<p>I totally get that state flagships exist to serve primarily their own, and making an outreach to lower socioeconimic students serves the state’s mission. I don’t see that cohort has significantly diluted UCB admission standards. Average unweighted GPA is a record 3.88, and the 75% end of middle SAT is an all-time high of 2260. Does the outreach contribute to the funding problem? No doubt. Some 55% of resident students receive FA to attend UC Berkeley. Obviously, if we agree those kids should be the ones getting that education, then we the UC system has to find off-setting revenue sources. If OOS and int’l students who are as well qualified as their in-state peers can be part of the fiscal solution, everyone wins. If UCB is so broke they will take anyone who can write the check, we all lose.</p>
<p>It would cost me to send my son 5k more to Brown, for example, than to Berkeley for the same program, and Berkeley offers better environment and facilities for my son. Berkeley’s econ is a solid top 10 econ in the world, which also means better faculty and teaching. Brown’s econ isn’t even in the top 20 in the US, let alone, in the world. </p>
<p>Now, if you think Brown is worth the OOS price, why is Berkeley’s, which even costs 5k less, isn’t?</p>
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And how do you know that Cal’s undergrad econ isn’t world-class whilst its postgrad program is?</p>
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But I can well afford to pay for the full price for either university. Why then would I need my son to apply for a fee waiver or fee discounts?</p>
<p>(Never claimed it wasn’t.) But there is absolutely no way for either of us to know since there is zero ways to measure ‘undergraduate programs’.</p>
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<p>A better question is why do you keep making up strawmen? Why do you keep changing words to make your points. Why do you keep inserting items and insisting that I defend them? (I would have thunk better of an Oxhridge alum.)</p>
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<p>Why does it matter if you got in on the basis of geographic diversity (and $$)? The privates have been encouraging such diversity for years. But simple math indicates that more OOS’ers means less instaters. Thus, in the aggregate, OOS’ers have to be displacing instaters. UC readily concurs.</p>
<p><a href=“Never%20claimed%20it%20wasn’t.”>quote</a> But there is absolutely no way for either of us to know since there is zero ways to measure ‘undergraduate programs’.
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I would claim that Stanford’s undergrad econ is world-class. And, seriously speaking, there isn’t much difference between Stanford econ and Berkeley econ. </p>
<p>so, again, why is Berkeley’s undergad econ, for example, not worth the full-price, something that you think other schools’ econ are?</p>
<p>I know there are great alternatives. For example, I think Rice would be a great alternative for Berkeley’s. But it’s not those schools that I am interested in know about. It’s Berkeley’s.</p>