Don’t know about Jersey (though I haven’t heard about capacity issues there), but in IL, the directional IL schools (especially WIU and EIU but also both SIU’s) have room to grow. In fact, they’re worried about falling enrollment at those schools. SIUC hit their peak enrollment back in 1991. Meanwhile, SIUE aggressively tries to get kids from neighboring states (offering them in-state tuition). Yet it seems that many IL kids would rather pay up to attend an FBS school in a neighboring state than an IL directional.
Except that in the two tiniest states,Delaware and Rhode Island, a majority of college freshmen stay in-state. Still, those states are well below the national average in the percentages who stay in-state, so there’s something to your point. Oh, and I should have included Hawaii in the majority OOS list, but that’s consistent with the small-state hypothesis. But there are also some geographically large states with relatively low rates of in-state enrollment, e.g., Illinois at 55.6% in-state and Minnesota at 58.8% in-state. In Minnesota’s case it’s largely explainable by tuition reciprocity. Minnesota residents get in-state tuition at public universities in Wisconsin and the Dakotas, and it can actually be cheaper for a Minnesota resident to go to college in one of those states than to stay in-state (plus UW Madison enjoys a perceived quality/prestige advantage over UMN Twin Cities, and offers a more traditional college-town experience). What’s going on in Illinois is less clear to me.
Looking at the Chronicle Data, which I agree is better, WUE does not seem to be the factor one would think on the surface. Which, is not surprising as in many of the WUE states, the choices are limited, exclude flagships and many other desirable options. It was surprising to some extent to see private schools in the WUE states coming up so high (for example for students from WA, the school receiving the most students in OR is a private jesuit school,. but in general the ones that do, are known for good merit.
Really interesting data even if it is limited.
@bclintonk, well, the recent state budget fiasco in IL is contributing to it, but also, as I noted earlier, there seems to be a strong correlation between the number of well-off suburbanites in a state and the number of kids going OOS for college from that state.
Plus, in IL, there is only one strong tier I residential public (UIC is a fair bit down and has a large commuter population while every other IL public is at the level of a directional) for a big state. Compare with VA, which offers a plethora of options. Or MN or WI, which also have only one strong tier I public but who’s flagships are considerably bigger despite those states having a much smaller population than IL.
Perhaps it may be due to high in-state costs and not very good in-state financial aid at IL publics?
Or also that the flagship UIUC can be very selective for popular majors (and a rather high percentage of majors there are selective ones)? A student not able to get admitted to UIUC (or his/her major at UIUC) may choose some out-of-state flagship over an IL non-flagship, if his/her parents are willing to fund it (or s/he earns enough scholarships).
NJ is a rich state with a LONG tradition of sending kids going “away” to college. True in my day (60’s) and true today. Just the target states have shifted from midwest to the southeast. Many schools in southeast are far better known and better quality than they were 50 years ago. I see many going to UMd, Va publics, Clemson, Bama and so on.
My brother’s son (Morristown, NJ) will graduate from ASU next year.
Yes and no. Some correlation, yes, but California is one of the highest-income states and it’s about average with about 3/4 of college freshmen staying in-state. Same for Virginia. New York and Colorado are both above the national median in household income and both states certainly have lots of well-off suburbanites, but both keep about 3/4 of their college freshmen in-state. Vermont and Wisconsin are both right around the national median in household income, but in Vermont only 44.8% of college freshmen stay in-state while in Wisconsin 75.8% do. Ultimately I think it’s more about the quality, price, value, and general appeal of in-state options, both public and private, more than income levels.
