Higher Education and Urbanity in Detroit

Traveling to older cities on the east coast I have noticed how many more universities and colleges are located within the actual cities. In Michigan, our universities tend to be spread haphazardly around, usually in rural areas or small towns.

Take Baltimore for example [[which is often compared to Detroit). They have a student population of over 60,000 at ten or so institutions of higher learning. Most of them are located in/near the center of the city. Now look at Detroit, we have a student population of around 40,000. But only WSU and CCS are located within the central city [[aprox 34,000 students, 32k from WSU).

That is a large difference, and Detroit has been a much larger city than Baltimore until recently. Baltimore's CBD population is also double Detroit's, at around 12,000 and there are many more residents living within a mile of Downtown than in Detroit. It is not uncommon to 50% + vacancy blocks from Detroit's CBD.

Now for a second imagine what our city would be like if UM stayed in Detroit, which alone has has many students as all of Detroit's universities and colleges combined. Or rather if UM-Dearborn was UM-Detroit, with its 8,634 students. Or Eastern Michigan University with its 23,000 students. Or if one of the new-build universities such as Oakland University [[19,000+ students) Grand Valley [[24,500+) or Ferris State [[14,381) or Saginaw Valley [[10,656) was located here. The billions of dollars invested into public universities in Michigan is amazing, but what if even a shred of it was invested into building a second public university in Detroit? Even if just one of those universities was located within the central city, the impact would be unparalleled.

I remember my high school graduating class, and only about 5 or so students out of 500 went to WSU or any college within Detroit. Hundreds went to Western, Central, and Grand Valley. What if they, and the thousands upon thousands like them, instead went to a university within Detroit?! The impact would be thousands of more people living Downtown, hundreds of new businesses, etc. Maybe Detroit wouldn't be so destroyed. Maybe the population loss wouldn't have been so large and rapid. Maybe we would have even seen a rebound. Maybe there wouldn't be so many suburbs. Maybe having more students would have made it worth it to keep/build mass transit.

Just sayin' -- Baltimore is often compared to Detroit has a rough city, but it is actually much more vibrant and livable than Detroit, with much higher density and more residents and students in the central city.

I think you're correct that Detroit suffers somewhat from not having more of a university presence, and specifically more of a resident [[i.e. non-commuter) student presence. Obviously if U of M were in Detroit it would be huge.

My sense is that Baltimore is in pretty bad shape, and really only very slightly healthier than Detroit, but it's true that Johns Hopkins plays a huge role in the city's health.

I have visited Baltimore and noticed that the Johns Hopkins medical center area is pretty awful. So even the presence of a super-elite educational-medical campus can't always save an area.

The undergrad campus, however, is in a very nice part of Baltimore, though it is somewhat suburban in nature [[kinda an equivalent to U of D and surrounding neighborhood, just imagine much more successful and interconnected).

Don't forget U-D-M and Marygrove. Of course, they are farther out than Wayne and CCS. They add a couple thousand students to the total. Also, there isn't a single 4-year college in Macomb County, which is seen as a major problem by many. Don't ignore the positive potential of community colleges. I think you can trace the transformation of Royal Oak from a sleepy bedroom community to a destination place with a vibrant downtown to the move of OCC to their Royal Oak campus.

UD-Mercy has over 5000 students. Marygrove probably about a thousand.

who in the heck would use a word like urbanity without a whiff of ironic intent intended?

Now I'm all in favor of word-play and creating funkified spellings with twisty-logicalisms thrown around just for fun, but really now, urbanity? What exactly do you mean by that word? A city? Is a specific density required by you to meet your meaning of urbanity? 'Cuz if so, Grand Rapids may have already be ahead of Detroit on a student-body density scale. Certainly The density levels of dorm complexes at MSU, Western and Central certainly trumps Wayne's mainly commuter student body on any density scale. Keep in mind, of those 32,000 Wayne Staters, a mere fraction live within walking distance of Old Main.

So, if urbanity equates to density and there is greater population density in Western's Valleys, than in Detroit's Midtown, are you saying your desire for urbanity has already reached apogee in the unwashed hinterlands?

Gee, what do them hicks know that we done don't?

Oh, one last thing, don't use words you don't understand. It makes you look uneducated, Sean.

Wow. Someone's buttons really got pushed here...

I didn't get that the thread is downing Western, Central, Grand Valley, or any other Michigan university. I think it's just speculating on patterns of development.

