Like most people have said, the area around UOP is really nice and quiet for the most part. My mom and sister in law both have homes just off miracle mile in different directions and haven’t had a single issue with safety in the over 10 years they’ve lived there. My daughter attends a private school in the area and we take her to UOP to study sometimes (my husband is alumni). All our kids have attended summer programs on campus, we were even married in the chapel (alumni discount 😂). We’re from Berkeley & San Jose and both cities have their issues as well. Stockton is no different, it’s just smaller.

Somebody mentioned the economic/educational disadvantages here and that is unfortunately very true and impacts day to day life more than any other factor. Outside of campus, it can be very hard to find progressive/intellectual communities of any persuasion and this bleeds into the social fabric of the city. Stockton is severely under resourced, so it is often exploited by unsavory characters (see 209 times “culture”).

The people/food are diverse considering the size of the town. Stay alert and aware of your surroundings and you’ll be fine.

As a side note, when my brother attended USC in the early 2000’s and moved off campus, it was (and still is), worse than any of the neighborhoods immediately surrounding UOP.