Hello! My name is Teghan Simonton. I am a data reporter for USA TODAY, and I have received permission from College Confidential to post here. I am interested in interviewing students (or their parents) who feel they were shut out or unfairly denied from their state flagship university, due to an increase in selectivity or an increase in out-of-state enrollment. If you’re interested, please contact me at tsimonton@usatoday.com
Thank you!
If someone is denied admission they may feel that OOS students are the reason but they really don’t know if that is true or not. Seems to me that any " data" you collect this way is totally bogus.
You can read this gripefest thread:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/2070343-californian-parents-justified-feeling-bitter-their-kids-are-shutout-of-the-uc-system-p1.html
Here is a summary of the typical complaints (reply #301 of that thread):
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/2070343-californian-parents-justified-feeling-bitter-their-kids-are-shutout-of-the-uc-system-p16.html
MODERATOR’S NOTE:
Confirming the OP’s credentials and that she has been approved to post.
I don’t think she is expecting to collect data here, she is looking for people to interview to personalize the story.
The 2 states where the OP will have the most success finding gripers will be California and to some extent Alabama. So if there is a state forum (there is one for California colleges) maybe this post would get more respondents.
Agree that she’s looking for personal anecdote, but also agree that that data will be “suppositions” --people’s guesses as to why they didn’t get accepted. So the “what happened” might be true, but the 'why," which is what the article is about, will most likely be sheer speculation.
Most likely, it will be someone looking for someone else to blame, rather than realizing that the application list was too reachy (i.e. they overestimate their chances at their state universities, so that what they believe are matches or safeties are really reaches), or that they were not aware of higher admissions competition for specific majors (like CS, engineering majors, and business at many popular colleges).
However, many state universities could do better than they do now in terms of publishing past admission numbers, including by division or major when that matters for admission selectivity.
Weren’t there problems in Illinois as well? And how the instate schools had to take in more international students because of budget issues?
Seems like the more common gripe in IL is the poor in-state financial aid at the public universities, so that those needing financial aid may have difficulty affording them.
@ucbalumnus You are correct. UIUC doesn’t give much aid therefore many high stats kids go out of state. But there is enough people in IL that UIUC is still the best deal they can get because of the non-resident fee OOS. Those are the kids that have an ACT around 27-32 or 33. A kid with a 29 or 30 going to another state’s flagship will find it more expensive than UIUC. It is only when you have a 33+ can you get the merit from some state’s flagship. Not all but some.
That has made UIUC quite competitive for Eng. Overall it is a numbers game. If you live in a highly populated state there is a good chance that the flagship won’t need to give merit.
I can’t speak much to need based aid at UIUC, but it is similar I believe.
I think a better topic for a story would be if in-state parents feel they are paying more in tuition because their state’s schools are giving merit/need/gap money to out-of-state students.
This is certainly worth exploring. Do you have any personal experience with this situation? Feel free to email me!
Just to repsond to tutumom2001’s statement: that could possibly happen in a tiny minority of schools. However, it can be hard to say where exactly the tuition money is going. Sure some could go to help for aid for OOS students, but it could also go to help poorer in-state students as well. (Or the new gym or new dorms etc.)
U Michigan has a lot of OOS students now. I wonder how those in state feel about that.
I think there are plenty of states other than California where this 'why them? it should have been me" comes up. Colorado has 45% OOS and there is plenty of griping. Texas doesn’t have a huge OOS group, but I bet there are a lot of Texas students who wanted to go to UT who begrudge each and every one of those OOS students. Michigan, Wisconsin, Virginia all have instaters who wanted to get into those schools but didn’t, and feel their spots were taken by OOS interlopers.
Might want to include in your story how SUNY system gives $$ to out of state students. Why? Why? Why?
Around here, parents are starting to complain that Ohio State is getting harder for in-state kids so you may want to try that forum. It seems like OSU does give a lot of OOS tuition waivers plus merit to out of staters, but I’ve got no data to back that up.
These are exactly the kind of personal accounts I’m looking for. I’m unable to post this query to another forum because of the site’s rules, but please feel free to send along my information. Thanks!
^^ my kiddo is looking at OSU for that same reason - they do give merit to those OOS, and it’s cooler than our midwest state (NE). Here - we give lots of merit to kids from OOS - and nobody feels bad about it; we are all happy when someone wants to come to our state from somewhere else!