According To Business Insider, These Are The Top 30 College Towns In America

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Going to college isn’t just a four-year commitment to academics; it is also a commitment to the town in which you’re living. You want to pick a college that’s going to put you in a prime city that has a good bar scene and is just right for college kids. Some towns are much better than others, but which stand out above the rest?

Business Insider took a stab at nailing down the top 30 college towns in America, and this is what they came up with:

30. Colorado School of Mines – Golden, Colorado
29. Dickinson College – Carlisle, Pennsylvania
28. Carlton College and St. Olaf College – Northfield, Minnesota
27. University of Utah – Salt Lake City, Utah
26. University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Amherst College – Amherst, Massachusetts
25. University of Wisconsin – Madison, Wisconsin
24. Purdue University – West Lafayette, Indiana
23. Penn State University – State College, Pennsylvania
22. University of Virginia – Charlottesville, Virginia
21. University of Oklahoma – Norman, Oklahoma
20. Dartmouth University – Hanover, New Hampshire
19. University of California at Santa Barbara – Santa Barbara, California
18. University of Miami – Coral Gables, Florida
17. University of Iowa – Iowa City, Iowa
16. Boston College – Newton, Massachusetts
15. University of Missouri – Columbia, Missouri
14. Colorado State University – Fort Collins, Colorado
13. Arizona State University – Tempe, Arizona
12. Brigham Young University – Provo, Utah
11. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill – Chapel Hill, North Carolina
10. Luther College – Decorah, Iowa
9. University of Kansas – Lawrence, Kansas
8. Princeton University – Princeton, New Jersey
7. University of California at Irvine – Irvine, California
6. University of California at Davis – Davis, California
5. University of California at Berkeley – Berkeley, California
4. University of Colorado at Boulder – Boulder, Colorado
3. Iowa State University – Ames, Iowa
2. University of Michigan at Ann Arbor – Ann Arbor, Michigan
1. Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) – Cambridge, Massachusetts

Going through this list, I thought there were some good ones in the middle of the pack. Sure, there were outliers like Missouri (who wants to walk through protests every day?) and BYU (can they even drink there?), but that’s going to happen. Then I hit the top 10. Boulder? Okay, that’s a good choice. Where’s Austin, though? Where’s Oxford? Where’s Tuscaloosa? And, more importantly, where is the best college town in America, Athens, Georgia?

Get out of my face with this list, Business Insider.

[via Business Insider]

Image via YouTube

  1. Superbly_Marginal

    UC Davis is a shit-stain in California. I went there for a weekend my freshman year and left saturday morning because that whole campus was full of soft-bodies who got drunk off nothing but fireball.

    10 years ago at 3:42 pm
    1. JamesLahey

      Do it for state! “State Snaps” is reason enough to say ISU is better than Iowa

      10 years ago at 7:20 pm
  2. Hoosier_SNU

    They had West Lafayette and not Bloomington (one of the top party schools/nationally ranked beautiful campuses)…West Lafayette is awful

    10 years ago at 3:51 pm
    1. Charlie Hustle

      Born and raised in Lafayette, 100% agree with you. Bloomington is a way better college town

      10 years ago at 5:10 pm
  3. frat17

    Cambridge, MA is essentially Boston, not sure how that’s considered a town? This list is shit

    10 years ago at 4:02 pm
  4. FrattyLightweight

    Irvine and Davis are boring suburbs not college towns…and Berkeley? Seriously?

    10 years ago at 4:52 pm
  5. FraGruber

    Not a single city in Texas? Probably because it isn’t “safe” enough for college students due to overly conservative values and respect for all the U.S. amendments.

    10 years ago at 4:59 pm
  6. rickyutah

    BYU is number 12. They literally sign contracts saying they won’t drink. When I saw that I threw this list out the window.

    10 years ago at 6:21 pm