This is a key point. In most states the public flagship absorbs 10% or less of the state’s college-bound students, so enrollment at the flagship isn’t the principal driver of OOS enrollment. So, for example, in 2014 Rutgers-New Brunswick absorbed 9.38% of New Jersey’s college freshmen, considerably higher than the University of Michigan which absorbed only 7.03% of that state’s college freshmen. Yet fewer than half of NJ freshmen stayed in-state, while nearly 85% of Michigan freshmen did. Why? Well, I think the perceived quality of the flagship indluences what happens to the most highyl qualified students, but it doesn’t move the needle on overall in-state v. OOS enrollment. For that, you need to look at the state’s secondary public institutions. After Rutgers, what is there in NJ? Not much. Michigan has Michigan State, effectively a “second flagship” to pick up some of the slack; plus a pretty decent engineering school in Michigan Tech, and directionals that are probably on the whole stronger then NJ’s second-tier publics. In some states, the quality and valuse of in-state privates also plays a role, but Michigan’s private schools are neither very numerous, very large, nor on the whole very distinguished, with a few exceptions like Kalamazoo College. (Geography may also play a role as Michigan is mostly surrounded by water, leaving relatively few OOS schools within easy driving distance, in contrast to NJ which has Philadelphia at one end and New York City at the other). So I buy the point about Illinois lacking quality second-tier public options after UIUC. Lots of Illinois residents who don’t get into UIUC will find Iowa State, Purdue, or Indiana more attractive than UIC, Northern Illinois, or Southern Illinois…
While whether something is a flagship is a bit subjective (the Michigan/MSU one being a good example, and goodness knows what to do with CA), a good addendum to the “this state has X college bound seniors and Y public college freshman slots, meaning they could theoretically seat z% of their seniors” would be - of those Y seats, a% are flagship and b% are not flagship." It would be interesting to know what % of each state’s freshman seats are flagship. My guess is that it varies a lot state by state.
It would have also been interesting to have the locations of the public colleges superimposed on to the map, perhaps contrasted with population centers.
I’m among those mildly surprised that PA doesn’t export more. But PA residents tend to stay in the state their whole lives (I forget where I read this first, but I just verified it in a Pew report from 2008 on US mobility patterns). However, my kids aren’t even going to apply to Penn State; we can’t afford it (or any out-of-state public). We are hoping they will have a chance at some “meet full need” privates or at some hefty merit aid. Otherwise, we are pretty much doomed. 
@twinsmama, PA, while a populous state, does have two big AAU public research U’s (actually, one big and one gigantic) which are, between them, far enough away for enough people that the whole state could choose a going-away-to-college experience while staying in-state.
And while in-state costs to PSU and Pitt are high, OOS costs are typically higher.
Too bad Temple discontinued their big merit awards.
Has Temple discontinued them? Or discontinued their being automatic? I highly doubt they’ll do away with them completely overnight, unless they’re prepared for the average stats of their admitted students to drop like a rock.
@twinsmama, if your children are competitive for “meets full need” privates, they may also be competitive for some big merit awards at OOS publics. My son attends Bama for less than half of what we’d pay for Penn State and about 3/4 of the cost of a PASSHE school.
There are many out-of-state publics poaching students from CA, IL, and PA. In addition to UA, check out Ole Miss, Arizona State, Ohio State and Miami of Ohio, UAB and UAH, and all the ones that appear here:
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
I’m not sure how up-to-date it is, but it’s a good starting point, as is the Financial Aid & Scholarships forum here on CC.
@twinsmama: http://nmfscholarships.yolasite.com/ and http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com/ are also worth looking at if you have a kid who is competitive for the (usually elite) rich meet-full-need schools.
I’d have to imagine that such a kid would be competitive for the Rutgers, Buffalo, and Delaware and probably Pitt, Syracuse, OSU, and UMD full tuition/ride scholarships, for instance (just mentioning a few in states adjacent to or in PA).
@LucieTheLakie, I think you’re right that Temple will still offer scholarships, but they haven’t posted eligibility criteria yet,
@PurpleTitan Syracuse is a private university.
@LBad96, ???
I didn’t say they weren’t. I said that a kid who is competitive for the meet-full-need schools should be competitive for the big scholarships there.
Does Syracuse have any big merit scholarships, though? I could be wrong, but I’m not aware of any. It’s a hugely popular school in this area, and I think a lot of those families are full pay.
Ditto with the publics Delaware and Maryland. (No Pennsylvanian chooses to go to Rutgers for undergrad unless there’s a specific program of interest, and there’s certainly no merit money there.) There are some small merit grants for top students at Delaware, but I’m not sure they even bring the COA to that of Penn State. SUNY schools are probably going to cost about the same as Penn State as well.
From Pennsylvania, you really have to be prepared to head west to Ohio and far beyond or pretty far south if you’re looking for big merit money from an out-of-state public. Some of the Catholic schools in the northeast offer some good merit packages, so they may be worth looking at too.
