Higher Education and Urbanity in Detroit

[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...

[iheartthed]

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...

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.