College town
![]() | The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. |
In North America, a college town or university town is a community (often literally a town, but possibly a small or medium sized city, or in some cases a neighborhood or a district of a city) which is dominated by its university population. The university may be large, or there may be several smaller institutions such as liberal arts colleges clustered, or the residential population may be small, but college towns in all cases are so dubbed because the educational institution(s) presence pervades economic and social life. Many local residents may be employed by the university, many businesses cater primarily to the university, and indeed the students population may outnumber the local population outright.
In Europe, a university town is generally characterized by having an old university often founded before, or in some cases shortly after, the industrial revolution. The economy of the city is closely related with the university activity and highly supported by the entire university structure which may include university hospitals and clinics, university printing houses, libraries, laboratories, business incubators, student rooms, dinning halls, students' unions, student societies, and academic festivities. Moreover, the history of the city is often indissociable from the history of the university itself. Many European university towns have not been merely important places of scientific and educational endeavor, but also centers of political, cultural and social influence to its respective society throughout the centuries. Examples of these cities include Oxford, Cambridge, Leiden, Bologna, Salamanca, Coimbra, Leuven, Heidelberg, Göttingen, Pisa, Marburg, Ferrara, Uppsala, Aberdeen, Pécs, Siena, Pavia, Delft, Tübingen, or Poitiers.
Besides a highly educated and largely transient population, a stereotypical college town often features a high number of people living non-traditional lifestyles and subcultures ("college town hippies") and high tolerance for unconventionality in general, an unusually active musical or cultural scene, and unusually left-wing politics. While relatively absent of heavy industry, many have become centers of technological research and innovative startups.
Town-Gown relations
As in the case of a company town, the large and transient population attracted to the university may come into conflict with longstanding natives. Students may come from outside the area, and thus represent a different—sometimes radically different—culture. Furthermore, students are concentrated in a small, young age group, whose living habits may not be agreeable in general to older members of society.
Economically, the high spending power of the university and of its students in aggregate may inflate the cost of living above that of the region. Indeed, it is not uncommon to find that many university employees commute in from surrounding areas, finding the cost of living in town too expensive.
Studentification, in which a growing student population move in large numbers to traditionally non-student neighborhoods, may be perceived as a form of invasion or gentrification. The phenomenon has several causes, including university enrollment expanding far beyond the capacity of on-campus housing, inadequate zoning enforcement, and student culture. At the same time as neighborhood associations work to limit conversion of family homes to student rentals, some local residents may oppose the construction of large on-campus dormitories or expansion of fraternity and sorority houses, forcing a growing enrollment to seek housing in town. Moreover, a single-family home can be converted into several smaller rental units, or shared by a number of students whose combined resources exceed those of a typical single-family rental—a strong incentive for absentee landlords to cater to students.
In the US, educational institutions are often exempted from paying local taxes, so in the absence of a system for Payments In Lieu Of Taxes (PILOT), the university population will disproportionately burden parts of the local public infrastructure, such as roads or law enforcement. When a university expands its facilities, the potential loss of tax revenue is thus a concern, in addition to local desire to preserve open space or historic neighborhoods.
As a result, members of the local population may resent the university, and especially its students. The students, in turn, may view the local residents as hypocrites who willingly take the jobs at the university provided by student tuition and fees, and who willingly accept the tax revenues (e.g., local sales tax, property tax on rented properties) that students generate, but then constantly whine about students not going to bed at 9 p.m. Some students refer to regular inhabitants as townies, a term with somewhat derogatory connotations.
This "town and gown" dichotomy notwithstanding, students and the outside community typically find a peaceful (even friendly) coexistence, with the town receiving a significant economic and cultural benefits from the university, and the students often adapting themselves to the culture of the town.
Settlement in college towns
While noise, traffic, and other quality of life issues have not been resolved, some advocates of New Urbanism have led the development of neighborhoods in college towns specifically capitalizing on their proximity to university life. For instance, some universities have developed properties to allow faculty and staff members to walk to work, reducing demand for limited on-campus parking; Duke University's Trinity Heights development is a key example. In many cases, developers have built communities where access to the university (even if not directly adjacent) is promoted as an advantage.