@LucieTheLakie:
http://coronat.syr.edu/
As for big scholarships at Delaware, UMD, RU, and Buffalo, please look at http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com/.
I do post links for a reason.
I stand corrected, @PurpleTitan, but that Syracuse program looks highly competitive and is by invitation only.
Maybe I misunderstood what @twinsmama is looking for, but I was trying to point her to less competitive scholarships. Certainly she should look at any school she thinks her kids have a shot at, but my impression is that only a small group of students are awarded most of those competitive scholarships like the Academic Elite at Alabama and the Eugene DuPont Memorial Scholarship at Delaware.
I appreciate the help @LucieTheLakie and @PurpleTitan . Schools in the South are out (my children’s choice) and Catholic schools are out (my choice), but we will certainly look into other schools you mentioned. My kids are only going into junior year, so we don’t exactly know where they stand yet. I don’t want to take the thread too far off-topic, so I will ask for more specific suggestions at another time and in another thread.
@Pizzagirl, this is quite easy to calculate from the Chronicle data. I didn’t do it for every state, but here are some that interest me. I listed the states in order of percentage of college freshmen who left the state in 2014:
CT: export 60.6%; UConn 9.37% of state’s 2014 freshmen
NJ: export 55.7%; Rutgers 9.38%
MD: export 54.4%; University of Maryland-College Park 10.27%;
IL: export 44.4%; UIUC 7.27%
MA: export 43.5%; UMass Amherst 7.69%
MN: export 41.2%; University of Minnesota-Twin Cities 11.25%;
VA: export 26.3%; University of Virginia 5.93%;
WI: export 24.2%; University of Wisconsin-Madison 12.32%,
PA: export 22.4%; Penn State 6.29%
IA: export 21.6%; University of Iowa 18.1%
OH: export 20.1%; Ohio State 8.16%
NE: export 20.1%; University of Nebraska-Lincoln 32.1%
MI: export 15.8%; University of Michigan 7.03%
There is indeed a good deal of variation, from a high of 32.1% of the state’s freshmen enrolling at the in-state flagship (Nebraska) to a low of 5.93% (Virginia). Not so much variation among the larger population states, though. Notice, however, that there is little apparent correlation between the fraction of the state’s freshmen enrolling at the public flagship and that state’s export rate.
This changes somewhat if we consider that some of these states also have a “second flagship” or quasi-flagship to take up some of the freshman demand. So, for example:
VA: export 26.3%; University of Virginia 5.93% + VaTech 9.24% + William & Mary 2.24% = 17.41%
PA: export 22.4%; Penn State 6.29% + Pitt 3.46% = 9.75%
IA: export 21.6%; University of Iowa 18.1% + Iowa State 26.2% = 44.3%
MI: export 15.8%; University of Michigan 7.03% + Michigan State 11.23% = 18.26%
That still doesn’t give you a strong correlation; Ohio with a single flagship taking up only 8.16% of the state’s freshmen still has one of the lowest export rates, and Pennsylvania has one of the lower export rates even though Penn State and Pitt combined accommodate roughly the same fraction of the state’s freshmen as the single flagships in Connecticut and New Jersey, states with extremely high export rates. But I think this all broadly confirms my hunch that it’s not so much the size of the flagship as the size, quality, and perceived desirability of the state’s non-flagship public institutions, combined with the size, quality, and desirability of in-state private institutions, that drive the export rate. And since most students who leave the state don’t venture very far, the perceived desirability of colleges just outside the state’s borders also plays a big role.
Illinois has a high export rate, not because of the size of UIUC, which accommodates a similar fraction of that state’s freshmen as the University of Michigan does of Michigan’s. But Illinois doesn’t have a Michigan State (Illinois State just isn’t the same in size or quality)… It’s got some very attractive privates in Northwestern and the University of Chicago, but together these absorb only about 1% of Illinois freshmen. Other in-state privates like DePaul, Loyola and Bradley take up a bit more, but ultimately it’s the appeal of nearby out-of-state options like the University of Iowa, Iowa State, Marquette, Wisconsin, Mizzou, St. Louis U, WUSTL, Indiana, Purdue, Notre Dame, and Michigan that draws thousands of Illinois freshmen out-of-state.
It doesn’t help that many of Illinois’ directionals have severe budget problems that can’t help but have an impact on the quality—even the existence—of the education provided at those campuses.