An out of state students on a merit scholarship is not paying oos rates. As far as attracting highly qualified students, that’s a two way street. The highly qualified California student who goes to Alabama on a full ride may never come back. Why not keep them vs attracting an OOS student?
An undocumented kid attending a California high school.has parents who, at a minimum,.are paying sales tax and property tax either via rent or home ownership. Most also pay income tax and social security as well.
@Totoros: “So maybe “lesser” UCs should offer some incentives for OOS, so it draws those kids away from the more prestige ones.”
Californians evidently do not want scholarships going to OOS kids either.
@knowledgegood: “Why the desirability of UC vs SUNY?”
Prestige is a big part of it. If Cornell, UW-Madison, and UIUC (not with great weather) were SUNY schools, people would be complaining about how they can’t get in to the top SUNYs in NYS as well.
@knowledgegood: “California in particular has a huge issue with desirable people leaving the state, due to excessive taxation.”
You’d think that if you read CC and certain other sites, but despite the taxes, CA is a magnet that draws a lot of the best from elsewhere. Silicon Valley was built up almost entirely by non-CA-natives, and if you list 10 of the top tech companies in CA, I’d bet you’d find that the vast majority of the heads of those companies are non-CA-natives.
DACA kids families do pay taxes. A total of 1.3 million young undocumented immigrants who are enrolled or eligible for DACA contribute $2 billion a year in taxes, state and local, according to the Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy. This includes personal income, property, and sales taxes. As a Californian who’s child will be in the competitive mix next year, I support these kids who by no fault of their own are here and working hard to be productive members of our community. I won’t use them as scapegoats for why my daughters college dreams.
A few thoughts as an OOS parent: with small exceptions like a few very specialized programs, and two big potential exceptions for the prestige of Cal and UCLA, the UC system does not make sense for most OOS students, and I think that’s as it should be. Why pay OOS tuition for a UC education when I can pay similar for a private college experience? If my kids were CA-or-bust (which I think is an unwise, myopic perspective to begin with), they’d be looking at USC and SCU, not UCI/UCD/UCSB, etc., and probably not even UCLA/UCB.
If there is a desire to boost the prestige of UCR and Merced, it sounds like there are enough in-state top students that could be offered more merit, if the system could afford to offer more.
I wouldn’t worry about a brain drain. Plenty of OOS students will give CA a shot after college graduation, long before they’re making enough money for taxes to scare them off. There’s a reason cost of living is so high; that demand doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.
" UCSC had been the lowest on the list for us"
Another great “low tier” UC School that has that amazing location “by the beach”, however still gets snubbed by some chasing that “overrated prestige” and/or for whatever other reason? Maybe since it doesn’t have the flagship glam and glitz of Berkeley or UCLA? Not sure about OOS Financial Aid, but some of the non-flagship UC’s definitely give much more aid to in-state students as a draw to their school.
Albany and Binghamton and buffalo over LA, Berkeley and SD?
Perhaps NY lacks that big rah rah flagship appeal. UCLA has the Bruins and UCB has the Golden Bears and Binghamton has the ?
Albany, Binghampton, and Buffalo sound similar to Merced, Riverside, and Santa Cruz in the UC System. Part of a great SUNY System where you will receive an amazing education perhaps lacking that big “rah rah” flagship appeal as well as the cold weather? Top quality students at those locations that make it work most definitely. Not as familiar with New York being from California. I’m sure other New Yorkers know more details here.
@Fisherman99 There is little to zero financial aid for OOS students, as it should be. Nice weather is not a wise reason for paying substantially more.
“If there is a desire to boost the prestige of UCR and Merced, it sounds like there are enough in-state top students that could be offered more merit, if the system could afford to offer more.”
Prestige is being boosted at the above locations…more merit draws many in-state top students in. However, the UC’s are still too expensive for many even with the merit they receive. With the budget crisis the way it is, the system cannot afford to offer more…would be nice though!
“:@Fisherman99 There is little to zero financial aid for OOS students, as it should be. Nice weather is not a wise reason for paying substantially more.”
Agreed @evergreen5
Sadly, I am sure that many parents stayed in CA - despite the highest taxes in the nation and myriad other problems - solely for the benefit of utilizing the UC system.
It must hurt very badly to see their own kids denied after paying all those taxes. And, putting up with all the other CA problems. After all that, the UCs chose to favor OOS applicants to close their budget gaps. At least that is what many articles claim.
California’s taxes aren’t the highest in the nation. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/taxes/2018/02/20/states-where-americans-pay-least-and-most-taxes/350963002/
Top three? No, though one might quibble based on how they’re measured. Top five? Yeah, top five.
