Santa Clara University probably should be included as well. It’s smack in the middle of the Silicon Valley and has a very fine business school.
Merit aid is not based on your parents’income but generally on your gpa+test scores in relation to the top 10% at a specific college.
Your stats qualify you for all sorts of merit aid at Miami Ohio, UAlabama, etc, and probably at Indiana Kelley, Fordham, or Baruch.
Hot weather and finance don’t mix because most financial strongholds or traditional Founding firms are in the North (NYC, Chicago, even Philly and Boston) although you do find some Financial firms or headquarters in most major cities, such as in Texas for instance.
Check out Tulane. Warm weather, business school, reminds me a bit of U Miami which you like, lots of fun, location is amazing and they give merit aid which you would have a shot at with your scores. Their admissions can be really weird though, they sometimes defer high stats kids hoping they will switch to ED so you can never consider it a match no matter what your stats are which is frustrating.
If you like them you need to really show them you like them - they are huge on demonstrated interest. Sign up for the mailing list now, go to online webinars, visit if you can, spend lots of time on the website, etc. They have an “optional” Why Tulane essay - don’t only do it but make it incredibly specific (in person visit really helps with this.)
Also, I would be in the group that says do not mention the plagiarizing anywhere on your application. Good luck!!
Then the good private universities in CA would have lot higher yield than they do, if they offered all this and better learning outcomes. Chapman, Occidental have like 20% yield compared to UCLA and UCB with 45-ish. That’s a big difference, only partially explained by cost. Because Stanford’s yield is 80% so these families are selecting Stanford over the UCs, and UCB/UCLA over the private CA colleges. Even USC yield is low 40s. Pomona is at 54% but they have ED, so that artificially inflates their yield.
Unless you have evidence, I know pesky word, that the learning outcomes and experiences are better at these private colleges, families will select the UCs over those private colleges, even with their financial aid.
“Plagiarism is a serious act of academic dishonesty, and I strongly support expulsion of college students, firing of professors, and firing of journalists who engage in it.”
Plagiarism in a college or high school setting like this is not illegal, it would be difficult to expel immediately on that. In college, first there’ll be hearings in front of a disciplinary board where you can explain the situation, in some you could even have an advocate. There’s still due process even in private colleges. I know a few professors at local (bay area) colleges, they would not use this to expel, especially if it’s a freshman class, but more to teach about it, so typically they could assign an F or have them redo it with a reworded paragraph or citation.
Yeah, I expressed my thoughts on plagiarism too harshly. My point is just that it’s a serious matter. I would forgive it in a 9th grader. A mistake at that age shouldn’t be an albatross. Beyond that, I expect more serious consequences.
You did not assert otherwise, but a large university is not necessarily a disadvantage this way, and it depends on the student. I went to a huge state university in the 80s where many courses were taught as large lectures, tests were multiple choice even for things like calculus and physics, and grading, section instruction, and office hours was the job of overworked TAs.
That didn’t make it a worse education for me. I liked the independence and hands-off approach. I very rarely went to any office hours. I agree it would be strange to pay an out of state premium for such an education, but in the case of UC it may look better on a resume (if someone is thinking ahead) than their in-state option. Regardless, some people will prefer the large university experience. I know I did. Though I have no direct comparison, it was a breath of fresh air coming from a prep high school.
There are some students that prefer a larger classes where they can be anonymous, surprising as that sounds.
1 Like
I think there’s less rigor inherent in testing calculus or physics as multiple choice, and I got good at taking shortcuts, especially with introductory electricity and magnetism, where a dimensional analysis was often enough to rule out answers. Also, I probably would not have had much of a shot at grad school except for smaller CS courses later on in which I could be noticed by the professor who was able to write a recommendation for me.
So there’s a tradeoff, but I agree with you that some students (like me) would rather just take the class in as impersonal a way possible.
You can look up the NSE Survey results.
But evidence comes from the fact many parents choose to pay for private universities over public ones when they feel they bring something additional worth the extra cost -otherwise with so many strong public universities in the country and especially in California most would have closed by now, and the Claremonts, Oxy, Santa Clara, Chapman, LMU… are still going strong.
(Yield isn’t a valid evaluation of student experience. It reflects value or prestigiosity, desirability if you will --I know there’s a whole discussion about it on another thread. If you’re really interested in yield, you can try and find yield from OOS for various UCs and private universities in California. It still won’t provide useful data about learning experience.)
Typically college students are happy with their experience regardless of university because"bloom where you’re planted" is strong and most are adaptable and find what they need where they are (or transfer), although I would disagree that allowing students to be anonymous and evaluating them almost entirely through multiple choice constitutes a great learning experience.
