My Son was accepted back in November to both CU and CSU’s School of Engineering. He had his sights on CU for a long, long time so we figured it was a done deal…However, after several visits & tours at both CSU and CU and in talking with current and former students, and Professors at both institutions, CSU is his final choice and he has committed 
!!! What we discovered at CU is that they have a very large percentage of out of state students (~55%) primarily from California who’s parents pony up $50K a year for their kids to go to CU sending them with their own BMWs and an unlimited credit cards. Many of these kids want to attend CU for the wrong reasons. It seems that their interests are more focused on partying, skiing, excessive social life, and the abundant and legal marijuana, all of which are not conducive to a successful academic experience. While there is no doubt that CU is a beautiful campus and location and, it unfortunately for CU, ends there. What we learned from several successful students at CU is that many of the out of state students are extremely superficial and spoiled by their parents which creates social status divisions and they bring an air of arrogance which is highly annoying to students from more modest and humble upbringings.
Wow @ChazRink . I take great exception to that stereotype. My D, who is from CA, goes to CU Boulder. She is a sophomore. She does not have a car. We might get her a used Subaru over the summer so she can drive back to Boulder. She works every summer for her play money - no credit cards from us. She doesn’t ski, but is thinking of trying it one of these days. She has great grades in her great program, doesn’t party much at all, and has made a lot of great friends - who also are not superficial.
She went to CU Boulder because the schools in CA are difficult go get into unless you have a 4.0, and severely impacted. She was told at a couple of the CA schools she visited that it would take 6 years to get through because she would not be able to get the courses she wanted. That’s one huge reason why a lot of CA kids go out of state. Are there spoiled kid from CA? You bet. CU Boulder is a big school with ALL types of people. Please don’t scare others away - they need to find out for themselves.
Yes @3mamagirls, duly noted !!! - I should have stated “many” students, but not all of them from CA, IL, NY and TX exhibit these types of behaviors or come from spoiled backgrounds. I’ve seen it myself from being on campus many times. Several students have made the same comments that we have met on and off campus.
Actually it’s more like a few students, which you will find at a lot of schools.
ChazRink, many people will be taking exception to your views on CU Boulder. They don’t earn their
Engineering ranking at CU as #30 for all Engineering, compared to CSU at 67, per US News and World
report.
CU is a highly ranked Engineering and Science Research University, with its exceptional ranked Aerospace
Engineering Science Dept. Offering high achieving students opportunities in Internships and Projects before
their sophomore year. This alone is a big draw for incoming students, many who chose CU over the Ivy
Colleges.
Boulder is the number #1 college town in the U.S. with an affluent populous, well educated, ranked #1 for
Physical Fitness in the U.S. The mountains are World Class, all this will draw all types of students. Those
that come to party will fall by the wayside, in short order. If you checked the stats for College of A & S, this
would have been apparent by the retention rate, as there are more than 70% of students within this CU
college.
You will pay at lot less in Cost of Attending with CSU. That is the better comparison.
@Annofthehill You seemed to have gone off on an emotional tangent…I never said CU wasn’t a quality university. My comments were about some of the student body. Their demographics, social class, personalities, seriousness about their education, etc…all matter when you are considering a particular university. It’s no surprise to anyone with intimate knowledge about CU and their typical students from CA and TX. Many (not all) of them are spoiled rich kids who come from money and parents that give them whatever they want (fancy foreign cars & clothing, no limit credit cards, etc…). CU is not an extension of the social status obsessed or keeping up with the Jones’ lifestyles commonly found in CA or TX. Colorado’s history is filled with hard working people who came from modest and humble beginnings. CU should embrace that and form their student bodies with those values verses having so much emphasis OOS acceptance rates to bring in the increased revenues with OOS tuition rates. The 55% OOS student body is really imbalanced and is further proof that CU is mostly concerned with raking in the money verses serving the Colorado Tax Payers who foot a significant part of CU’s operating budget and construction costs.
ChazRink I have no idea where you are getting your stats from, but these are the figures from
Sept. 2017, which are the latest available:
Largest % of Out of State Students enrolled
CA. 12.6%
IL. 3.9%
TX. 3.4%
Instate Students enrolled
51.5% - mainly middle class status.
Which makes 55% of any mix of out of state students - impossible!
According to CU only 5% of students have cars. Most students have bikes or take the free buses.
CU Boulder, only gets monies from State taxpayers for New Buildings or upgrading current Buildings.
Which usually takes 5 or more years for approval. That is why the tuition is so high!
I think you have been a victim of rumors and the disgruntled.
