<p>What is interesting is the the top UCs still rank high on the college ranking lists and one has to wonder how they still can be so highly ranked with class sizes exceeding 500 and all the budget cuts they have had over the years.</p>
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<p>Lower division courses are taught “in bulk” at most colleges; if taught in small classrooms, they are often taught by adjuncts or TAs.</p>
<p>Yes, the LAC fans will probably be writing their responses, but LACs in aggregate enroll only a tiny fraction of the total number of college students. For whatever reason, there do not appear to be any large colleges following the LAC model, even though the LAC model could theoretically be scaled up.</p>
<p>But it does mean that the large lower division classes are unlikely to be a big difference compared to most of the schools that most college students attend.</p>
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<p>UC is a major research University. Why do you think that 3.0 students should attend a major research University? (And why do you think UC Merced should offer remedial classes for those 3.0 students? Is that a good use of taxpayer dollars?)</p>
<p>I’d almost feel bad for the OOS’ers who are paying full freight to UC only to see their programs whacked. But I won’t feel bad because I have been warning those OOS’ers not to come for years. (PT Barnum was right.)</p>
<p>And in an example of pure irony, UC purposely chose to force instaters to go elsewhere to enable room for the OOS’ers. But those OOS’ers cannot vote for your proposal, Governor. Perhaps is a few more instaters were allowed to attend their campus of choice, the Gov might have garnered a lot more support. :D</p>
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<p>Patently false.</p>
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<p>Irrelevant. Your comment was “at most colleges.” “Most colleges” are not large universities.</p>
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<p>Because large colleges by and large don’t care about undergraduate education. The undergraduates are there to give them legitimacy, maintain public support for funding, and form an alumni network that will contribute money and political support, so that the colleges can continue to fund research. They could care less how good an education they provide.</p>
<p>As far as UCs accepting anyone who qualifies, no longer the case. UCR is turning away lots of students now. They have waitlists and many of the students on this list are above average students.</p>
<p>And, in my eyes anyway, a B (3.0) student is not a remedial student! If that is the case, then the UCs should just be more honest and raise the qualifying criteria to 4.0. </p>
<p>CC tuition could double and still be very affordable to most students, without having to offer financial aid. Tuition is $36/credit, going up to $46 soon. </p>
<p>To be fair the community colleges are finally talking about eliminating all the fluff classes and focusing on the serious student. And I did hear the UCLA law (I think) is considering privatizing.</p>
<p>^^ Is UCM turning away UC qualified students? Their admit rate was 81.5% so there aren’t many being turned away (about 3,000 weren’t admitted - it doesn’t indicate if they actually qualified or not). UCR was about a 69% admit rate. Regardless, I doubt ‘most qualified students’ are being turned away form the UC system since at least a couple of years ago, if not now, all of them could attend a UC. </p>
<p>I don’t think one can look at just the GPA to determine if the student is qualified and UC doesn’t - the student has to achieve the GPA while taking the UC required courses and if they can manage that then theoretically they don’t need to take remedial courses. One 3.0 is not the equivalent of another 3.0 if the courses for one are more difficult than the other.</p>
<p>I’m not sure UCLA Law privatizing would help UCLA in general since given the tuition they charge I doubt they’re losing any money and I assume they’re self sufficient and not dependent on state funds but I’m not sure of this point.</p>
<p>ucbalum, I couldn’t agree more with your post #19. I’ve always thought that ballot-box legislating would be the death of this state, and I see no reason to change my opinion now.</p>
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<p>Nor are they LACs. Most freshmen and sophomores are not going to have many course taught in small (< 30 student) sections led by eminent faculty members (even if you assume this to be true of LACs, only a small percentage of college students attend them).</p>
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<p>If the LAC model were so recognizably superior that more students would prefer to attend such a school, surely there is an opportunity in the market for college education for a LAC to increase its size while still being organized along the LAC model, or a large non-LAC to transition to the LAC model.</p>
<p>But it does not seem to have happened, for whatever reason. Which means that LAC model schools can only serve a small minority of college students. Perhaps only a small minority of college students consider the LAC model to be advantageous for them.</p>
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<p>A 3.0 HS GPA student should not be a remedial student if s/he goes to college – but standards are so low that a large percentage of college students do need remedial English and/or math courses in college.</p>
<p>Perhaps part of the postsecondary budget problem is due to the unnecessary load placed on the colleges and universities by large number of students who are taking high school level courses. It is truly a waste to teach the same student a given subject twice – once inadequately in high school, then again in a remedial course in college. And the state (i.e. tax payers) is paying for it both times.</p>
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<p>There’s actually huge variance on this from one college or university to the next. At my daughter’s LAC there are zero classes with 100+ students, and 2 classes with 50-99 students. That represents about half of one percent of all classes taught. No “in bulk” teaching there.</p>
<p>At Yale, about 3% of all classes have 100+ students, and another 3% have 50-99 students. Not at the same level as my D’s LAC, but still relatively little “in bulk” teaching. </p>
<p>At MIT, 4.3% of classes have 100+ students, and another 8.6% have 50-99 students. Now we’re starting to get into some significant “in bulk” education—enough so that, large classes being large, meaning a lot of students take them, we’re probably into territory where students on average are spending as much or more time in large classes as in small ones (<20 students)—something that is definitely not the case at my D1’s LAC, and also not at Yale.</p>
