<p>Well said Tx</p>
<p>Preach TxNewCollage Mom, Preach.</p>
<p>As a Texas alum who’s children no longer benefit from legacy status, I have to say that I am a fan of the top 10% (or whatever percent it is now). I do not believe it has dummied down UT or any of the other Texas universities. The admittance stats and first year returning student rate has remained steady. The one big difference from when I attended in the early 80’s to visiting 30 years later with our college bound son…the student population looked a lot less like Memorial & River Oaks and a lot more like the general population of Texas. And I think that’s a good thing.</p>
<p>not to create factions or disagreement but there is another issue in this state that plays into some of the resentment. that is the PACT situation. alabama had a “pre-paid” tuition plan that guaranteed full tuition to alabama students at any of the public universities. (the language was later changed to include investment language…however a judge recently ruled that all contracts whether guaranteed or not…were essentially the same) so many parents in this state bought these contracts…some paid when their kids were in kindergarten, some paid as their kids were older, but price for these contracts ranged from6K to over 25K depending on when you bought. well… pact ran out of money and after many years of court rulings, appeals etc…last year a decision was reached that pact would only pay 2010 rates from now on. so many people in this state who bought contracts feel that they are now left with big differentials and no time to find an alternate way to fund college as they had relied upon their contracts. they dont begrudge oos students per se…they begrudge that the colleges and the legislature have not found a way to honor these contracts…(colleges were asked to cap tuition increases to about a 3% increase per year…some colleges agreed, the big 3 didnt)…if they had done so, pact contracts could have been honored. the legislature did agree to kick in some money but it still left pact holders with the 2010 rates. sooo impressions play a role…the schools can find money for oos student scholarships but not for their own state students. as this pact debacle just occurred i think you MAY see some of these 40K pact holders still to attend, have to choose other schools in state with lower tuition costs…it wont be they cant get in, it will be that they cant afford to get in. as is mentioned in the comments on al.com… especially in the rural areas…in state students may be at a disadvantage score wise to compete for the academic scholarships… again as this just went into effect, it isnt known what will happen for instate enrollment numbers, and choice of college. yes i know alabama has a lot of other colleges they can go to, but when a parent forked over 25+k thinking that money would be wisely invested by the state and now has no time to make up the difference other than out of pocket…it stings a bit.</p>
<p>the schools can find money for oos student scholarships but not for their own state students</p>
<p>That would be true if the schools were ONLY offering OOS scholarships. The schools offer instate students better scholarships in many cases. For instance, an instate student just needs an ACT 30 to get the free tuition award at Bama. And an ACT 27 student gets $3500 per year which pretty much closes the PACT gap. </p>
<p>So the argument that these schools can find money for OOS students but not for instate students just isn’t accurate.</p>
<p>Unless the colleges had a say in how PACT was originally structured, to expect them to take less money isn’t fair. If a family is short on a few thousand per year in tuition, then the student can work over summers, take out student loans, or whatever to make up the difference. I don’t lose sleep over the PACT folks. These typically aren’t low income people. After all, low income folks don’t usually have thousands to fork over to buy PACT. Every single person I know that has PACT for their kids is upper/upper-middle income.</p>
<p>as i said m2ck… it is the perception. the prepaid tuition plan had NO gpa requirement or ACT requirement…just did they meet admission requirements of the school… so your argument of they “JUST” need an act of 30 for a scholarship just isnt accurate in these cases… their families have ALREADY paid for their “full tuition” contract, which they now wont receive
and just getting an act of 30 isnt that simple for goodness sake. many excellent and wonderful students dont have a 30 act. </p>
<p>if you paid for a mercedes and suddenly were told…you get a suzuki for that price would you be happy?</p>
<p>just saw your edit… m2ck… many pact holders are NOT upper/middle class… some are single moms, that worked very hard to make that payment every month… many saw education as a priority for their kids and worked very hard to pay that contract… i find that comment a bit offensive actually as i know many pact holders and i really couldnt care less if you lose sleep or not . the schools were not asked to reduce tuition for pact kids, they were asked if they would put a tuition INCREASE cap in place. they could still increase tuition, just at a lower rate…</p>
<p>I wasn’t saying that getting an ACT 30 is easy. I was pointing out that the instate req’ts are LOWER. </p>
<p>An instate ACT 27 student gets about a 40% tuition merit award. An OOS ACT 27 gets about a 15% tuition merit award.</p>
