If you could change one thing about UNC it would be....

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
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<p>“But regardless, even if you do use SAT scores as a judge of talent, UNC is decidedly not having trouble retaining talent from North Carolina.”</p>

<p>I beg to differ. My evidence may be anecdotal, but it is extensive. And it is more recent than 2009.</p>

<p>BTW, if setting policies to retain in-state talent is so pointless, then why are so many other states doing it?</p>

<p>I just learned about another example: Georgia. The state awards free tuition (for Georgia’s public universities) to any in-state kid who graduates from high school with a B average of higher.</p>

<p>Again: objective criteria. I don’t care which objective criteria you use – GPA, SAT I, SAT II, NMF status, or some combo thereof – as long as the criteria are reasonably objective. Without objective criteria, the potential for abuse, corruption, and favoritism are simply too high. </p>

<p>We’ve lived in NC for 21 years, and we love it here, but our recent brush with the state’s higher education system is definitely leaving a sour taste in our mouths. What on earth was that stupid Education Lottery for? And what has it actually done lately for NC’s high achievers? (Or, indeed, for NC education in general.)</p>

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<p>^ Have you thought that maybe your child isn’t high achieving enough?</p>

<p>I’m sure that if he/she was winning MacArthur genius awards or whatever, they’d have no trouble getting funded, in NC or out of it.</p>

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<p>I’m not sure I understand what you are saying here. Are you saying that because UNC-Chapel Hill did not offer your child a merit scholarship they are, because of that mere fact alone, having trouble retaining talent from North Carolina?</p>

<p>You seem to love objective criteria, so I’m confused as to why you are rejecting the objective data I have provided on UNC-Chapel Hill’s ability to retain high-scoring North Carolina students.</p>

<p>Here’s what I said:

</p>

<p>I cannot find a single other university that enrolls a higher percentage of top-scoring students from a single state. Not Georgia, not Berkeley, not Michigan, not Alabama, not Yale.</p>

<p>There are a lot of things that I would change about UNC - including about financial aid. But to claim that Chapel Hill needs to do a better job of retaining talent from within North Carolina compared to how other universities in other states have been performing has little if any basis in objective or subjective data.</p>

<p>Where I think we might find common ground is that it is unfortunate that a college education remains out of reach for too many families.</p>

<p>I am truly sorry that UNC does not appear to be within financial reach for your family. I wish it were. I wish that need-based aid resources were even greater so that it were within reach of even more people, including middle-income families.</p>

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<p>Lady Di is simply contending that her child should receive merit aid based on NMF status, which is ABSURD. There are a few students at my school who are NMFs/were NMSFs and are NOT hard workers; they’re bright, yes, but their grades definitely don’t match up to their high score.</p>

<p>The problem with basing a student’s proficiency on ONE test is as follows: some students are better test takers than other students. Is this fair? Absolutely not. I believe one’s GPA and Extra-Curriculars are what will carry one throughout life, which is the policy Wake Forest adopted and other schools are contemplating.</p>

<p>In college, after your sophomore year, in most classes, grades are determined through presentations, projects, etc. The days of multiple-choice/scantron tests will be a thing of the past; therefore, the use of “test-taking skills” is essentially useless. </p>

<p>I just thing Lady Di is bitter that other students are receiving scarce merit aid and her “perfect” son isn’t getting any; I also don’t believe bashing UNC both on this forum AND on the Alabama forum is helping anyone out.</p>

<p>The best thing to do is get over it, plain and simple. Your son is already committing to Bama, so why are you beating this issue even more?</p>

<p>It seems like every thread on this forum has one of her ridiculous rants…</p>

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<p>Another derailed thread…</p>

<p>LadyD –

Is your extensive anecdotal evidence from reading the threads on CC? You seem to believe what you want to believe and disregard the “facts” that many have shared. Is UNC losing some top students to better deals elsewhere? Sure. Is it at a rate that will eventually decrease the average stats for UNC? I guess we’ll have to wait and see…but, when I look at all the stats that have been provided to you by many posters on this UNC forum, I just don’t see the mass exodus and the falling stats you’re trying to portray. Some states are trying to build their universities and that’s great. UNC is already a top university…even if you don’t think “it’s all that” (or however you said it). </p>

<p>Re: Objective Criteria. I don’t think you can use GPA as an objective criteria. All schools, courses, and weighting systems are not created equal.</p>

<p>The Education Lottery :slight_smile: … <a href=“http://www.nc-educationlottery.org/about_where-the-money-goes.aspx[/url]”>http://www.nc-educationlottery.org/about_where-the-money-goes.aspx&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>I was reading this thread and then almost lol’d when I saw LadyDi start up again. It’s not even the content, it’s that actual students and maybe even some prospective students were giving their thoughts based off of their experiences here and then the mom stood up and said the exact same thing she’s said in twenty different threads. “one of these is not like the other”</p>