It can be said that the Eastern states simply have more universities, perhaps because our development as a nation began out there. It isn't just that there are lots of urban universities out East; there are simply a lot of universities out east. For every Johns Hopkins, Temple, or CUNY, there are several other Bridgewater State Colleges or SUNY - Plattsburghs.

What if people from other parts of the state have no desire to go to school in Detroit because maybe they aren't from Detroit...and don't care about it? What about that?

Isn't Wayne County Community College in downtown proper? And Marygrove is in Detroit. I think there are a few unaccredited colleges knocking around as well.

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Originally Posted by English

Wow. Someone's buttons really got pushed here...

I didn't get that the thread is downing Western, Central, Grand Valley, or any other Michigan university. I think it's just speculating on patterns of development.

It can be said that the Eastern states simply have more universities, perhaps because our development as a nation began out there. It isn't just that there are lots of urban universities out East; there are simply a lot of universities out east. For every Johns Hopkins, Temple, or CUNY, there are several other Bridgewater State Colleges or SUNY - Plattsburghs.

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If this were a thread about Macomb County needing a four year university, you'd be dropping nature abhors a vacuum bombs and other urbanities all over it. I think the beef was well stated.

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Originally Posted by bartock

If this were a thread about Macomb County needing a four year university, you'd be dropping nature abhors a vacuum bombs and other urbanities all over it. I think the beef was well stated.

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No, I wouldn't. I'm part of the efforts to develop our first satellite campus in Macomb County. That is, because that population isn't being served by any four year institution, we are creating the capacity for a student from Northern Macomb to complete an entire bachelor's, post-bachelor's, and master's degree at the Macomb Center, which will eventually develop into WSU-Macomb, much like U-M Dearborn or U-M Flint.

I'm passionate -- and knowledgeable -- about education everywhere, not merely in the city of Detroit. But thanks for assuming.

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Originally Posted by English

No, I wouldn't. I'm part of the efforts to develop our first satellite campus in Macomb County. That is, because that population isn't being served by any four year institution, we are creating the capacity for a student from Northern Macomb to complete an entire bachelor's, post-bachelor's, and master's degree at the Macomb Center, which will eventually develop into WSU-Macomb, much like U-M Dearborn or U-M Flint.

I'm passionate -- and knowledgeable -- about education everywhere, not merely in the city of Detroit. But thanks for assuming.

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I may be assuming or just addressing speling and grammer pet peaves.


Anywho, I thought WSU had a satellite campus at MCCC on Hall Rd.

Eastern Michigan has a satellite campus at the Northwest Community Center, and Central has a center somewhere in Detroit, too. Western is supposed to open a satellite in Royal Oak.

http://macomb.wayne.edu/universitycenter/

Eventually, the powers that be would like to make this a four year campus. I will likely have to teach out there soon with my "urbane" self. :)

I still don't think that the original poster meant any harm to other Michigan institutions. If he did, well, it's a message board. We're all b.s.ing, shooting the breeze, and enjoying this warm spring day.

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Originally Posted by Parkguy

Eastern Michigan has a satellite campus at the Northwest Community Center, and Central has a center somewhere in Detroit, too. Western is supposed to open a satellite in Royal Oak.

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We are calling those [[and I quote) "tents in our own backyard!" Everyone wants a piece of Detroit these days...

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Originally Posted by English

http://macomb.wayne.edu/universitycenter/

Eventually, the powers that be would like to make this a four year campus. I will likely have to teach out there soon with my "urbane" self. :)

I still don't think that the original poster meant any harm to other Michigan institutions.

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I don't think he did either, and I've re-read his post several times. The spirit of his question seems to be asking if Detroit's apparent lack of college students, per capita, is in some way tied to the inability of the city to stop the decline? Good question if you ask me.

Personally, I don't think that the relationship is causal, but it may be symptomatic of the larger issue with Detroit. Baltimore and Philadelphia have a pretty large student body population, both declined severely, and both have struggled to recover [[albeit neither on the scale of Detroit). New York probably has a smaller college student population than Philadelphia [[per capita, if not in absolute numbers), but has staged the ultimate comeback story of the 20th century. And I'm not aware of any higher education institutions in San Francisco that are on the scale of a NYU, Boston College or Johns Hopkins.