<p>So again, my point wasn’t that a student can easily get a 30. My point was the the req’ts for the various awards are lower for instate.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that the COLLEGES didn’t promise these people anything. Their beef needs to be with those who designed the contract. If I sold you a contract that said you could get a Mercedes with it, and then my program went broke, why should Mercedes (who didn’t create the contract) have to honor it??</p>
<p>I agree with your comments. My daughter will be at UA next year. If she can improve her ACT score on Saturday it will mean better automatic scholarship. I am a little concerned about the engineering dept providing scholarships for out of state high-ACT students (the ‘full tuition scholarship’ paying the difference for out of state students). I would rather see them provide incentives to in-state students.</p>
<p>I sympathize for parents with less opportunities in state for their college bound students (I live in AL now and my children are/will be going to college in AL, but have lived in TX and WI, and understand the limitations in IL). UA is doing a lot of correct things and doing things well - beautiful facilities and strong faculty/academic offerings to start. I also hold two PACT contracts, and along with the other PACT contract holders are disappointed that the contracts are really not fully state-backed contracts and not being fully honored (that is why the State of AL waffled and opened the door for PACT money paying for the lawsuit settlement - millions to the class action lawsuit attorneys for the State agreeing to pay 2010 rates so the fund would not go broke). My hope is that high GPA students may still have enough UA scholarship opportunity if they cannot hit the ACT 30 to not give me heartburn for what out of state students are receiving. My heartburn will go down hugely if my daughter can score a 30 on her ACT exam on Saturday.</p>
<p>^^^^SOS, good luck to your daughter. Many of us will be pulling for her!</p>
<p>Good luck to your D.</p>
<p>I would rather see them provide incentives to in-state students.</p>
<p>? The College of Eng’g is providing incentives to instate students. Did you think that the incentives were only for OOS??</p>
<p>My hope is that high GPA students may still have enough UA scholarship opportunity if they cannot hit the ACT 30 to not give me heartburn for what out of state students are receiving. My heartburn will go down hugely if my daughter can score a 30 on her ACT exam on Saturday.</p>
<p>While we hope that your D gets an ACT 30 so that she can have both the full tuition merit scholarship AND the PACT money, I’m not sure what you’re saying above.</p>
<p>If your D gets a 29, she’ll get a half tuition scholarship, right (plus a bit more if she majors in eng’g)? It’s not as if she’ll get nothing from Bama. Not sure what you mean by “high GPA”. The GPA req’t is 3.5. There are a gazillion kids with very high GPAs. It’s the test scores that are really used to award merit.</p>
<p>In-State Scholarship Offers
Students who have a 27 ACT or 1210-1240 SAT (critical reading and mathematics scores only) and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will receive $3,500 per year for four years.</p>
<p>Students who have a 28 ACT or 1250-1280 SAT (critical reading and mathematics scores only) and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will receive $4,000 per year for four years.</p>
<p>Students who have a 29 ACT or 1290-1320 SAT (critical reading and mathematics scores only) and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will receive the value of one-half tuition for four years.</p>
<p>Students who have a 30-36 ACT or a 1330-1600 SAT*(critical reading and mathematics scores only) and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will receive the value of tuition for four years.</p>
<p>I dont think people understand that Bama needed to populate the new SEC with high stats kids…and the state alone couldn’t provide enough of those kids. Students who don’t have high test scores often get weeded out in engineering because the math, physics, etc are too hard for them. </p>
<p>The PACT issue, while very disappointing to the holders, is a problem between the holders and those who instituted the program. The colleges didn’t create PACT, they didn’t manage PACT, they didn’t issue PACT contracts.</p>
<p>Again, if I started a program MBPACT that assured parents that their child would get a Mercedes Benz at graduation and then my program ends up underfunded, that is not Mercedes Benz’s fault. They didn’t design the program, they didn’t issue contracts. They would be under no obligation to then provide a $60k MB when they’re only receiving $50k.</p>
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<p>I was talking about in-state students, to be clear. If they want to come to take advantage of the academics offerings and they feel like OOS students are blocking their ability to do so, I sympathize with them. If they simply want to get into the Machine, I don’t have as much sympathy for their plight.</p>
<p>^^</p>
<p>Ok…</p>
<p>That said, where are all these instate kids who were denied admission? What were their stats? They must have either been too low (regardless of OOS admissions) or they didn’t take the necessary HS classes. </p>
<p>The instate enrollment numbers haven’t decreased. Personally, I do not know one instate kid who applied to Bama and was denied. I’m sure there are such kids because I know that students can graduate from high school w/o taking all the minimum college reqts. </p>