Student housing, obviously, also is an important component of college towns. In the United States most state universities have 50 percent or more of their enrolled students living off campus. This trend, which began in the 1960's, originally meant the conversion of near campus single-family homes to student housing, creating the ubiquitous Student Ghetto.
Purpose-built, off campus student housing areas began being created in the 1970's in more university towns. The Cotton District in Starkville, Mississippi is an especially well-designed example of such a development. Beginning around 2000 in the United States, nationwide real estate investment trusts and publicly traded corporations began developing student housing complexes.
Another notable development is the surge in popularity of retiring to college towns, since the 1990s. Besides nostalgia for one's younger days, retirees are attracted by presence of cultural and educational opportunities, athletic events, good medical facilities, low cost of living, and often pedestrian- or transit-friendly development pattern. Several development companies now specialize in constructing retirement communities in college towns, and in some cases the communities have developed formal relationships with the local institution.
List of college towns
The college town is largely an American phenomenon, according to Blake Gumprecht, an assistant professor of geography at the University of New Hampshire who has researched the subject considerably[1]; in continental Europe and Asia, most institutions of higher education are found in major cities -- with considerable exceptions such as Cambridge, Oxford or Heidelberg. As new institutions are founded to serve growing student populations, however, the phenomenon of the college town is recognizable worldwide.
Africa
- Grahamstown, South Africa (Rhodes University, St. Andrew's College, Diocesan School for Girls)
- Pietermaritzburg, South Africa (University of KwaZulu-Natal)
- Stellenbosch, South Africa (Universiteit Stellenbosch)
Australia
New Zealand
Europe
Belgium
- Leuven, Belgium (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven)
- Louvain-la-Neuve (Université catholique de Louvain)
Germany
- Göttingen, Germany (University of Göttingen)
- Heidelberg, Germany (University of Heidelberg)
- Marburg, Germany (University of Marburg)
- Tübingen, Germany (University of Tübingen)
Italy
Ireland
Netherlands
Portugal
Spain
Switzerland
United Kingdom
- Aberystwyth, Wales (University of Wales, Aberystwyth)
- Cambridge, England (Cambridge University)
- Durham, England (Durham University)
- Loughborough, England (Loughborough University)
- Oxford, England (Oxford University)
- St Andrews, Scotland (St. Andrews University)
North America
Canada
- Antigonish, Nova Scotia (St. Francis Xavier University)
- Sackville, New Brunswick (Mount Allison University)
- Wolfville, Nova Scotia (Acadia University)
United States
- Albany, New York (State University of New York at Albany)
- Allendale, Michigan (Grand Valley State University)
- Ames, Iowa (Iowa State University)
- Amherst, Massachusetts (Amherst College, Hampshire College, and University of Massachusetts Amherst)
- Ann Arbor, Michigan (University of Michigan, Cleary University, and Concordia University)
- Arcata, California (Humboldt State University)
- Ashland, Oregon (Southern Oregon University)
- Athens, Georgia (University of Georgia)
- Athens, Ohio (Ohio University)
- Auburn, Alabama (Auburn University)
- Austin, Texas (The University of Texas at Austin)
- Bellingham, Washington (Western Washington University)
- Berkeley, California (University of California, Berkeley)
- Blacksburg, Virginia (Virginia Tech)
- Bloomington-Normal, Illinois (Illinois State University and Illinois Wesleyan University)
- Bloomington, Indiana (Indiana University)
- Boone, North Carolina (Appalachian State University)
- Boulder, Colorado (University of Colorado at Boulder)
- Bowling Green, Kentucky (Western Kentucky University)
