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Haha, in terms of politics, Northampton makes Boulder look like rural Texas. Like, I'm a Bernie Sanders supporter myself, but Northampton is too much for me. There just seems to be a smug disconnect from reality.
I honestly don't notice it that much. Maybe because I'm liberal myself, but not everyone in Northampton (most, really) are stereotypical activists. I don't think it really matters much to most people who live here. Does local politics really matter for everyday life?
It largely depends on what you like. I've never been to MA, but I've lived in Lafayette my whole life. "The West Side" is an entirely different world than Lafayette, and most of the students tend to stay on their side of the river. I want to move away, but not for bad reasons. Laffy is a city with a "town" feel. People aren't as friendly as in the South, but they are friendlier than East Coaster's. We have movie theaters, shopping malls, mini-golf, etc., your standard town things. There's several parks, a rock climbing gym, crossfit gyms, etc., if you are active. In a 3 hour radius you lengthen your opportunities x1000 because Chicago is 2 hours away and Indianapolis is 1 hour away, and the possibilities of things to do there are endless. My favorite place to go that's a drive is Turkey Run State Park, it's about 45 mins from here and it's absolutely gorgeous.
There's a lot of diversity at Purdue and people love to go get crunk at the campus bars, but if you cross the bridge into downtown Lafayette there are several really nice local hole-in-the-wall bars with a very different vibe and feel from West Lafayette. Also, Indiana is pretty conservative but the liberalism from Purdue does affect our area. There's still plenty of conservatives around but I feel that it's pretty equal. At any rate, I've never had issues with anyone.
Hope that helps!
Ever been to Harry's Chocolate Shop in W. Lafayette? Great wings!
For the sake of full disclosure, I have been to West Lafayette multiple times because my wife is a Delta Gamma from Purdue. I was married in Chicago and I spend a long weekend every year in Harbor Springs, MI.
All that being said, Purdue is a far superior school to be associated with.
Just in case you weren't saying that tongue-in-cheek on your wife's behalf, that's an opinion not everybody would agree with. I'm not a huge fan of college rankings for similar reasons (still somewhat subjective), but they might be a better indicator than one person's opinion. That being said, the widely viewed US News rankings has Purdue at #61 in the nation and UMass at #75 in the nation - doesn't seem to suggest a large gap between the two. If anything they are very comparable. So I think it's tough to argue that one is overall "far superior" unless you are going for a particular reason, in which case you could probably argue either way depending on the situation and career being pursued.
I honestly don't notice it that much. Maybe because I'm liberal myself, but not everyone in Northampton (most, really) are stereotypical activists. I don't think it really matters much to most people who live here. Does local politics really matter for everyday life?
I'm liberal too, and many would see me as an activist, but I had some unfortunate conversations with some people in Northampton over the years.
Once a friend of a friend said something condescending about people who don't buy organic food. I told the person that many people cannot afford organic food and that oftentimes organic pesticides are worse for the environment than conventional pesticides. That conversation did not end well.
Another person called me "classist" because I was developing an activity for my professional writing students on Google Docs.
Apparently assuming college students know how to use a Web-based word processer is classist in Northampton, but telling poor people they need to eat organic is not.
Northampton is the only place I've ever been where I actually met anti-vaccine people, and for a similar reason, Northampton does not have fluoride in the drinking water.
A friend of a friend (the organic food one) told me, "I only use fluoride-free toothpaste flavored with local fennel."
I guess these are isolated incidents, but it still turned me off of that city as a whole. And this is coming from a liberal.
Some time ago I already inquired about Fairbanks, AK, due to a potential short-term (2-3 months) research stay next year. Turns out, the destination could also happen to be UMass at Amherst, MA, or Purdue at West Lafayette, IN. For a foreign scholar with wife and (then) one year old child, what would you suggest to be the best location? Potential criteria: Quality of the university, sights to explore on weekends (i.e. up to a ~3 hour radius), possibilities for wife and kid to spend the time when I'm at work (parks, shopping, cafes, streets/neighborhoods to stroll around), general atmosphere in the respective city - and so on.
(Of course, the considerations extend to the neighboring towns of Northampton and Lafayette, respectively.)
I'm a Purdue alumni so I suppose I can speak a bit about the area having lived there for four years. I love Purdue, it's a fantastic school. West Lafayette is a really nice city, but yes it is different than Lafayette. Lafayette is more blue collar and can be almost hick in some areas. It's not a bad city, but more of your typical Indiana town while West Lafayette is most definitely a college town. Purdue's campus is fairly compact... I remember having two classes back to back and literally on opposite sides of campus and it was a 10 minute walk. I normally had to run because I only had ten minutes between each class, but I normally managed to make it on time.
