University Park, State College Station, etc.

I was at a concert at the Bryce Jordan Center on campus, and the headliner accidentally called out to all of us in “College Station”.  He graciously corrected himself in the encore (working in both “State College” and “Happy Valley” into his banter).  I bet it’s a common mistake for musicians to forget which town they’re in, and even commoner amongst the variously named college towns.

For those who still aren’t sure where or what Penn State is, here is a handy guide in both list and graphical form:

  • “PSU”, “Penn State”, or The Pennsylvania State University Nittany Lions. That’s us.
  • “Penn” is usually the University of Pennsylvania, which is an Ivy League school in Philadelphia. They’re Quakers, not Nittany lions.  It’s not technically wrong to refer to us as “Penn”, but unnecessarily confusing.
  • College Station: City hosting the Texas A&M Aggies. Not us. [Update: The College Township Alpha Fire Sub-station near our campus is often referred to as “College Station” by firefighters. So, kinda us.].
  • College Park: City hosting the University of Maryland Terrapins. Not us.
  • State College: The town hosting most of PSU main campus. Us.
  • College Township: A neighboring town hosting much of PSU main campus (mostly the athletics facilities, including Beaver Stadium and Joe Pa’s grave site).  Also us.
  • State Penn: Nothing, except that a State Pen(itentiary) is on the other side of town from Penn State (making for a nice palindromic joke).
  • State University: Common appellation of public schools in US. Sort of us (we hold the land grant charter for Pennsylvania so we are it some sense a “state university”, but we are not an arm of the state government; we employees are not civil servants. In fact, there is a separate Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education, which is a proper system of “state schools.”  Yeah, it’s confusing.)
  • University College: School in London. Not us. [Update: Actually, there is a “University College” route for students at the Penn State Commonwealth Campuses to get certain degrees.  So, sort of us, but not us at University Park.]
  • University Station: Name of some public transit stops and a shopping center in Massachusetts. Not us.
  • University Park: Name of the main, State College PSU campus, and our postal address. Us.
  • Park University: In Missouri. Not us.
  • Park College: Former Park University in Missouri. Not us.
  • College University: Web comic. Not us.
  • College State: Website listing universities. [Update: Website no longer exists.]  Not us.
  • State Park: Common appellation of public parks in US. Not us at all.
  • Penn Station: Famous train station in New York (and other places). Not us.
  • Park State: Bank in Duluth. Not us.
  • State Station: On the T in Boston. Not us.
  • Park Station: Condos in Utah. Not us.
  • Station Park: Hotel in London, Ontario. [Update: The hotel changed its name.]  This is also the name of a shopping center in Utah. Not us.
In graphical form:
\ University State Park  Station College
University x x Us Shopping London, Sort of Us
State Sort of us x Not us T stop Us
Park Missouri Bank x Condo Missouri
Station x x Shopping x x
College Comic x Maryland A&M (but…)  x

I hope that clears things up.

One thought on “University Park, State College Station, etc.”

  1. Kamen

    There are many Penn Stations in the North-East US, the famous one is the one in New York. I think they used to be owned by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and not by their competitors. There are Penn Stations in DC, Baltimore, New London, CT and several others towns. :)

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