<p>"I have to admit, as the father of a soon to be UofC student, I saw these articles this weekend and it concerned me."</p>
<p>As the mom of a current U of C student I wasn't too pleased either. Bad weekend. In our county, however, I think we lose more people (proportionally) to deer/car and farm accidents. Not to mention the ever-popular drunk driving by high schoolers. City crime is scary, but so is hitting a deer, believe it or not. The world is not a safe place.</p>
<p>1990Dad, as a Chicago resident, hearing in Monday's news that thirty (?) people were shot over three days, not something I wanted to hear either. Yes, there are six million people in the region...</p>
<p>I have a first-year and none of this weekend's violence was near campus.</p>
<p>'Alum', I didn't know I was supposed to avoid the newer Eastern European immigrant areas. Where are they?</p>
<p>"Furthermore, you would not touch UChicago with a ten foot pole if you had a problem interacting with a large number of African Americans on a day to day basis. There are plenty of elite colleges in predominantly White / Asian areas to easily substitute."</p>
<p>The gunman at Va. Tech is Asian and the one at NIU is White! So who poses the greatest danger now to an average student, some gangs shooting at each other around the neighborhood or an unstable person on campus?</p>
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So who poses the greatest danger now to an average student, some gangs shooting at each other around the neighborhood or an unstable person on campus?
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<p>It's still gangs.</p>
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The gunman at Va. Tech is Asian and the one at NIU is White! So who poses the greatest danger now to an average student, some gangs shooting at each other around the neighborhood or an unstable person on campus?
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<p>Sorry, but this argument does not fly. Just because two tragedies happened in which multiple people were killed does not discount the fact that random violence happens all the time in far higher numbers.</p>
<p>Random violence does NOT happen all the time in far higher numbers. The number of University of Chicago undergraduates killed on or near campus stands at 0 for I don't know how many years . . . at least 30. I have no idea how to research it, but I would be surprised if in the entire history of the University of Chicago as many students were seriously injured in the campus area as were killed or wounded at Virginia Tech last year.</p>
<p>OP was concerned about safety at the uchicago, not Chicagoland, not Cook County. Gun violence in big cities is common. The headline seemed to suggest that it was bloody even by Chicago's standard. Welcome to Chicago, home of Al Capone.</p>
<p>The campus shootings should be a wakeup call to all that danger from within is more real than one would want to believe and it can happen anywhere at anytime. All one needs is a deranged copycat with access to firearms.</p>
<p>These arguments sound remarkably reminiscent of the posts at the time of the U Chicago grad student's murder last year - this can happen anywhere, always watch your back, you have to exercise sound judgement and caution after dark, off campus, etc.
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-chicago/419807-graduate-student-shot.html?highlight=graduate+student+murder%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-chicago/419807-graduate-student-shot.html?highlight=graduate+student+murder</a></p>
<p>UCLA PhD tells readers to go to school elsewhere if you want to "keep hiding out in the burbs." What of the sheltered confines that are the Hyde Park campus? Just how much of an urban immersion experience does Chicago offer when one is "hiding" instead within the confines of a heavily patrolled campus for reasons of safety? I, for one, don't believe Chicago undergrads face great risk. Not because significant risk isn't around the corner, but because students learn not to venture around the corner. Unfortunately, this lack of ability to integrate into the immediate surrounding community, the need for just the isolation people like UCLA PhD abhor, the need to constantly watch your back and accommodate your behavior to the real world risks of the south side, are some of the unfortunate facts of life faced when reaping the benefits of U Chicago.</p>
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I have no idea how to research it, but I would be surprised if in the entire history of the University of Chicago as many students were seriously injured in the campus area as were killed or wounded at Virginia Tech last year.