For students who want a large public environment out of state there are better choices at the undergraduate level than UCs OOS (although California thanks all kids who pay 65k to attend 
). Some top publics meet need (UMich till 95k income, UNC and UVa overall), others offer significant merit, you have sizes from 15,000 to 50,000, there’s really no dearth of choice that doesn’t cost 65k, and if what you want isn’t so much large public university but top research, prestige, topnotch professors, high-performing classmates… you have a lot more choices than UCs.
UCs make total sense for Californians who want large universities.
Note that everyone supported OP for UCs till it came out he isn’t from CA and doesn’t have 65k.
OP will need to have a merit based strategy to their choices. Budget issues are much more likely to be a problem to his college admissions and subsequent attendance than a mistake from 9th grade, so I hope this minor sub-topic is put to rest so we can all focus on helping OP find affordable universities that are a good fit, be they large or small.
1 Like
There’s some contradiction in this post, you mention the evidence that private colleges in CA are better than public ones is because many parents choose to pay for them given what they offer - additional resources, smaller classes, prestige etc… Then the yield would be higher, since these families are choosing the private colleges because they desire or value them over the public colleges. Choosing a college and desiring a college are related when selecting a college, not separate as you seem to think.
But that’s not case, in fact the OOS yield for UCB and UCLA are in the low-mid 20s, higher than overall yield of non-Claremont colleges.
“although California thanks all kids who pay 65k to attend ).”
You keep bringing this up like CA is broke or something. CA, at last check, had a surplus of $70B, even after the effects of covid. The UC/CSU/community colleges are on a much better standing than some of the smaller private colleges you mention.
1 Like
It’s off topic - but I listen all day long to people who tell me California is bankrupt, everyone is leaving, yet the state has a huge surplus, is rated AA- (very high) and houses in the bay area (where everyone is supposedly leaving) sell for like $400K over list. People are so off base it’s funny.
I probably missed the basis of this argument - but both private and public colleges excel in CA.
1 Like
Off topic, but a lot of people in other states want California to fail.
I have only been here since the late 90s, but I have seen it again and again. In 2000-2001, the state endured an electric power crisis that was entirely due to market manipulation by energy companies (though enabled by a really ill-conceived deregulation plan signed into law by former governor Pete Wilson). Much of the country was quite certain that California was doomed, that our tech industry was using all the power and that we had foolishly not built enough coal-burning plants (no, I swear; people said this!). There was evidence for market manipulation the whole time, but only after the collapse of Enron was national media finally willing to acknowledge it. Critics also missed that California ranks among the top national economies in the world and has agriculture and manufacturing, not just tech and entertainment.
I only mention that example, because it was when it really clicked that this is what people outside California think. They get a lot of other things wrong, like missing the distance both geographical and cultural between SF and LA. I don’t say this as a Northern California snob. I like Southern California, but it’s a very different place. I love my adopted state in all its diversity. It’s an amazing place: a land of natural wonders and an economic juggernaut.
Do we have problems? You bet! The price of a house in the Bay Area is out of reach for anyone with a normal job, and the rest of the state is also expensive by national standards. But there is no mass exodus. In fact, it is still a magnet for the most ambitious and skilled people in the US and the world.
On a more specific note, I have lost count of the number of “Death of Silicon Valley” stories I’ve read since I came here. A new one every five years at least.
Sorry folks. There’s a lot to criticize about California as with many states, but we are not about to collapse any time soon.
Here’s what I would criticize about California - the state I went to for middle and HS and lived 8 years after grad school -
go to ANY college - whether Chico State. coming out making $45K or UCLA coming out at $65K…
how does any young person survive in the state? Cost wise it’s impossible. My company left in 2006 - we had two six figure incomes…but a young person starting out today is sort of screwed. Sure, the schools are great - but as a young person, I’d be looking for an out of state opportunity.
There’s a ton of $$ in the state…no question…people say taxes are high but property tax is reasonable. It’s just the overall cost…is crazy. But it’s gorgeous, and even if you have to commute two hours, people want in!!! It is a magical place.
1 Like
Yes, that’s a serious problem. And I doubt my own kids can live anywhere near where they grew up. But it’s not the story people tell elsewhere that “everyone” is leaving California. In fact, the people who leave often do so because they can’t afford to stay, which only makes sense if there are successful people who aren’t moving anywhere. There is no fire sale in progress. The Bay Area is not emptying out.
Let’s move off the OT California is Bankrupt discussion, and any discussion unrelated to the OP, please. This is not the cafe.
3 Likes
Sure you can! It usually takes a lot more than that for it to show up on a transcript. Just apply and don’t give it a second thought. I think we’ve all done our fair share of dumb when we were teenagers. I’ve done many things as a teenager we won’t discuss in this forum or…ever. It could always be worse 
1 Like