- Bowling Green, Ohio (Bowling Green State University)
- Bozeman, Montana (Montana State University)
- Brookings, South Dakota (South Dakota State University)
- Burlington, Vermont (University of Vermont)
- Cambridge, Massachusetts (Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
- Carlisle, Pennsylvania (Dickinson College, Penn State Dickinson School of Law, and the U.S. Army War College)
- Carbondale, Illinois (Southern Illinois University)
- Cazenovia, New York (Cazenovia College)
- Champaign-Urbana, Illinois (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
- Chapel Hill, North Carolina (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
- Charleston, Illinois (Eastern Illinois University)
- Charlottesville, Virginia (University of Virginia)
- Cheney, Washington (Eastern Washington University)
- Chico, California (California State University, Chico)
- Claremont, California (Claremont Colleges are a consortium of seven schools of higher education)
- Clemson, South Carolina (Clemson University)
- College Park, Maryland (University of Maryland, College Park)
- College Station, Texas (Texas A&M University)
- Columbia, Missouri (University of Missouri, Stephens College, and Columbia College)
- Commerce, Texas (Texas A&M University-Commerce)
- Conway, Arkansas (University of Central Arkansas, Hendrix College, and Central Baptist College)
- Cookeville, Tennessee (Tennessee Technological University)
- Corvallis, Oregon (Oregon State University)
- Cullowhee, North Carolina (Western Carolina University)
- Davidson, North Carolina (Davidson College)
- Davis, California (University of California, Davis)
- DeKalb, Illinois (Northern Illinois University)
- Denton, Texas (University of North Texas and Texas Women's University)
- Duluth, Minnesota (University of Minnesota-Duluth)
- Durham, New Hampshire (University of New Hampshire)
- East Lansing, Michigan (Michigan State University and Davenport University)
- Edwardsville, Illinois (Southern Illinois University Edwardsville)
- Ellensburg, Washington (Central Washington University)
- Elon, North Carolina (Elon University)
- Eugene, Oregon (University of Oregon)
- Fargo, North Dakota/Moorhead, Minnesota (North Dakota State University, Minnesota State University Moorhead, Concordia College, Moorhead
- Fairfax, Virginia (George Mason University)
- Farmville, Virginia (Hampden-Sydney College and Longwood University)
- Fayetteville, Arkansas (University of Arkansas)
- Flagstaff, Arizona (Northern Arizona University)
- Fort Collins, Colorado (Colorado State University)
- Gainesville, Florida (University of Florida)
- Gambier, Ohio (Kenyon College)
- Grand Forks, North Dakota (University of North Dakota)
- Greenville, North Carolina (East Carolina University)
- Grinnell, Iowa (Grinnell College)
- Hamilton, New York (Colgate University)
- Hanover, New Hampshire (Dartmouth College)
- Harrisonburg, Virginia (James Madison University)
- Hattiesburg, Mississippi (University of Southern Mississippi)
- Huntington, West Virginia (Marshall University)
- Huntsville, Texas (Sam Houston State University)
- Indiana, Pennsylvania (Indiana University of Pennsylvania)
- Iowa City, Iowa (University of Iowa)
- Isla Vista, California (University of California, Santa Barbara)
- Ithaca, New York (Cornell University and Ithaca College)
- Jonesboro, Arkansas (Arkansas State University)
- Kalamazoo, Michigan (Western Michigan University, Davenport University, and Kalamazoo College)
- Kent, Ohio (Kent State University)
- Kirksville, Missouri (Truman State University and A.T. Still University)
- La Crosse, Wisconsin (University of Wisconsin - La Crosse), (Viterbo University), and (Western Technical College)
- Laramie, Wyoming (University of Wyoming)
- Lawrence, Kansas (University of Kansas and Haskell Indian Nations University)
- Lewisburg, Pennsylvania (Bucknell University)
- Lexington, Kentucky (University of Kentucky), (Transylvania University)
- Lexington, Virginia (Washington and Lee University)
- Lincoln, Nebraska (University of Nebraska-Lincoln)
