<p>This college is on my S's radar. Any of you folks know anything about this other than that which can be found on the standard websites. Looking for a first or second hand perspective... anything really.</p>
<p>Check out the surrounding city. It’s pretty rundown and there are unsafe areas. Bad for job opportunities too. It was a thriving town years ago but has struggled since manufacturing left. The population has been shrinking for years.
On the plus side, living costs are LOW and there are beautiful areas within a short drive. Lakes, the Adirondacks, lots of cool “outdoorsy” stuff.
I thought Utica College attracted mostly local kids but it may have changed since the time I was familiar with it (many years ago!). Find out how many kids are commuters…this can impact the experience your son has.<br>
A visit is always helpful…stop some students and ask questions.</p>
<p>nightingale - Did I read your S’s stats right? SAT’s around 1200? That would put him near the top of incoming freshmen at Utica. I see from your prior posts that you’ve looked at a number of other colleges. JMHO, but I’d choose any of those over Utica – unless of course he’ll be majoring in Criminal Justice or Criminal Investigation, which appear to be Utica’s specialties. Good luck with the search!</p>
<p>Unless your child is interested in any of Utica College’s “specialty” (ahem invented) degrees like Economic Crime Management or Construction Management (yeah that is a 4 year program) I would not look too heavily. It is a big price tag for a school that is not very selective. I will say their Physical and Occupational Therapy departments are well regarded, tough programs though. </p>
<p>Utica as a city is not very nice, the crime rate is fairly high (although UC is on the edge of the city proper really). They have done a lot of renovations on the college but the faculty and staff have had ongoing contract disputes, some of which are not yet settled. My daughter has many friends who went there this year (we are local) and they do not have good things to say about the dorms.</p>
<p>They do mostly attract local students and many urban students looking to get out of inner city NY to go to college. Most often they give very good financial packages though.</p>