American needs help?

Question

Trying to pick a University to go to just need some help choosing a city, so far down to Canberra, Perth, Adelaide, or Hobart.

Answer 1

Well it all depends on what courses you want to do, and what you like in a city. I'm from Adelaide so I'll tell you about it.

http://www.adelaide.southaustralia.com/home.asp
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/worldguide/destinations/pacific/australia/adelaide/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adelaide (see this Wiki link for climate details)


It's a small city with a population of around 1 million people. I love living in Adelaide because it's not too crazy, and it's really close to beaches and the beautiful Adelaide Hills which are full of vineyards, Aussie bushland, English style gardens and lovely pastures, along with many fantastic restaurants and pubs. Also the city is surrounded by parks and gardens, when you come in on a plane it is MUCH greener than other cities.

Driving in the city (even the very centre) is really easy because all the roads are set out in a grid, and there are very few one-way roads or 'no right turn' intersections. Housing is much more affordable here than say Sydney, Melbourne or Perth. Sydney and Perth are the most expensive cities in terms of housing.
We have three Universities here: Adelaide Uni http://www.adelaide.edu.au/, Uni SA http://www.unisa.edu.au/ and Flinders University http://www.flinders.edu.au/. Adelaide Uni has a bit of everything, Uni SA is mainly arts based and Flinders is mainly science and medicine, and is the only Uni in South Australia that offers Archaeology.

The weather here is very similar to the Mediterranean climate so it's just gorgeous. We have much better weather than Sydney and Melbourne where it rains a lot. And Hobart is very cold, but they are right underneath the hole in the ozone layer so it doesn't take long at all to get sunburnt, even when it's not that sunny.

We don't have much of a nightlife though. There are many pubs and clubs but they only really go off on the weekends, and even then it's not that busy. A weeknight on one of the main streets in a suburb of Melbourne is busier than a Saturday night on the main 'party' strip of Adelaide. We still have fun though, by no means is it a ghost town!

Every year we have the Fringe festival http://tix.adelaidefringe.com.au/ticketing/Home.aspx which is an arts festival which lasts about a few weeks, performers from all over the world come and exhibit art, perform plays, stand up comedy, play music and do street performances. The parks fill up with buskers and big tents where people perform and there's interesting things to see ever night.
We also have Womadelaide http://www.womadelaide.com.au/home/index.html every year which is a 3 day world music festival, featuring artists from over 20 countries on 6 stages, performing and holding workshops.

Anyway I guess that's enough... feel free to email me through my profile if you want to know more about Radelaide, as we affectionately call it!

Answer 2

The University you choose should depend on the course you want to do. If you want to pick a Uni for the nightlife in the city, you should not leave out Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane - and they all have great universities too. If you really want to restrict yourself to those cities I would choose ANU in Canberra followed by Adelaide, Hobart and Perth. ANU is a great Uni and it is where I would do a PhD in my field. It is also closest to Sydney.

There is nothing wrong with any of the cities but I put Perth last as it is just so far away from anything else in Australia.

Answer 3

If you are down to those four, come to Canberra, the ANU is easily the best uni in those cities. (Melbourne and Newcastle Unis are top too, but not on your list).

I go to the ANU and it is beautiful, big spaces, trees everywhere, and a lot of smart people. Fabulous research, and a very respectable place to get a degree from.

We also have a bar which awesome bands regularly play at, heaps of cool societies, lots of fun stuff (toga party next week!).

Only thing is there is a bit of a housing prob in canberra, rental market is very very tight at the moment (less then 1% vacancy!)

But if your just choosing between the same degree at differnent uniss, choose ANU...much more prestigious