<p>As a matter of fact, one of the kids from my kids’ high school is attending Bama with a 17 ACT (not a URM). She had a decent GPA and Bama admitted her on “academic probation” (I guess they’re hoping she’s just a bad test-taker…or maybe she just did ridiculously bad in one section.). As long as she keeps her grades up, she’ll go off probation.</p>
<p>I don’t know of any either. I think this is a mostly made-up problem.</p>
<p>Lord have mercy on me. </p>
<p>lol</p>
<p>I find out that SOSConcern is my best friend. </p>
<p>So sorry dear beloved friend. I’ve apologized on the phone, but thought I should do so here as well. </p>
<p><3</p>
<p>P.S…more prayers that your darling D does get the ACT 30. </p>
<p>{{{ hugs to both of you }}}</p>
<p>I haven’t really heard a response from the perspective of a future OOS student, so here’s my take. I’m from Texas, NM semi finalist (let’s keep our fingers crossed for finalist!), 3.9 GPA, all 5’s on AP exams, etc. I had my pick of many awesome schools and Bama ultimately came out on top. For one, the generous scholarships are available to everyone who can meet the requirements, so this isn’t an issue with overcrowding of OOS students. It is not UA’s duty to make sure Alabama students get into the school. They want to attract the best and brightest in order to create a strong, reputable university and if any student, instate or OOS doesn’t make the cut, that’s his problem. Going to UA is a privilege, not a right, and if you want a higher percentage of in state students to get accepted, focus on reforming the k-12 education system instead of crying foul when better qualified kids from other states get accepted in record numbers. Just my two cents.</p>
<p>I haven’t crunched the numbers myself, but I would imagine that if you compared the population growth of Alabama against the growth of the university to the percentage of out of state students to the physical number of seats that the percentages equate to, I would imagine that you’d find that the number of seats available to in state students is probably on par with the population growth of the state.</p>
<p>What I really think we’re seeing is that the school is growing faster than the comparative population of the state, so of course there’s going to be more OOS students on campus, filling those new seats. That’s the only way it was going to happen when the University (rightly so) decided not to lower the admission standards.</p>
<p>I would imagine that you’d find that the number of seats available to in state students is probably on par with the population growth of the state.</p>
<p>I agree. That’s why we’re not hearing any specifics about rejected instate students who would have been admitted a short time ago. </p>
<p>This state has a lowish population (4.8M) but it has a proportionately large number of public univs (15). Therefore UAlabama is just one of many targetted destinations for higher education. </p>
<p>I find it interesting that Arizona only has 3 public univs with a larger population (6.5M).</p>
<p>To reply to the OOS scholarships that UA gives, the University requires a higher ACT score for out of state versus in state, that is true. However I believe the engineering program offering additional automatic scholarship to OOS students receiving ACT 30 and 31 should also mean that in state ACT of 28 and 29 also be able to receive full tuition like those targeted OOS students (in the spirit of the University’s automatic scholarship levels). I also believe the engineering college should hand select these additional recipients (in-state 28/29 and OOS 30/31 engineering prospective students) versus automatic full tuition scholarship for OOS 30/31. Richard T Crow PhD retired prof from UA school of social work wrote a guest opinion published in the Huntsville Times Dec 8 titled “Out-of-state students top 50% at Alabama”. He discussed schools with OOS student caps, and noted Univ of Georgia, Univ of Missouri, Penn State and Indiana University along with AL does not restrict OOS enrollments. 37% of freshman at AU were OOS students. It will be interesting what will happen when UA system present their budget request to the Legislature in early 2014. I hope my daughter got that magic ACT 30 on Saturday so she can receive full tuition scholarship plus the additional $2500/year scholarship from engineering. There are students that have a 30 or above ACT who wash out at college, and some of the in-state ACT of 28 and 29 may be more college ready and more serious about completing their college program as a good student. We paid for private high school so our daughters would be better prepared for college and make the college transition without problems. The PACT discussion is a separate matter, but the State of AL was wrong in wiggling out of an obligation, saying it really wasn’t a State Contract. The 2010 tuition payments from PACT will be a widening gap amount to current and future tuition, as tuition goes up every year. My older daughter was able to apply the PACT money to her housing at UAB and has had academic/music scholarships cover tuition. UA has nice housing with a nice price tag - sucking it up as honors housing is important to us. We have no qualm with OOS students as a significant percent as long as good in-state students do have an opportunity to attend. Perhaps there should be some trend analysis and target rates for OOS students while continuing to give incentives to in-state students. I think UA will have an easier time with state funding with better accountability. Also looking at the OOS scholarship students after graduation - how many remain in AL and how many become alumni benefactors? How many help advance the University’s Mission?</p>