It could be a lot worse. I’d rather have the California system and outcomes than the Illinois alternative: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-illinois-students-brain-drain-20180405-story,amp.html
It’s stunning to me that 46% of Illinois HS graduates seeking a 4 year degree are going out of state
@knowledgegood:
“solely for the benefit of utilizing the UC system.”
They can. Meet the top 9% criteria and they are guaranteed a UC.
“After all that, the UCs chose to favor OOS applicants to close their budget gaps. At least that is what many articles claim.”
Not really. The difference between OOS and CA residents is often minimal. I do find that many Californians often overblow the differences.
Here are stats for Cal:
https://admissions.berkeley.edu/student-profile
Domestic OOS have a slightly better admit rate than CA residents (Internationals have a far worse admit rate). But both domestic OOS and Internationals have significantly higher standardized test scores than CA residents (among both applicants and admits). GPA is about the same.
I stay in California because it is my home. 2 of my kids’ 4 grandparents were born here and all 4 spent their adult lives here. I don’t know what all these awful problems are I am supposed to be fleeing.
@knowledgegood:
And here are numbers for UCLA:
http://www.admission.ucla.edu/Prospect/Adm_fr/Frosh_Prof17.htm
Higher admit rate for domestic OOS but higher stats across the board for domestic OOS as well.
And then there are those of us, who went to high school and college in California but moved away – reluctantly! – for jobs (academics: you go wherever it is you’re hired) who are actively planning to move back.
Because we love California’s energy, its multicultural richness (always struck, not in a good way, how overwhelmingly white the central part of the US is) its geographic diversity, and yes, its mild winters & mostly leftie bend.
You know that Joni Mitchell song, California? (“I’m coming home.”) It goes through my head a lot. 
^ BTW, that UCLA admit breakdown is interesting.
If you have an weighted GPA of below 4.33 and unweighted GPA of below 3.9, your chances of getting in are really really low.
Above that point and UCLA is a match.
So it seems that the UC’s are still easier to chance than the elite privates (f you know GPA and major).
But it seems that the problem is that many Californians are not aware of the current thresholds. They think that top 10% (but not top 5%), 3.8 unweighted GPA is enough to get in to a top UC in a competitive major when that doesn’t seem true at all.
@Twoin18:
Th reasons for that:
- IL is a big state (not CA/TX/FL/NYS, but roughly the same size as OH, MI, PA, and now GA and NC) but only has one major flagship that is big but not gigantic like OSU or PSU. MI, PA, GA, and NC both have two major research U’s that are also P5 schools (in sports). In OH, OSU is much bigger and there are also a bunch of other OH publics that have their strengths in various areas.
- UIUC is among the most expensive publics (though so are UMich and PSU among comparable states).
- Chicagoland is close to several other states and schools in all those states draw from Chicagoland. In fact, the big flagships in surrounding states like IN and IA almost need a steady influx of IL students to make their budgets work. Not surprisingly, they price (and give merit scholarships) in order to draw in IL students. PU engineering is also in the same league as UIUC engineering and IU Kelley is about the same or better than U of I’s b-school. ISU and Iowa price themselves to be competitive with UIUC in-state rates and may offer places to kids shut out of UIUC engineering.
- Building on #1, there isn’t a range of schools or “directionals” that are terrific in one way or another like OH and VA have plenty of (other than UIC in health fields). There’s a big gap in the spectrum between UIUC and UIC/ISU/NIU/SIU/EIU/WIU that the IA & IN schools, MSU, UMTC, and Mizzou fill.
In a way, it’s kind of how many NJ kids also want to leave NJ for college.
Correct. The thresholds are very high, and there is much ignorance about this as I write this. My 3.6-3.7 UW was accepted (and he was “challenged,” too) only to M and R, waitlisted at Irvine.
A friend’s daughter, top 10% at competitive suburban school and statewide path, with great scores, gpa, and extracurriculars, got into UCSD, UCSB but was waitlisted at UCD, all for Computer Science. I think that’s an example of the randomness factor. How can a student get in for the same major at highly rated UCSD (she also was admitted to her first choice residential college) and be waitlisted at UCD?
It is entirely true that most families don’t seem to be accurately informed of their students’ chances. The playing field changes every admissions cycle. Families cannot keep up with the increasing selectivity of the UCs, especially in the highly sought majors like CS, engineering, Bio, etc. Families may have access to Naviance, but the data you find there is not refined enough with the constantly changing scenario to really be of much use.
Also, there is definitely an element of snobbery among certain families for whom the lower UCs are just not good enough, when in fact, that is where their student would match academically compared with the rest of the applicants.