One thing about Purdue is you have the campus which is directly adjacent to "downtown" West Lafayette which has a number of bars and restaurants, and then you have downtown Lafayette which is immediately across from the Wabash River from downtown West Lafayette. So it's sort of nice because all of the central/dense areas are all clustered around each other. There is a ped bridge that you can walk across to get to downtown Lafayette from Wabash Landing which is a commercial area just east of the campus. If you are on the east side of the campus you can easily walk there. There's also a trolley that goes between W. Lafayette and Lafayette as well as a very extensive bus system throughout Lafayette and West Lafayette. Downtown Lafayette sort of sucked when I first started at Purdue which was in 2004, but it gradually improved during my time there as new bars and restaurants opened. I'm sure it's even better now, though I haven't been back to visit in several years.
In Indiana, IU in Bloomington is widely regarded as the more "liberal" campus in the state (and also the prettier campus). It's probably because Purdue is centered more on fields like engineering, pharmacy, agriculture, etc. while IU is centered more on the liberal arts. I think Purdue's campus is actually pretty aesthetically appealing, though there is a lot of brick. But part of it is that IU's campus is just so goddam beautiful that it outshines Purdue. Doesn't mean Purdue is ugly.
Within three hours you have Chicago, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Louisville, Cincinnati, SW Michigan. Of those, Chicago is really the city you'd want to visit and spend most time in I'd think. It's way in a different league compared to the others, though each of the others offer different cultural experiences. Indianapolis is less than an hour away and Indy has some nice museums, good shopping, good restaurants, etc. I mentioned SW Michigan because it's a particularly nice area along the south shore of Lake Michigan, lots of wineries and nice restaurants and scenic areas especially in the warmer months.
I can't speak about UMass but I would imagine being in MA you'd have easier access to bigger and better cities with lots to offer. I can only share what I know about Purdue/W. Lafayette.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawn.Davenport
West Lafayette feels like a party-centric college town. Think drunk frat boys, rather than the idealistic gender-queeer communists you'd find in Northampton. Lafayette, again, feels more adult. And Lafeyette feels more like a real city. Many people in Lafeyette are from there and not associated with the University; I think this might be a good thing because it avoids the complaint that many have about college towns, which is that they feel rather transient.
So, according to my taste, here's how I'd rank the towns:
1) Greenfield, MA
2) Lafeyette, IN
3) Northampton, MA
4) Amherst, MA
5) West Lafeyette, IN
It's hard to rank schools, because both are very large public universities that are amazing in some areas and horrible in others. I think Purdue's campus is prettier than UMass, for whatever it's worth. UMass looks like some sort of a 1960's Soviet prison.
Purdue is definitely a frat/sorority campus. I wasn't in a fraternity but there are something like 70+ of them on campus. As far as locals go, yes, in Lafayette there were few transplants but West Lafayette is a different story entirely. West Lafayette is 100% centered around Purdue which has people coming and going from all over the country and the world. There is a huge international student and faculty population there, as well as students and faculty from around the US. I don't think I had a single professor who was actually from Indiana.
Just in case you weren't saying that tongue-in-cheek on your wife's behalf, that's an opinion not everybody would agree with. I'm not a huge fan of college rankings for similar reasons (still somewhat subjective), but they might be a better indicator than one person's opinion. That being said, the widely viewed US News rankings has Purdue at #61 in the nation and UMass at #75 in the nation - doesn't seem to suggest a large gap between the two. If anything they are very comparable. So I think it's tough to argue that one is overall "far superior" unless you are going for a particular reason, in which case you could probably argue either way depending on the situation and career being pursued.
I just meant that the campus experience is better, you can't beat the Big Ten.
I have been to both West Lafayette (conference at Purdue) and Amherst (multiple times as i live in New England).
Amherst Center is its own place as UMass is down the road a bit making them somewhat separate entities. The town of Amherst actually has more than just UMass as it is also home to two other colleges, Amherst College and Hampshire College. Amherst College is a highly selective school located in the center of town within walking distance of UMass. It is considered a "Little Ivy" grouped with other small liberal arts schools such as Williams, Middlebury, Bowdoin, and Wesleyan. Furthermore, there are also two other colleges (Mt Holyoke and Smith) in nearby towns which round out the Five College Consortium. Mt Holyoke and Smith are considered among the best women's colleges in the US and are part of the Seven Sisters (along with Vassar, Wellesley, Radcliffe, Barnard, and Bryn Mawr). Needless to say, education is a big part of the Amherst-Northampton region. Nearby Northampton is located just 8 miles from Amherst Center and has a larger lively downtown area. The City of Springfield is about a 30 minute drive south.
Amherst is within a few hours drive of Boston (90mi), NYC (160m), Providence (90m), Albany (100m), Hartford (50m), Cape Cod (130m), the Maine coast, and the VT Green Mountains and NH White Mountains. There is always something interesting to do on weekends. Multiple cities, the ocean, and mountains are just a short distance away.
West Lafayette seemed a bit remote to me as there is not as much nearby. The area seemed to be defined either by Purdue or farming. The Purdue campus was very nice and quite large and the town seemed to be an extension of it.
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