I'll chime in here as a Johns Hopkins alumnus who lived in Baltimore for 8 years. There are a lot of colleges/universities in Baltimore city, but all of them are fairly small. Wayne State alone is probably larger than 3 or 4 of them put together. When I was at JHU, there were a total of about 4000 students. It's a bit bigger now, but only by a couple thousand.

Off the top of my head, here's a list of Baltimore colleges: Johns Hopkins, Loyola College, Notre Dame, U of Baltimore, U of Maryland at Baltimore, Goucher College, Coppin State, Morgan State. The latter two are historically black universities.

However, Johns Hopkins is the biggest private employer in the state of Maryland and gets the most research dollars of any university in the US. Therefore it draws a lot of educated people to the city and surrounding area. This probably contributes more to the city than the actual student population.

Baltimore and Philadelphia have struggled in their revival but are really nothing compared to Detroit, for they never reached the level of depopulation so severe as witnessed in the inner-city of Detroit.

Look at a satellite map of Detroit, Philadelphia and Baltimore at the same level. What do those cities have that is missing in Detroit? There are noticeably more buildings, the streets connect, there is a fluid connection between downtown and the neighborhoods. It is clear that there are many residents living in the neighborhoods around Bmor and Philly's downtowns. But thats just not true in Detroit.

Wayne State, although very large, has few students living in the central city relative to the student body, which is mostly commuters. I would say partly due to only recently having dorms, but more to do with the overall decline of the inner-city. Living and shopping and walking the streets of "downtown" is not something many people do in Detroit. Most drive off the freeway ramp and into parking lots or garages, quickly walk into the building/complex and repeat on the way out. And if they don't have an obligation to go downtown, such as school or work, they won't [[besides the occasional sports game or music event or associated trip to Greektown).

Of course some people still live and work and shop in the central city, but those are very few in comparison to how many people don't here in Metro Detroit and how many people DO in other cities. Would having more universities or colleges in the center of the city make any difference?

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Originally Posted by casscorridor

Baltimore and Philadelphia have struggled in their revival but are really nothing compared to Detroit, for they never reached the level of depopulation so severe as witnessed in the inner-city of Detroit.

Look at a satellite map of Detroit, Philadelphia and Baltimore at the same level. What do those cities have that is missing in Detroit? There are noticeably more buildings, the streets connect, there is a fluid connection between downtown and the neighborhoods. It is clear that there are many residents living in the neighborhoods around Bmor and Philly's downtowns. But thats just not true in Detroit.

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I'm very familiar with Philadelphia, and while it does remind me of Detroit, there is a big difference between the two cities. The lack of college students in Detroit is only part of it, and not the cause IMO.

I doubt Baltimore began with 10 colleges/universities in its core.

Don't forget Wayne County Community College on Fort Street.

My pop used to be a big fan of the phrase "Whatever the market shall bear." Clearly the market for higher education within Detroit is not there.

I applaud Wayne State in their expansion and clean up efforts in midtown.

In Detroit you have Wayne State, U of D Mercy, Marygrove, CCS, and WCCD. Only Wayne State has both football and basketball. I think having major sports teams would draw more students to these schools. However, Wayne State's sports programs are not in the top college division and are not promoted like those at MSU, U-M, or Oakland University. If Wayne State had Division I sports it might draw more students. More students would need places to stay around the campus.

Many students want that college town feel and a big part of that college town feel revolves around that college town's football and basketball teams. Students want that big time college sports affiliation. If Wayne State moved up to Division One-A and built a real football stadium, Wayne State might attract more students. In Philly, Temple University, despite many years of sub-par teams, has continued to have a football team, eventhough, Penn St. is the king of college football in Pennsylvania. A stronger sports program by Wayne State, especially in football, might create that kind of college town feeling needed to draw more students to live in the area like they do in Ann Arbor and East Lansing.

The reason MSU and UofM have large student-resident populations and are not commuter schools has little to do with the colleges themselves. It has to do with their location and UofM's freshmen residency requirement. East Lansing is an island unto itself. Students cannot commute to MSU unless they live in Lansing. If you look at the demographics of MSU student body, I bet a huge chunk of it comes from Metro Detroit. Therefore, students are going to have to find housing near campus because commuting from Madison Heights is not really practical.

