A selling point for the Colorado Buffaloes' recruiting efforts has come from a world-renowned publication. According to National Geographic, Boulder was named the "Happiest City in the US" and for good measure. The four-year study led by best-selling author Dan Buettner examined places in America with a scale of 15 metrics. Everything from eating healthy, to civic engagment, and even every day living were taken into account.
Boulder topped the list due to "A sense of community, access to nature, sustainable urban development and preservation policies, and perhaps even that clean mountain air." Those qualities in addition to CU’s newly built, state-of-the-art athletic complex provides an outstanding one-of-a-kind environment for recruits.
Buettner and his team of researchers listed 25 of the happiest cities, designating the honor to three of Colorado’s own. A total of twelve major college towns including Boulder made the cut.
No. 3 Charlottesville, VA- Virginia (Believe it or not; Tiki torches and all)
No. 4 Fort Collins, CO- Colorado State
No. 6 San Jose-Sunnyville-Santa Clara, CA- Stanford
No. 7 Provo-Orem, UT- BYU
No. 15- Honolulu, HI- Hawaii
No. 16 Ann Arbor, MI- Michigan
No. 18 Colorado Springs, CO- Air Force
No. 20 Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura, CA- UCLA
No. 22 Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN- Minnesota
No. 23 San Diego-Carlsbad, CA- San Diego State
No. 25 Austin-Round Rock, TX- Texas
The entire list from National Geographic can be found here.