Big city or something more rural? Does it matter?

MWolf
Sat, 02 Mar 2019 01:13:37 +0000

Finding cheap activities in large urban centers is actually easier than in small campus towns. Chicago has free museum days and steep discounts for students. There are plenty of fairly cheap independent coffee shops, if that’s your thing, and nice, but cheap bars, if that’s what you like. there are always plenty of cheap eating possibilities, from small eateries to taco trucks, and hot-dog vendors (Chicago style, of course). There are very cheap small shows in the artsy parts of town, and places for free walking tours. Large cities are wonderful places for shoe-string budget activities.

Small college towns, on the other hand, are often filled with places which cater to rich students looking for the Deluxe Student Experience, especially those around the more “Elite” colleges, like large state flagship universities, private universities, etc. The cheap eating places tend to be fast food chains, and even cheap shows can be expensive.

I experiences this exact thing, when I spent 7 years in Champaign-Urbana, which isn’t all that great a place for kids who came from low income families. The median income of UIUC student families is $109,000, and 50% come from the top 20% by income, with only 6% coming from poor families. Campus Town reflects this. The cheap places were in locations that were fairly far from campus, in areas that were almost never frequented by undergraduates, which was good, since graduate students were a lot poorer than the undergraduates.