In regards to UofM, first of all, the university requires freshman to live on campus. I had a buddy who wanted to save money by commuting from the western suburbs, but was pretty much forced to live "on campus" his freshman year. Ann Arbor is also sort of island, whereby people cannot easily commute to it unless they already live in Ann Arbor or the western Detroit suburbs. Ann Arbor is a long commute from Rochester Hills. On top of that, UofM attracts many out-of-state and even international students, thus, those people are going to need housing close to campus, which drives up residency rates around the school.

The difference between MSU/UofM and WSU is that Wayne, while a major research institution, is located within driving distance of all of Metro Detroit. Students from the area who attend Wayne can usually live at home with their parents and commute relatively easily. While I know many WSU students who live in Midtown, there are many more who simply commute from their parents' home elsewhere in the city or 'burbs. Eastern Michigan University also has somewhat of a commuter culture, as most Metro Detroiters can drive to Ypsi in under an hour, whereas at Western Michigan University, many students live near campus because not many are actually from Kzoo.

If WSU wants to beef up student-resident rates in Midtown, it needs to focus on attracting out-of-state and international students who will have to live there, just as MSU and UofM requires of its students. The real question, though, is finding a way to get students to stay in Detroit after graduating...

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Originally Posted by gnome

who in the heck would use a word like urbanity without a whiff of ironic intent intended?

Now I'm all in favor of word-play and creating funkified spellings with twisty-logicalisms thrown around just for fun, but really now, urbanity? What exactly do you mean by that word? ...

Oh, one last thing, don't use words you don't understand. It makes you look uneducated, Sean.

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Not quite sure what you're so mad about, but according to the OED:

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3. The state, condition, or character of a town or city; life in a city; town-life.In freq. use from c1898.

c1550: Complaynt Scotl. [[1979) vi. 34 Tha detestit vrbanite and desirit to lyue in villagis.
1789: W. Belsham Ess. I. xvii. 328, The serenity, the elegance and urbanity of Paris.
1877: R. Martineau tr. Goldziher Mythol. Hebrews iv. 83. This trait of glorification of the old-fashioned Beduin-life, to the disparagement of the free urbanity of the townsmen.
1898: F. W. Maitland Township & Borough 13. A difference between‥urbanity and rusticity.
1900: A. Jessopp in Birm. Weekly Post 14 Apr. 5/3. A glimpse of the world of streets and the docks and the seamy side of ‘urbanity’.

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Note the 1550 example: the more things change...

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Originally Posted by BrushStart

The reason MSU and UofM have large student-resident populations and are not commuter schools has little to do with the colleges themselves. It has to do with their location and UofM's freshmen residency requirement. East Lansing is an island unto itself. Students cannot commute to MSU unless they live in Lansing. If you look at the demographics of MSU student body, I bet a huge chunk of it comes from Metro Detroit. Therefore, students are going to have to find housing near campus because commuting from Madison Heights is not really practical.

In regards to UofM, first of all, the university requires freshman to live on campus. I had a buddy who wanted to save money by commuting from the western suburbs, but was pretty much forced to live "on campus" his freshman year. Ann Arbor is also sort of island, whereby people cannot easily commute to it unless they already live in Ann Arbor or the western Detroit suburbs. Ann Arbor is a long commute from Rochester Hills. On top of that, UofM attracts many out-of-state and even international students, thus, those people are going to need housing close to campus, which drives up residency rates around the school.

The difference between MSU/UofM and WSU is that Wayne, while a major research institution, is located within driving distance of all of Metro Detroit. Students from the area who attend Wayne can usually live at home with their parents and commute relatively easily. While I know many WSU students who live in Midtown, there are many more who simply commute from their parents' home elsewhere in the city or 'burbs. Eastern Michigan University also has somewhat of a commuter culture, as most Metro Detroiters can drive to Ypsi in under an hour, whereas at Western Michigan University, many students live near campus because not many are actually from Kzoo.

If WSU wants to beef up student-resident rates in Midtown, it needs to focus on attracting out-of-state and international students who will have to live there, just as MSU and UofM requires of its students. The real question, though, is finding a way to get students to stay in Detroit after graduating...

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I don't think there is a requirement that all freshmen live on campus at UMich. But they do promise housing to all freshmen who want to stay on campus [[that isn't promised after freshmen year). A few years back they ran out of housing and had to convert some housing that was reserved for grad students into dorms in order to honor that promise.

U-M and MSU [[to a lesser extent) are also national schools [[i.e. undergraduates are recruited from all over the country), and like you said, WSU undergraduates are largely native to Metro Detroit.