<p>LadyDi, you don’t seem like an unreasonable person and I honestly don’t even think the stuff you’re saying is so terrible because your reasoning is laid out and people can take from it what they will. But at this point it seems like you’re engaging in some kind of catharsis. Contrary to popular opinion, catharsis isn’t actually a productive way to deal with your emotions - it polarizes them.</p>

<p>This is what I think the problem is and there is always the chance that I’m wrong. Your argument is that you are an NC resident and your kid is not stupid, in fact, is actually pretty smart, so as a tax paying citizen you should not be strangled by him going to a NC state school. I agree with you 100%. BUT there are many other schools in this state where I’m sure your son has/will get money (I haven’t done my research on your son so maybe you’ve already put that out there). So that takes care of that. Your son can probably get a free or close-to-free education in the state of NC at a school that is not terrible. I bet UNCG would be fine, or State, or App, or whatever. Even if he didn’t get a scholarship there, you could probably find a cheap option to where you could minimize your debt. So that takes care of things.</p>

<p>I’m not sure where else this argument should go. Your son was admitted to Carolina, so that’s great. Maybe he didn’t get a scholarship, but the debt you would incur from him attending here is not outrageous. It’s up to you to do your research on whether it’s worth it to incur that amount of debt. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. But if it isn’t, he can go elsewhere in the state of NC and you haven’t been wronged. Right? Emotions aside for a second, that’s what makes sense, does it not?</p>

<h2>Also… I have no idea how NMF really goes but I have a feeling it doesn’t factor in AT ALL. I bombed it. I had a friend who actually is attending Harvard who literally fell asleep while he took the PSAT. Let’s just say we had a terrible guidance counselor that year and I had no idea that the PSAT mattered for anything. And my mom didn’t know that I was taking it that day, either, since the guidance counselor wasn’t on top of things. Kind of a gigantic train wreck for my school, when I look back on it.</h2>

<p>My thoughts on bettering UNC:</p>

<p>Eliminate the elitist out of state students.</p>

<p>I’m joking. But seriously. Some of y’all come off as jerks in the way you describe in staters, or, as I should say, the sorry people. I think Carolina actually does a pretty good job of proving that, though SAT is predictive of success to a certain extent, you can have an incredibly vibrant community while still having a holistic approach to admissions. I obviously can’t disagree that if you were to accept less in state students that the SAT score would raise and that’s great for its own reasons, but having learned more about our admissions process, I actually feel very positively towards it. They read your essays. They really, really read your essays.</p>

<p>And this has been said a million times, but labeling in state students as homogeneous is a pretty ignorant thing to do. You know what, I’m not even going to expand on this. I take it too personally.</p>

<p>Now time for me to be offensive.

  1. I’d love it if there were no traditional greek system. Ironically, some of my best friends are in sororities and I’m sure they’ve been happy with what they’ve done. But my experiences with the greek system have been generally extremely negative. I have heard some of the most racist, sexist stuff from greeks. I’ve had some Greek friends (who are in the ‘more academic’ fraternities/sororities) go to rehab who I feel like otherwise would never have gotten involved in all that. I used to think the J. Crew tacky patterns of little bull dogs on men’s pants were dorky and endearing, now I can’t take them any more. Anyway, I know there are some great people who happen to be greek. It happens. Sorry if you read this and you get flustered, but this is my experience and I stand by it. They will probably never eliminate the panhelenic (aghh sp :slight_smile: branch of the greek system because that would be a crazy move donations wise. I bet if we didn’t depend on alumni donations so much that they’d already be gone, at least, that’s the feeling I always get whenever I read anything about what’s going on in the system.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>This isn’t really a complaint, it’s more of a thought. If you look at the heads of most organizations, they tend to be Moreheads. Maybe this is because 1. Moreheads are just the best leaders and they’re awesome. 2. Non-Moreheads are not interested in being leaders and so it just works out that way, 3. Moreheads are grandfathered into leadership positions because of the networks they’re immediately involved in when they start at UNC. Maybe it’s a bit of all three. Still, it would have been nice to go to a school where there isn’t an immediate divide between students. I’m a hypocrite, I’m a Carolina Scholar. But honestly, I’m not really a part of a program like the Moreheads are and there is no networking to speak of from my scholarship. I think it would be refreshing to be at a school where everyone was just treated equally from the get go. I feel like there are several groups within Carolina and the Moreheads in my year seem to gun especially hard to the point where I can only stand to be around a handful of them. Again, ironically, some of my best friends are Moreheads. But they’re the kinds of Moreheads who ask themselves if they actually deserve the honor rather than whisper to each other about cousins and blah blah blah so tired of this. Maybe it was just my year. In general I feel positively about Moreheads because I see all the good they all do here. It’s just the environment created from having merit scholarships that sometimes I feel iffy about. Not a huge deal, though.</p></li>
<li><p>More single dorm rooms. I loved living on campus but I also had a serious boyfriend junior year and had a strong desire to not **** off a roommate. I lived in Kenan and was not about to go live down on S campus. So. Now I live in Carrboro, which great, actually, and I’m kind of glad I was forced into the situation. I have to remind myself that I actually go to a public school and sometimes we gotta make compromises. Still, it would be nice to be a five minute walk away from all of my classes.</p></li>
<li><p>Connect Carolina can burn in hell.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>That’s really it. I used to complain about parking but then this Bio professor lectured me on sustainability and I dropped it.</p>

