely too much on the next generation of college student/parents to forget about the last tragedy as time moves on, and they do.
But is it safe enough to send your daughter? Sure, there aren’t reports of attractive blonde girls getting raped, murdered or kidnapped by neighborhood thugs - don’t know if there ever has been. And thousands have gone there year after year without incident. But go there and make sure she is comfortable there. Did I hate knowing even my strong, athlete son was riding a bike late at night some distance from campus - you bet, and was glad when that ended (although it was never a big deal to him obviously). So you send her if it is the right education and she wants to go, and just worry a bit more, but they get through it, and so do you. And they will be so ready for the real world when they are done.
Fear mongering—do we have these discussions about places such as Yale, Columbia and Penn, who have analogous neighboring hoods, but moreover crime statistics that are similar? Short answer–no. Would you not send your child to any of these highly elite schools? I think there herein lies your answer–
Actually, if you have a daughter you have these discussions all the time. People just need to be comfortable in their choices. I know a kid that didn’t choose Yale because of the neighborhood and weather. They went to Stanford.
I do have a daughter, in fact three. Cognizant of your surroundings is one thing, hyperbole another.
Oh, you bet we do. And the University of Chicago. Constantly. Actually, Columbia seems to be somewhat exempt from the discussion, because its campus is so tightly contained, because it can house all of its students and so few students can afford even to think about living off campus, and because visitors simply ignore the less wealthy neighborhoods to the north and east. And even those are gentrifying fast. Neighborhoods that once were synonymous with “ghetto” now mean “decent rentals for white 20-somethings.” Harvard also gets a pass, because no one thinks of Cambridge as a dangerous community. But if you spend any time on the Penn, Yale, or Chicago CC pages, you will see a constant stream of parents worrying about their children’s safety.
The main risk to students is from other students. That’s true everywhere. These urban campuses probably do have more street crime – muggings and petty theft – than places like Dartmouth or Amherst, but they have a lot less drunk driving or passing out in snowdrifts, both of which are substantially more dangerous than having your bike stolen or your pocket picked. Another thing people don’t consider is that the urban neighborhoods have more crime because they are much more densely populated and used. They seem to have more crime than a small college town, but it’s not necessarily more crime per person living or working there.
By way of background, middle D is an undergrad at Y, and I previously had an appointment there, so I know New Haven rather well. Further, we lived in Morningside Heights for a number of years, closer to Central Harlem than Columbia. That said, you make a lucid comment about issues of density and usage, to which I agree.
By the way, as a point of reference, and via the published stats of the Jeane Cleary Act, the institutions included with the highest prevalence of crime, that is to say, in their top 10, include places we never discuss—such as University of Conn., University of San Francisco, and the number 1 school, University of Alabama Huntsville. USC is not even in the top 25, but Harvard and Duke are…???
It’s no secret that Cleary Act reporting practice is far from standard from one college to the next. Harvard seems to be especially diligent about reporting everything, including student-on-student stuff that other colleges don’t treat as criminal.
Duke shouldn’t be such a surprise. I’ve never been there, but I have a strong impression that Durham is somewhat New Haven-esque: a small city that has both real wealth and real poverty in it.
My petite blond daughter studied at USC without any personal untoward incident and she lived ten or so blocks off campus for two of her four years. She was careful of her surroundings when she went out at night (which was frequent) and didn’t linger outside more than she needed to. She usually walked or biked but caught rides when she could at night and was usually with a friend or two. It seemed to me that most of the more serious incidents took place on the streets late at night, in one case I remember with people parked in a car chatting instead of going inside their home to talk. In another case a student argued with a street tough he encountered. My daughter’s house was entered by a thief during the summer months when she was out of town. One of the housemates had not locked a back door - he was sleeping upstairs and the thief tore out of the house the moment he saw him. I think my main point is that USC is located in the midst of a big city and its surroundings have the typical city problems. One has to take precautions and not behave as though he or she is living in an upper middle class suburb or gated community. Now that she graduated and lives in Venice Beach, she still takes the same precautions.
Even in super nice area like Hermosa Beach, which was on the news lately, that robbers entered and opened door because it was not locked and the house is facing directly to the ocean, but it also means other stranger can also have access to it. What I’ve heard robbers dressed up as police officers. You can’t never be too careful wherever you live.