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<p>Perhaps he was looking at the question in a general (non-UC-specific) stance, in which case it's very fair to say that random violence (like car accidents and drug overdoses) kills more college students than campus shootings.</p>
<p>At UC, the odds of either happening are astronomical. However, the prevalence of both gang activity and available guns on the South Side means that, if I have to rank, I'm going to put "hit by a stray bullet" over "deranged campus shooting." People do kill each other in the neighborhood - last month there was a gang shooting so close that people in apartments could hear the shots, in mid-afternoon - and so if I was putting morbid odds on what was more likely to end my life, I'd pick that. </p>
<p>But like I said, I'm about 400 times more worried about my analysis midterm than any sort of violence happening on campus, which I think was JHS's issue in the first place (random violence occurring in "far higher numbers").</p>
<p>"Unfortunately, this lack of ability to integrate into the immediate surrounding community, the need for just the isolation people like UCLA PhD abhor, the need to constantly watch your back and accommodate your behavior to the real world risks of the south side, are some of the unfortunate facts of life faced when reaping the benefits of U Chicago."</p>
<p>This is true, but as I was saying prior, it is not something that enough students take to heart.</p>
<p>The University of Chicago campus, unlike, say, Columbia's, or even USC, is very open to the surrounding community. Apart from a couple blocks of quads, university buildings are interwoven with non-university buildings across an area of several square miles, and several undergraduate dormitories are "off campus". Hyde Park and Kenwood, while not anything like the South Bronx, are diverse from both a racial and an economic standpoint. Far from having a "lack of ability to integrate into the immediate surrounding community", integrating into the immediate surrounding community is a daily necessity for most Chicago students. In addition, they travel all over the city on public transportation, and many recent grads who stay in Chicago wind up living in neighborhoods like Pilsen, which are not in the least hermetically sealed enclaves of privilege.</p>
<p>Each urban university is slightly different. Chicago is nothing like Temple, where you could get a tan from the klieg lights that shine 24 hours a day in the main campus areas, and there are blocks within half a mile of the center of campus that look like something left over from the Bosnian civil war. But it sure ain't Princeton or Stanford, either. As many have said, it's safe in the way that urban places can be safe, but it's not a college where someone who is freaked out by urban settings and urban dangers is going to feel completely comfortable. </p>
<p>One relatively recent grad I know came from a small town in Minnesota. He liked the education at Chicago, but always felt nervous living there, and his idea of a great place to live is represented by Cornell, where he went to graduate school. Now 30, he is just beginning to feel OK about living in a city, but he lives in a luxury high-rise in a rich neighborhood, and reverse-commutes to a job in the near suburbs. Nothing bad ever happened to him in Hyde Park, but all he remembers about it is the (irrational, subjective) fear he felt. </p>
<p>If that sounds like you, you probably should consider other options. If you can deal with it -- if you wouldn't mind going to Yale, or Penn, or USC, for example -- then, really, Chicago is just fine.</p>
<p>JHS,</p>
<p>Well put. </p>
<p>The only thing I would add is that some of the environment around the university has changed markedly over the past 25 years. </p>
<p>When I attended the GSB in the early 1980s, the area north of 47th street was a very tough area, one where no UofC student would go, even to drive through. This tough area extended all the way to Chinatown, even further north, perhaps - I never really looked hard. </p>
<p>Back then, south of campus in Woodlawn, there was still a thriving though poor community, with shops under the EL along 63rd street. The area was pretty tough, though. Meanwhile, South Shore was an interesting enclave of affordable housing, and still a rather integrated community. Garfield/55th to the Ryan was still full of apartments, stores and even an A&P near the EL stop, but no one from UofC used the EL at the Ryan, and the area south of Washington Park and east of Cottage Grove (Englewood) was a very tough neighborhood. And the Ryan from 55th north to downtown was lined with high rise low income housing.</p>
<p>In general, the university was an oasis surrounded by rather tough areas, (but we did have two grocery stores in Hyde Park!)</p>
<p>Flash forward to 2005, when I lived in Hyde Park for a year. All the low income projects, including the high rises along the Ryan, are gone (save for one!). The area west of campus along Garfield is largely vacant land and ripe for re-development. Not safe at all, but not dangerous like it used to be. Students use the El at the Ryan and take the Garfield bus to campus all the time. The area north of the campus, all the way to downtown, is rapidly gentrifying. We used to bicycle and walk the dog through areas we would have never set foot in 20 years ago. And because so many members of the UofC community are living up there, the U police have expanded their patrol zone way north of 47th.</p>
<p>South of 61st, most of the community is gone.</p>
<p>But, the removal of the low income projects on the S. Side had some negative impact too. Some of those displaced moved to South Shore, so the neighborhood has had a real decline in safety. There has been quite a bit of gang activity along and west of Drexel, especially north of 53rd. Englewood is, if anything, worse than it used to be. </p>
<p>My point? The area around Hyde Park has changed radically over the past 10-15 years. A lot of folks have perceptions formed in their years on campus and they may not be relevant now. </p>
<p>It is still an urban campus. It is still an oasis of affluence with serious poverty nearby. But it is no longer an oasis.</p>
<p>Thanks for everybody's thoughts. They have been very helpful and gives us some things to pay attention to on our june visit.</p>