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<p>I agree that unc is a very respected school, and nc students are lucky to have it as an in-state option. Personally, I think it is often difficult to make a convincing case for a nc student to by-pass unc-ch for an outofstate school, especially for schools that are not in the top 10. </p>

<p>But I do hope unc-ch be more proactive in recruiting the most ambitious students in nc. Based on my anecdote information, some of the best students are much more heavily recruited by OOSs than by unc-ch and end up leaving the state. Also, slightly loose up the oos cap to 20-25% will definitely enhance the quality of student body and school reputation.</p>

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<p>I won’t fully experience Carolina until next fall. One thing that I would like to see changed is the amount of places there are to eat. It just seems very limited compared to State, ECU, and Ohio State. I compare it to these three because they are the other institutions I applied to.</p>

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<p>UNC needs to keep its in-state policy. Not because it helps the school in any way, but because it does a great service to the kids living in North Carolina.</p>

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<p>Y’all can’t hate on the Pit! I know it doesn’t have the quad’s good looks, but it has the best personality. ; -)</p>

<p>There is no way ECU has more places to eat than UNC - I’ve been to Greenville and it was a pretty bleak situation.</p>

<p>I fully support the in-state policy (being in-state and all). The people I know who happen to be the biggest pieces of work are OOS (cloying had a point with the elitist thing - I know we’re half joking, but still).</p>

<p>If I had to change something, I would probably attempt to clean up Franklin St. - the number of homeless people has definitely risen since my freshman year. It does get kind of creepy at night, and I get tired of being asked if I have change, etc.</p>

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<p>Another unsolicited parent opinion, so only worth 1/2 cent, since it comes second hand, but if I had to change one thing it would be to make the science courses and tests more reasonable. This isn’t a “sour grapes” opinion because of a “my child is so brilliant and always deserves A’s” stance. In fact, D did pull off A’s in both her science classes so far…but it seems like whatever one ends up with…A, B, C, etc…it ends up feeling like you were bludgeoned in the process as pulling off an A can mean that you got a 68 on a test where the class average was a 48. Averages like 48 on a test mean to me that the professor isn’t teaching or testing correctly.</p>

<p>And I love the pit :-)</p>

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<p>Science classes are like that at most schools, even small private LACs…just the nature of the beast. My guess is that it is in preparation for what follows…either grad or med school where the curves are even stricter (some med schools are A, A-, B+, B, B-, F) and the competition much stronger…both make undergrad grading seem much more fair.</p>

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<p>Here are some additional wish list items that bug me as a parent…would be interesting to see what actual students think of them:</p>

<p>1) Smaller class sizes so that separate recitation sessions aren’t required
2) More sessions of popular classes so that getting into a full class (which there seems to be at least one a semester that one needs) isn’t a game of musical chairs…email professor, show up at class the first day, talk to someone in the department etc…and hope the approach for this particular class is correct to get the last seat.
3) More in-depth advising</p>

<p>Of course I understand why all these don’t happen…because there is no “money tree”…but one can still wish.</p>

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<p>My mom could have written awayfromitall’s post… I have felt bludgeoned many, many times by science classes! When you’re going through it you’re actually pretty grateful that a 68 or whatever translates into an A or a B, but the whole process just seems ridiculous. I do think they need to make things more reasonable. It just gets hard to swallow after awhile when you know people at State, etc, taking the same classes and breezing by. I had several friends choose to take the hard sciences at other schools during the summer, and I totally understand why (even though I don’t think med/grad schools like to see that). Just my two cents… : -)</p>

<p>ETA - I agree about advising… There are a handful of really good advisors, but they are really hard to find.</p>

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<p>Hopefully you don’t think that this is unique to public schools…the ONLY exception that I know of is at very small LACs.</p>