- Logan, Utah (Utah State University)
- Lubbock, Texas (Texas Tech University)
- Macomb, Illinois (Western Illinois University)
- Madison, Wisconsin (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
- Manhattan, Kansas (Kansas State University)
- Mankato, Minnesota (Minnesota State University, Mankato)
- Marquette, Michigan (Northern Michigan University)
- Middletown, Connecticut (Wesleyan University)
- Missoula, Montana (University of Montana)
- Monmouth, Oregon (Western Oregon University)
- Morgantown, West Virginia (West Virginia University)
- Moscow, Idaho (University of Idaho)
- Mt. Pleasant, Michigan (Central Michigan University)
- Muncie, Indiana (Ball State University)
- Murfreesboro, Tennessee (Middle Tennessee State University)
- Murray, Kentucky (Murray State University)
- New Brunswick, New Jersey (Rutgers University)
- New Haven, Connecticut (Yale University, Southern Connecticut State University, Albertus Magnus College, Gateway Community College, Paier School of Art, University of New Haven, Quinnipiac University and nearby Wesleyan University)
- Newark, Delaware (University of Delaware)
- Newton, Massachusetts (Boston College) - Half the campus of B.C. is situated in the Chestnut Hill village in Newton, with the other half in the Brighton neighborhood of Boston.
- Norman, Oklahoma (University of Oklahoma)
- Northfield, Minnesota (Saint Olaf College and Carleton College)
- Northampton, Massachusetts (Smith College and other nearby members of the Five Colleges)
- Notre Dame, Indiana (University of Notre Dame)
- Oberlin, Ohio (Oberlin College)
- Oneonta, New York (Hartwick College and SUNY Oneonta)
- Orono, Maine (University of Maine)
- Oxford, Mississippi (University of Mississippi)
- Oxford, Ohio (Miami University)
- Palo Alto, California (Stanford University)
- Potsdam, New York (SUNY Potsdam and Clarkson University)
- Princeton, New Jersey (Princeton University)
- Pullman, Washington (Washington State University)
- Radford, Virginia (Radford University)
- Radnor Township, Pennsylvania (Villanova University)
- Richmond, Kentucky (Eastern Kentucky University)
- San Luis Obispo, California (California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo))
- San Marcos, Texas (Texas State University-San Marcos))
- Santa Cruz, California (University of California, Santa Cruz))
- Socorro, New Mexico (New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology))
- Stanford, California (Stanford University)
- Starkville, Mississippi (Mississippi State University)
- State College, Pennsylvania (Penn State)
- Statesboro, Georgia (Georgia Southern University)
- Stillwater, Oklahoma (Oklahoma State University)
- Storrs, Connecticut (University of Connecticut)
- Tallahassee, Florida (Florida State University, Florida A&M University)
- Tempe, Arizona, (Arizona State University)
- Terre Haute, Indiana (Indiana State University)
- Tuscaloosa, Alabama (University of Alabama)
- Vermillion, South Dakota (University of South Dakota)
- West Lafayette, Indiana (Purdue University)
- West Long Branch, New Jersey (Monmouth University)
- Williamstown, Massachusetts (Williams College)
- Wilmington, North Carolina (University of North Carolina, Wilmington)
- Wooster, Ohio (The College of Wooster)
- Yellow Springs, Ohio (Antioch College)
- Ypsilanti, Michigan (Eastern Michigan University)
See also
References
- Gumprecht, Blake. "The American College Town," The Geographical Review 93:1, January 2003.
- Gumprecht, Blake. "Fraternity Row, the Student Ghetto, and the Faculty Enclave: Characteristic Residential Districts in the American College Town," Journal of Urban History, 32:2, January 2006.
- Gumprecht, Blake. "Stadium Culture: College Athletics and the Making of Place in the American College Town," Southeastern Geographer 43:1, May 2003.
External links
- College Town Life, a portal featuring news, links, and related information about living in college towns
- ePodunk College Towns Index, rates university-oriented communities in several size classifications