pdiddy348 said:
I'm having trouble deciding between which campus to rank higher: Peoria or Rockford? For those of you who have some familiarity with the campuses (i.e community, school curriculum, etc), can you tell me about it? Thanks
I am from Peoria, born and raised, and think it would be a much better place to do med school than Rockford. I've only been to Rockford a couple of times and was not impressed with the place at all. I live in Washington DC now but will be coming back to IL for med school this summer (SIU).
Pro's of Peoria:
Big town feel in a medium city
Low traffic (~15 min to get from one side of the city to another)
Variety of things to do...decent bar scene for relaxing, lots of great parks and hiking venues, a riverfront that is becoming very prominant, several choices for cinemas (no independent film houses tho).
Young professionals are quickly becoming the norm in downtown Peoria.
Housing is cheap compared to other places. You could buy a nice house for ~100K easily. Rent is around 400-700 for good one bedroom apartments.
Shopping is diverse...2 main malls and many other shopping centers/Wal-mart & Target/Best Buy all those good places, a couple of good thrift stores, and summer garage sales are awesome.
Lots of great restaraunts (if you want some names I could recommend some).
Two large hospitals that have a good range of specialties (Heart care, Childrens's/Women's, Geriatric, etc.)
Public Health department that serves a large portion of the underserved in the area
Small city stuff like parades and festivals are cheap and really entertaining (particularly St. Pat's day stuff)
Airport that flies to Chicago and St. Louis that isn't as expensive as other small town airports.
The Civic Center in P-town has many really popular bands, symphonies, and other entertainers who come into town.
Great high school sports teams (basketball and football especially).
Con's of Peoria:
Right now there is lots of construction going on which makes some of I-74 unavailable. Annoying, but manageable.
Although there are many K-12 schools, there are only a few that I would actually ever send my kids to (if I had them).
The public transportation system kind of sucks. Last time I looked, they don't run any buses on Sunday and very late/early on the other days. But if you have a car it's not a problem.
Sometimes Peoria gets boring, but then you can hop in the car and visit Springfield (<1 hr away), Chicago (2.5 hrs away), or St. Louis(2.5 hrs away) if you need that bigger city stuff.
Bottom line, Peoria is a great place to live for a while. It has a lot to keep you busy if you want to stay busy and bunches of things to do if you want to chill out. The hospitals are great. My pediatrician(years ago) graduated from UIC and did all her stuff in Peoria and seemed to like it.
If you choose Peoria, I could help with advice on where to live and eat and all that. Just ask if you have any specific questions.
good luck choosing