<p>An example I’ve mentioned here before…back when S was a freshman he was taking and advanced calculus class after scoring a 5 on the AP BC calc exam…his class was taught by an English speaking, fully tenured professor with about 50-60 in the class…</p>

<p>His best friend from HS was taking the exact same class at Wharton at the same time…his class was taught by a TA whose English was very hard to understand in a class of 250 plus…and for that his parents had the pleasure of paying $40K plus a year in tuition…</p>

<p>It happens at any major research university…Harvard is not an exception either; especially the first two years,</p>

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<p>IMO-- I’d rather have large classes with an excellent professor/lecturer and recitations than small classes with grad students or OK teachers. I don’t think that a small-sized class necessarily translates to a higher quality educational experience. </p>

<p>Secondly… about advising, they’re just there to make sure you graduate. They aren’t there to help you find you life passion or anything like that. That seems like something that’s out of their job description and better learned elsewhere: UNC career services offers several classes and seminars for helping students figure out the best career path; Developing a mentor relationship with a professor in your area of study would also probably be a better choice for that sort of advising. IMO it’s not in their job description to really do that sort of work, so if you find someone you really connect with and helps you in that way, then the advisor has really gone above and beyond. UNC’s advising system is centralized for a reason-- the goal is to get you to graduate, not to form a mentor relationship with students.</p>

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<p>eadad, at Cambridge, students are taught in classes of 1 or 2 (as well as in big lectures etc), so there certainly are public schools with smaller class sizes.</p>

<p>Most other UK colleges have classes of 5-10 students.</p>

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<p>On the topic of recitations, I would love it if there was a rule that attendance could NOT be required. I realize that having a smaller group to review class material might be helpful for some people or in some classes with some instructors, but I haven’t had a single recitation at UNC that I’ve really gotten anything out of. Most of the time, they are a huge waste of time. </p>

<p>Heck, I even had one class where the recitation was “taught” by fellow undergrads. I’m sure these kids made As in this class and might have some helpful advice, but it seemed like they didn’t even remember the material from whenever they took the class, nor did they make much effort to re-learn it (can’t blame them, I would have just shown up and collected the credit/pay also). If people want to sit through that or need extra help, great, they can do so. But it’s silly and paternalistic to REQUIRE everyone to do so. </p>

<p>Going a step further, I’d eliminate any kind of attendance requirement from most classes. The argument against this might be that you need people there to participate in a beneficial discussion, but in my experience, the people who don’t want to be there aren’t the ones participating in class anyway. In fact, in recitations, I usually either sit there fuming mad about having to be there, or browse espn.com and never open my mouth. </p>

<p>This is college. People are old enough to make their own choices, and we’re paying the money to be here, the professors aren’t paying us to show up. If people can make As without going to class, then it’s silly and inefficient to make them go. If people can’t do well without going to class, they are old enough to weigh the costs and benefits for themselves.</p>

<p>If professors were actually earning their keep, it would be impossible to do well without going to class. Sadly, there are a ton of classes at UNC where this isn’t the case. Maybe if we prohibited attendance requirements, it would encourage professors to make classes harder, thus incentivizing attendance and at the same time helping to quell the out of control grade inflation.</p>

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<p>Ironically I have near perfect attendance most of the time but I totally agree that attendance shouldn’t be required.</p>

<p>I got into an argument about this with the head of the English department at another school and he made a pretty good argument for it that I also knew I couldn’t excuse. At the end of the day though I feel that it’s incredibly paternalistic and I wish there were a way to discriminate between college applicants who clearly want to be in college. Too many people who have no business going to college do so. And all I mean by that is people who have no interest in going to college and get absolutely nothing out of it go. Don’t do that. Actually think about what you want to do in your life and do it, stop wasting everyone’s time and money. End rant.</p>

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<p>About attendance, this used to bother me quite a lot. I’m not at all a fan of ‘participation grades’, and like you I thought that if I could do the work without showing up, then that’s up to me.</p>

<p>But I think part of it is that in many classes the aim is to teach you how to discuss and debate the issues, and to measure how well you do that. That’s something that can only be done in person.</p>

<p>I think the main problem with grade inflation is the importance of student evaluations. Grad students and untenured profs know that if they grade toughly, it will negatively impact their evaluations and hence their careers. It sucks, but I read something recently that many profs feel there’s a “nonaggression pact” with students: we don’t ding them on evaluations, and they don’t ask too much of us.</p>

<p>I tell you what though, I don’t think anyone can continue to believe the propaganda about UNCCH students all being so smart and talented and hardworking and whatever after attending an 8am recitation and seeing what bull people spew, whether or not they’ve done the reading (usually not).</p>

<p>I think that part of the problem is that the discussion sections are just too big. I’m not sure you can have a really meaningful discussion in 50 minutes with more than 10 people.</p>