Humboldt State also has surfing nearby, and a major in Recreation Administration as well as several majors in the Marine Sciences department - the Oceanography major is more interdisciplinary than Marine Bio and might appeal.
As others have mentioned, the WUE rate at UH Manoa can make it relatively affordable. A majority of students take more than 4 years to graduate, though, so one must budget for that or have a firm up-front agreement with the student that the 5-or-more-year-plan will not be funded.
There are some possibilities in the Carolinas. UNC Wilmington is a great surf school; it has an Honors College that might be within reach, and merit $ associated with Honors that could bring the ~40K OOS cost down to be competitive with CA in-state costs. College of Charleston offers a nice combination of coastal/surfing opportunities and a small, historic city; CoC also has an Honors College, plus its school of business offers some very engaging entrepreneurial programs as well as a major, minor, or concentration in hospitality & tourism management. A merit-based OOS tuition waiver could make it pretty affordable.
Overall it sounds as if both you and your son will be happier if he’s not pushing the envelope on either cost or competitiveness; that way he can achieve the work/life balance he’s looking for, at a cost that won’t cause undue friction about getting your money’s worth, or prohibit stretching the timeline.
Lol. In addn to SB City College or Santa Monica, I’d throw in Orange Coast College. OP mentions he wants to go to college, but not that he wants the serious work of college. Why not wo years to have fun in a less competitive academic environment, do well, then with some goals, transfer to a better place?
Decades ago, my brother’s only requirement was “near an ocean.” That basically meant CA or FL. He went to Chapman, caught fire. But his intention was to study and have his fun on the side. Not have a few classes on the side. And Chapman was a college then, not a uni, not today’s competition for an admit.
Plus, we don’t have stats/major for OP’s son. Just naming schools a few miles from the ocean doesn’t seem enough.
UH is not that selective (WUE schools typically are not because they have capacity that would otherwise go unused if they cannot attract WUE students), so low or slow graduation rates are not surprising.
But given the student’s low interest in school now, it is likely that the student has a high risk of needing more than eight semesters to finish if he starts college now. So the parent must consider the financial limits with a realistic view in the unlikelihood of eight semester graduation if the student starts college now.
What’s strange about this thread is OP’s post #5 seemingly appeared out of nowhere when some of us were recommending community college, queued subsequent to that post. If he wants to go to a four-year like his friends, then perhaps he should just go to a CSU, perhaps LB, as this seemed amenable. Hopefully in his breath courses, he’ll find his calling – he should go in undeclared and cast a wide net; hopefully the light will go on.
Community college is still college, so an unmotivated student may build up a college academic record that will make transferring to a four year school difficult (and may need more than two years to reach transfer readiness).
Also, with students at SBCC, SMC, OCC aiming to transfer to colleges like UCSB, UCLA, UCI, the academic atmosphere may not be so laid back.
@ucbalumnus . . . hopefully the OP won’t mind, but what happened to Berkeley City College? Why is it so “bad”? I know Cal gets a lot of students from Diablo Valley and De Anza College across the bay, but I would have thought BCC would have fed more students to Cal.
BCC is relatively small, at about 6k students (the other community colleges in the same district are about 6k or 10k students each). DVC has about 20k students, SMC has about 30k students, and De Anza has about 23k students.