Question about Fitchburg

[Patman]

Originally Posted by Annabelle

One of the schools on my daughter's college list is Fitchburg State as they offer a program she is very interested in. However, we visited and the campus looked a little "tired" and the City of Fitchburg, was the same. Is the city safe for college students or are there issues that I should be concerned with?
Thanks for any input!
A.

Most of the posts here are on target. I'm a legal resident of Fitchburg as I'm a Ph.D. student at UConn (and I'm only registering for a another matter, but I saw this... and for the record I live in a safe part of Willimantic thank you very much... I'm not a glutton for punishment.)

Fitchburg is a dying blue-collar town which has had a proud past but its fallen by the wayside as factory work has left the town and other non-skilled minorities filled in. I'm not blaming minorities but when you add unskilled work with unskilled work things don't usually compound well. The city lacks any natural draw... its in Massachusetts so taxes are high... there are no direct links to roads that make any retail sense in terms of expansion. The geography is littered with hills making any connecting roads nothing more than a city hall fantasy... and its city government has ignored very real problems, such as drugs for so long. One former mayor in 1999 failed to acknowledge the homelessness in a city debate. Fitchburg's hope rests in their ability to find a niche... I'm not hopeful but I have to think there's always something... who knows... maybe somebody will buy out the entire downtown for something

Fitchburg State is in a dangerous area but its getting somewhat better. They have done a fair bit of work on the area between Main Street and the college where they have demolished buildings, but in some variety of student center, and things like that. My sister graduated from one of the specialized programs at Fitchburg State and she's done very well for it and she'd still be doing what she did her work in if it weren't for an severely abusive boss.

I don't think for a commuting student that a Fitchburg State student would have a difficult time at all. I say this having graduated UMass-Lowell.

Fitchburg as of right now has no real future as a city and I wouldn't recommend anybody with kids to move there. As long as your child is commuting things should be fine, but Fitchburg is not a college town by any stretch of the imagination. (Worse, the town's consciousness is completely enveloped by the high school. Fitchburg and Leominster's street signs are Red and Blue for a reason.)

[LeavingMA]

Overall though, Fitchburg State is a good school and I know many people who have gone there and enjoyed it. So despite the fact Fitchburg as a city has some problems, the school is a solid state college.

[lodovico1984]

The colllege area is far from the worse area in Fitchburg, for that I would travel to Columbus, Normany, Meadowbrook Leyte and or State Street

[Eddy G]

At one time Fitchburg State had the highest incidents of rape then any other state school in MA.
That may have had something to do with a serial rapist or gang trouble, something like that

That was 7 or 8 yrs ago (may be even 10)

I don't know how much has changed since then. It hasn't been in the news for a while, for what ever that's worth.

I can say the area hasn't gotten much better since then. It's still a rough looking area.