<p>Then you come to a school like UC San Diego where, according to their Common Data Set, an astonishing 22.1% of all classes have 100+ students. That’s almost an order of magnitude more than Yale, and almost two orders of magnitude more than my D1’s LAC. That’s “in bulk” teaching carried to extremes.</p>
<p>It is not the same everywhere. There are huge differences from one institution to the next. And it’s not a public v. private thing, either. Some very fancy private universities have shockingly high percentages of large classes, and some public universities are much better on this score than others. But the excuse that “everybody does it” is just demonstrably false.</p>
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<p>It hasn’t happened for several reasons. LACs haven’t increased their size because they are perfectly happy being LACs and fulfilling their role of providing top-quality undergraduate educations to limited numbers of students. This may come as a huge shock to some people but not everyone wants to teach/administer/study at a big university, and not every well-trained PhD wants to spend the bulk of his or her professional life doing research and training graduate students. There are, believe it or not, a lot of very smart and well-educated people who actually like teaching undergraduates. If all you’ve experienced is a big university, I’m sure you will disagree, because it’s highly unlikely you encountered many there.</p>
<p>Big Us haven’t transitioned to the LAC model because (a) they can continue to attract lots of students under the delusion that they provide good undergraduate educations, and (b) because they frankly could care less about the quality of the education they provide.</p>
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<p>Wholeheartedly agree that legislation by proposition is a terrible idea!</p>
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<p>I often agree with you, ucbalumnus, but this makes no sense. In the first place, if a LAC were to scale up in size, it would no longer be a LAC, and it would defeat its own educational model. It’s a bit like saying, “Well, if Harvard were demonstrably superior, it would grow so large that it would dwarf the competition.” No, if it grew so large it would dilute the quality of the brand, the quality of the product would suffer, and it would no longer be Harvard as we know it.</p>
<p>Second, the logic of your argument seems to be that the bigger a school is, the better it must be; after all, rationally self-interested consumers are choosing it. OK, by that logic, the best colleges in the U.S. are 1) CUNY (all campuses), 2) SUNY (all campuses), 3) University of Phoenix (virtual), 4) Cal State (all campuses), 5) Community College of the Air Force (multiple locations), 6) Maricopa County Community College, 7) Ivy Tech Community College, 8) Miami Dade College, 9) City College of San Francisco, 10) Penn State (all campuses). Or, limiting it just to largest campuses, 1) Arizona State, 2) U Central Florida, 3) Ohio State, 4) Minnesota, 5) U Texas-Austin, 6) Texas A&M, 7) U Florida, 8) Michigan State, 9) Penn State, 10) Indiana. What’s wrong with this picture?</p>
<p>Finally, your “rational choice” model naively ignores the fact that there are huge information costs in the market for higher education, and that very few consumers in that market have anything close to full information. It could easily be the case that the best values and the best product quality are hidden gems that are overlooked by most consumers in favor of more recognizable and glitzy brands.</p>
<p>All qualified students are guaranteed to be admitted to a UC. It just may not be the UC of their choice. All those in the top 9% will be placed in a UC…they may be placed in UC Merced if they don’t get into the school they choose. (Top 9% is new this year, it was top 4%.) Many students specifically applied to some UC’s with a larger acceptance percentage just in case…at D’s high school it was UC Davis.</p>
<p>The UC GPA–sophmore and junior grades only, maximum of extra points for UC approved honors/AP/IB courses does impact admissions results. Some students don’t realize that all honors courses do not qualify for the grade bump. Others maximize the challenge level and the UC GPA suffers.</p>
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<p>Why would it? If a 2,000 student LAC made itself five times larger, with five times as many students and five times as many faculty, but kept the same model where tenured and tenure track faculty teach all levels of undergraduate courses in small classrooms, how would that defeat the educational model?</p>
<p>Would it necessarily defeat the educational model if the five Claremont colleges merged into one, or if Swarthmore, Haverford, and Bryn Mawr merged into one?</p>
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<p>No, that is not the claim at all. The claim is that if the LAC model is so unquestionably superior that more students wish to attend a LAC model school, surely there would be more, and larger, LAC model schools to fulfill a market demand.</p>
<p>On CC costs - in my area, they are $160 - $200/credit hour in-state and New England regional. They are $350 - $400 if you are attending from outside the region.</p>
<p>What would be useful is that a credit hour costs at California CCs vs what they charge. I’d guess that there is a very wide gulf there. I have one nephew taking CC courses in California so I guess I could ask my sister as to how things are going there.</p>
<p>[CaliforniaColleges.edu</a> - How Much Does College Cost?](<a href=“http://www.californiacolleges.edu/finance/how-much-does-college-cost.asp]CaliforniaColleges.edu”>http://www.californiacolleges.edu/finance/how-much-does-college-cost.asp)</p>
<p>According to that chart, they appear to be about 70 per credit (in state) This was for last year. This is appreciably less than what they cost in my state, which is 173 per credit in state.</p>
<p>ETA – corrected, thanks to Bay, it is about 36, the numbers in the link are per year, not semester. Cant beleive it is so low.</p>
<p>^I think you miscalculated - Cal. cc fees are closer to $36 per unit.</p>
<p>That page states that OOS students pay $180 more per unit than in-state so actual course costs are $210/credit unless there is also a subsidy for OOS students. $30/credit hour would be considered a bargain for CC in New England.</p>
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<p>Bingo!</p>
<p>And of course, that ignores the question of whether that 3.0 student really needs to attend a major research university. The Cal States and jucos are much more cost effective method for tax payers to educate its B students. Realistically, how many of those 3.0 students will ever participate in research? Ever even wander into office hours, much less a lab to volunteer?</p>
<p>btw: in addition to math an english remediation, most UC campuses also offer Into to Sciences/Chem, which is the rough equivalent of advanced high school version of Chem, below AP level. Are these students really research-bound? Can they really take advantage of a research University?</p>