Ann of the Hill, No rumors or incorrect info from the disgruntled here, $73,000,000 Colorado Taxpayer dollars (https://www.colorado.edu/bfp/funding-overview/how-cu-boulder-funded) are in the Budget for CU Boulder for FY2018 where only half of the students accepted are actually from Colorado. Seems hardly unfair in comparison to The University of California system which caps it’s OOS acceptance rate at 20%. Further, OSS tuition revenue for CU is $439,000,000 verses only $220,500,000 from ISS students. So, you can see that CU is primarily interested in OOS acceptance rates to increase the revenue to the university. CU also has (un-advertised) lower acceptance requirements for OOS students in comparison to ISS which is quite alarming but it given further proof it’s all about the Money…
Watch out @ChazRink, my CA son might be headed to CSU Engineering next year too. No BMW in tow, though.
SC Anteater, no issues with that. I have many CA friends who feel the same way I do about “Some” of CU Boulder’s student body. They call CU Boulder “The Mountain Campus of UC Berkeley”. CSU is a great university and it’s location, Ft. Collins, is a beautiful small Colorado town and it won’t be anything less even with a few more Californian’s in attendance there It has a great family atmosphere and the kids all seem genuinely happy, where social class, material items, etc… are of little importance.
Chaz Rink, thank you…just as I said, 72.9 million Direct State Paid, of a 1.69 Billion dollar annual budget,
which is for New Aerospace Building and other repairs and improvements to current bldgs.
ChazRink, yes it is the OOS students that pay for the Colorado Students…no doubt about it!
If you look at "Types of People that attend CU " from last July, on this page. You will see that that most
of the things you object to about CU, were in print back then.
Ann of the Hill, you still didn’t answer to my other points…Why does the University of California system cap it’s OOS student percentage at 20% while CU Boulder’s OOS student percentage is near 50% ?? Seems unfair to the State of Colorado Taxpayers and their kids who for generations have paid for CU Boulder to be initially constructed, expanded and maintained. The return on investment belongs to the citizens and taxpayers of Colorado who’s kids should be given a priority over OOS Calif. and TX applicants who “in part” send their spoiled, materialistic, daddy’s credit card swiping brats to CU as if it were a boarding school for troubled kids.
ChazRink, yes I did…just above.
OOS Students pay for Colorado Students to attend CU Boulder. So literally the Colorado Taxpayers are
making out! They paid less than 9% towards the cost of a new Aerospace Building, which broke ground
in Oct this year. It will allow for a great number of students, who want to study Aerospace in a State which
is 2nd in that industry with more than 400 companies.
Each state makes their own rules about education. Obviously the state of California passed legislation regarding the % of OOS that would be admitted to their state universities. Other states have enacted similar legislation. If the residents of Colorado have a problem with how many OOS attend their universities then they need to lobby their state legislature to put a cap like other states have.
Universities are courting OOS students because their state legislatures have cut their funding substantially over the past 15 years. They want to maintain lower tuition rates for resident students, so they admit OOS that are full pay to cover the deficit in funding. There are wealthy students at every state school. Our state flagship has students from CA, NY, IL, TX, and international students. All these full pay students mean that our in state students pay less. The university has pledged to have a minimum number of in state students admitted to each incoming class, they are admitting more in state students than ever before. But they are also admitting more OOS than ever before.
If you’re going to post something provocative you have to expect push back from people on the forum, kind of what happens around here.
ChazRink…as far as babysitting spoiled students goes…I’d say, CU Boulder is making out big time!
It does irritate a number of students, watching those who have inexhaustible funds, but not to the point
of giving up their education or causing fights or shootings, for the majority. It is a lot more fun to watch
them self implode. And possibly they get a jump on a number of students without the advantage watching
and learning to live with people they are bound to run into later in life. It really isn’t that big of a deal to
Coloradoans. They have something far bigger…the Mountains!
As for a Mountain Berkeley…yes I think CU Boulder would love to be the Berkeley of the Mountains,
minus the radicals.
So do you think $73M comes even close to cover the discount ISS get from CU? Nope, and this problem will only exacerbate as time goes on. This is a real problem for all public universities, it just shows why the very top schools are all private and private schools will continue to become better while public schools will struggle with balancing there budgets.
Public schools struggle because the tax dollars that used to support them are going to give breaks to attract companies, and to wealthy donors that want to pay less income tax. Private schools charge high tuition to everyone, and they have wealthy alumni that donate large sums of money to their endowments. Families that can’t afford to send their children to their state flagship because of rising tuition sure can’t afford private tuition either.
States used to proved 50% or more of the operating budgets of their universities, it’s now more like 25%, if that.
And that’s the problem, on the open market a CU education is worth around $52K (total cost), for in state students its subsidized down to $30K (not really of course, more like $42K from taxpayer dollars, leaving a 12K deficit), money has to come from somewhere, it doesn’t grow on trees. This also limits FA & merit scholarships. Don’t see much of either of these from state universities. Top privates don’t have these issues and will continue to attract the very top students.
CU123, you’ll be happy to know that the MIT deferred and not accepted - Love CU Boulder. They can get
hands on experiments from day one and are not in a pool of bright students all struggling to get on a team
doing experiments.