A French tree, around university, is disliked (9)
I believe the answer is:
unpopular
'is disliked' is the definition.
(similar in meaning)
'a french tree around university' is the wordplay.
'a french' becomes 'un' ('a' in French).
'tree' becomes 'poplar' (poplar tree is a kind of tree).
'around' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'university' becomes 'U' (abbreviation as in UMass).
'poplar' placed around 'u' is 'popular'.
'un'+'popular'='UNPOPULAR'
(Other definitions for unpopular that I've seen before include "unlike 27 [IN FAVOUR]" , "Generally disliked by people" , "not favoured" , "Not well-liked" , "Without general approval" .)