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freshnesschronic · 03-13-2007, 11:26 AM

Anybody heard of Naperville, IL? The 2nd best place to live in America?

Extremely safe (the only crime here is massive underage drinking), most familys make at least 100k, and people are still moving to Naperville (over 140k) because of it's excellent education (District 203 ranked #1 in the world in Math and Science in '99, ahead of freakin' China!).

But this city is a bubble. The values you learn in Naperville is "Oh, be a doctor or a lawyer or a businssman, anything else is below you." Kids inflate their GPAs to 4.6, 4.7 on a 4.0 scale by taking weighted classes and competition on grades is huge. When college kids leave they experience a huge makeover in their life-not everywhere is like Naperville.

Over 80% white in the schools, probably 88% for the city pop, with 7% Asian (mostly Korean, Chinese, Indian) and <5% Black & Hispanic (only Mexicans and Puerto Ricans). Even though most people are well off the communities are divided. The richest white people live together in huge million dollar mansions, the middle class Asians can be found sprinkled into middle class subdivisions not by coincidence and the apartments complexes house the blacks and working class. Then recently over the last 5 years Naperville has been shipping inner-city kids from Chicago to our 4 high schools and that creates an even more seperate community; inner-city blacks tend to stick to only themselves and not include the suburban blacks (or anyone else for that matter).

I guess it's a good city, but I would have liked to have been raised in a more diverse place, that would have prepared me for the real world rather than a "happy, safe" utopia that has city ordinances against strip clubs or limiting the number of bars in Downtown Naperville to 5.

I plan to live the rest of my life in a more integrated city like New York. Still diverse, but integrated

03-13-2007, 11:26 AM	#12
freshnesschronic Professor Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 1,555	Anybody heard of Naperville, IL? The 2nd best place to live in America? Extremely safe (the only crime here is massive underage drinking), most familys make at least 100k, and people are still moving to Naperville (over 140k) because of it's excellent education (District 203 ranked #1 in the world in Math and Science in '99, ahead of freakin' China!). But this city is a bubble. The values you learn in Naperville is "Oh, be a doctor or a lawyer or a businssman, anything else is below you." Kids inflate their GPAs to 4.6, 4.7 on a 4.0 scale by taking weighted classes and competition on grades is huge. When college kids leave they experience a huge makeover in their life-not everywhere is like Naperville. Over 80% white in the schools, probably 88% for the city pop, with 7% Asian (mostly Korean, Chinese, Indian) and <5% Black & Hispanic (only Mexicans and Puerto Ricans). Even though most people are well off the communities are divided. The richest white people live together in huge million dollar mansions, the middle class Asians can be found sprinkled into middle class subdivisions not by coincidence and the apartments complexes house the blacks and working class. Then recently over the last 5 years Naperville has been shipping inner-city kids from Chicago to our 4 high schools and that creates an even more seperate community; inner-city blacks tend to stick to only themselves and not include the suburban blacks (or anyone else for that matter). I guess it's a good city, but I would have liked to have been raised in a more diverse place, that would have prepared me for the real world rather than a "happy, safe" utopia that has city ordinances against strip clubs or limiting the number of bars in Downtown Naperville to 5. I plan to live the rest of my life in a more integrated city like New York. Still diverse, but integrated Last edited by freshnesschronic; 03-13-2007 at 04:05 PM.