Talk:College town

Global

This article focuses almost solely on the US - it has a section for each state, and not one on a single other country or regions other than the broad category of "around the world". Needs a major overhaul. 130.15.43.101 (talk) 06:21, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Think we should move the list to another article, and add a short paragraph about the united states, since most users believe it requires special treatment... --CrtL (talk) 18:43, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

In the rest of the world, they're called "university towns." "College town" is a specifically American term, since only in America are universities called "colleges." john k (talk) 05:50, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps moving this to "University town" would be appropriate (I seem to remember it being called that at one point) and making a "List of college towns in the United States" or something of that nature. We could easily have the mention of the US-term "college town" in the lead here. --JonRidinger (talk) 20:31, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

College town is the proper term, not university town. Europeans seem to be missing the point of what a college town is. It just isn't a town that has a university and a lot of students in it. It is a town/city that is practically run by the college. A town that is so interconnected with the college that it is hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. Leeds? Manchester? Seriously? There is a complete disconnect with the definitions that americans have traditionally used and europeans are using. --DavisJune (talk) 00:31, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Great liberties taken in defining a "college town

I guess the key phrase in this article is "have been called college towns", which I think borders on weasel wording.

Many of the cities listed in this article probably should not be labeled as college towns as they are extensive metropolitan areas where the colleges or universities present are not really a dominant presence compared to other factors of the city. Reno, NV, Tucson, AZ, Austin, TX, Pittsburgh, PA, Knoxville & Nashville, TN, particularly do not fit the mold, but several others on the list too. Apparently merely having a college campus located in the city, or nearby has qualified it as a "college town". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gillwill (talk • contribs) 03:26, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps we should say that we only include a town if there are at least two sources that say they "have been called a college town". We follow the sources. --Bduke (Discussion) 03:53, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Can we possibly come to a consensus on the definition of "college town" or "university town" and then apply accordingly. Many of the places on that list hardly qualify, don't have sources (or have an extremely unreliable one) and flat-out should not be there. That list needs an extremely heavy prune. Xtremerandomness (talk) 07:37, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Great US-bias

1) The title of this article is biased. In the huge majority of countries around the world, institutes of higher learning are primarily called Universities, not colleges- which are normally synonymous with further learning institutions. The article should be renamed 'University Town' to reflect a worldwide view.

2) The phenomenon is not just a US one, just because one study says. Quite clearly there are university towns around the world; in Europe I can think of Salamanca in Spain, Leeds in the UK and Uppsala in Sweden, and those are just the first that came into my head.

3) There is no need for an extensive list of US university towns- this only adds to the bias. It should be a separate article if deemed necessary. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.9.46.158 (talk) 12:38, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree. The article makes the claim that it is largely a US phenomenon, with barely a mention of the fact that there are many throughout the world, and not just in America. In addition, a large amount of those "college towns" in the list hardly count as such. Duke University in Durham is archetypal of the statement "most institutions of higher education grew together with major cities", which is written in the "College towns worldwide" section making the point that these cities are not "college towns". The US list needs to be heavily pruned, as currently it seems to include every university that is not strictly a campus outside of the main town, and the worldwide list definitely needs to be expanded. Xtremerandomness (talk) 13:13, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

I still have yet to see any proof that college towns are NOT just a US phenomenon. Non-americans need to be aware that just because a college exist in a town, and that town and college have good a good relationship with one another, this does not make a college town. --DavisJune (talk) 02:22, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps the most well-known college towns are Oxford and Cambridge in Britain (whose US namesakes are among the most well-known US college towns). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.86.241.73 (talk) 15:22, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

I do not think that Oxford can be called a College town in the sense of some US towns. Certainly the university and its colleges dominate part of the town, but not all of it. People living in, for example, Cowley, go about their business as if the university did not exist. This was particularly the case when the Morris Oxford works were in Cowley. This concept is certainly mostly a US concept. I can think of no examples in UK or Australia, and if there were, the term "college" town would be inappropriate. Universities are not called colleges in those countries. The idea that Leeds in UK is a college town is nonsense. Leeds is a very large industrial city that has a university just as Manchester, Liverpool and Sheffield has. --Bduke (Discussion) 22:43, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

A key part of the US concept of a "college town" is related to the history of land-grand colleges and state universities. Due to being created on federally donated land, many were located in relatively rural areas well away from major cities. This meant that not only did the university come to totally dominate the local economy and culture, but that even today the towns are somewhat isolated, being hours away from larger cities. Despite becoming large state universities, most have remained fairly small towns with limited development or economic opportunities. It's this combination of factors that tends to characterize the American concept of the "college town". Thus we end up with rather different ideas of what is meant by the term. It would probably be best to either cover the non-US form under the title of University Town or to have defined sections that discuss the meaning of the term as it applies to that region. 24.6.40.21 (talk) 10:19, 30 August 2021 (UTC)

Hyde Park

Hyde Park is a neighborhood within the city of Chicago, not a town. It shouldn't be included in the article. If you change the name to "College communities" then you might have a case, Mr. Person Who Put that in the Article, but otherwise no. 68.59.32.38 (talk) 06:40, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Moving the list of college towns to another page?

I'm not opposed to the full move, but I think there should at least be a small list of college towns on the main page. As it stands now, there aren't any U.S college towns listed (strange because college town are predominately american) and this presents a lopsided view of college towns and what they actually are. I also think that the move of the list of college towns to a new page should not have been done without approval. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DavisJune (talk • contribs) 00:39, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Columbus

Columbus, Ohio isn't considered a college town, at least as far as the sources I have read in this article and elsewhere. While OSU football is certainly the most popular sport in town (basketball rarely sells out), current OSU students do not account for a large percentage of the population of a city of some 800,000 people. The fact that the city has a large OSU following does not make Columbus a college town; maybe a college sports-crazed town, but not a "college town" in the sense that is being defined in this article. College towns are towns or areas that have large college student populations compared to the regular population. That's why places in Ohio like Athens, Oxford, Bowling Green, and Kent, all of which have large universities in a small city, are considered college towns, but larger cities like Akron, Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus (all of which have large public universities) are not. Has nothing to do with fan support. Please take the time to actually read the sources used in the article and the article content itself instead of repeatedly adding unsourced content. --JonRidinger (talk) 21:35, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Was just about to add the same thing itself. OSU is certainly a major part of Columbus' identity, but Columbus is more well known for being one of the largest state capital cities in the US and a center of technology, finance, and diversified manufacturing. OSU no more defines Columbus than the University of Minnesota defines Minneapolis--a similar size university in a similar size major US city. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.86.241.73 (talk) 15:18, 22 May 2015 (UTC)