<p>Well, first, Truman State with nearly 6000 undergraduates hardly qualifies as a “small LAC.” And that “up to 75” is for freshman bio, and 75 is a maximum; after that, classes are smaller.</p>
<p>That anyone could consider 200-300 an “ideal size” for anything, much less upper level classes, blows me away.</p>
<p>Truman State’s schedule of classes lists both some freshman biology courses with three labs sharing a single lecture – presumably 75 in the lecture, with 25 in each lab, although actual capacities are not stated. But some upper division biology courses there also have the same pattern of three labs sharing a single lecture.</p>
<p>In any case, 75 is not really that much different from a larger class size – the threshold for “small class size” which gives the purported advantages of small class size is generally thought to be significantly less than 75.</p>
<p>While large class sizes may not be optimal, it may allow the faculty to teach more different courses to cater to students’ diverse interests, instead of numerous small lectures of the same commonly taken course. Of course, very wealthy schools which can afford to underutilize faculty teaching capacity can afford to do both, but there are relatively few such schools.</p>
<p>Bclintonk - I think it’s location, location, location. Madison and Ann Arbor are great college towns. Champaign-Urbana isn’t. </p>
<p>I too perceive Madison as closer than Champaign, partly because I’m still driving through “civilization” to get to Madison, whereas to get to Champaign I feel like I’m in the middle of nowhere. But by my map, it’s six of one, half dozen of the other.</p>
<p>I occasionally substitute for public school staff in an upscale Detroit suburb. One day I was working in a middle school library, and the guidance counselors brought in all the 8th graders (in groups of about 40 at a time). Each 8th grader sat at a computer and was instructed how to search for info on colleges. They were supposed to come up with a list of 5 colleges they might be interested in. </p>
<p>Any time a kid mentioned a private or out-of-state public, the counselors immediately shot it down with comments like “NOOOO, that would be SOOOO expensive!!” In contrast, I remember one kid saying, “How about Eastern Michigan?” A counselor almost exploded with approval, saying, “GREAT school! That’s where I got my master’s degree! That’s where I met my wife!” You almost have to live in Michigan to comprehend how little consideration out-of-state options are given here.</p>
<p>When did the OOS population begin to grow so much at Bama? Was there an effort to have this happen?</p>
<p>Yes, the President (now Chancellor) developed a growth plan over 10 years ago and put it into place. Over 40 new buildings were built (including a mega-sized Science and Engineering Complex). The older bldgs were remodeled and updated, the infrastructure around the campus was renovated, etc. It was a huge undertaking…all completed either on time or before schedule. </p>
<p>*Alabama is trying to “buy” a better-credentialed student body with generous merit aid to top OOS students. They’re by no means the only school doing this; essentially, that’s what merit aid is all about, it’s not a magnanimous gesture on the part of the school. They’re just exceptionally aggressive about it, especially for a public university.
*</p>
<p>Very true. It’s a domino effect. You get better students on campus, it’s easier to attract better profs, you get better grants, ranking goes up, donors are happy, big corporations take interest…and so forth. </p>
<p>That said…it’s an interesting fact that most OOS students at Bama are paying full freight or very close to it. Over 3000 frosh are from OOS, yet probably only about 500 have significant scholarships.</p>
<p>^^Yes to post 104 even for the brightest. A few years ago a fellow graduate of my S2 got accepted (and decided to attend) Harvard. Their younger kiddo is also a friend of my third so I knew the parents fairly well. I could not believe how many people questioned the parents about why their kiddo would want to “go so far away” and why they weren’t going to UofM. I know they got spectacular financial aid from H so it wasn’t a difficult decision. I also know the parents value education immensely. I thought they did a great job of deflecting but it was so amusing to me. We also have several sets of friends that had kids that went away to prep schools as legacies, and schools that kids (and parents) drool over who brought their kids “back” to attend UofM. Staying “here” is pretty entrenched in this state.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Even one that was cheap, like South Dakota Mines or South Dakota State?</p>
<p>*Quote:
Originally Posted by Oivoiv
Any time a kid mentioned a private or out-of-state public, the counselors immediately shot it down with comments like “NOOOO, that would be SOOOO expensive!!”
*</p>
<p>Both extremes by GCs can be wrong. One type assumes that all schools are affordable no matter what the schools’ FA policies are or what the family financial situation is. The other type assumes that anything other than their local cheap public is too expensive.</p>
<p>“Even one that was cheap, like South Dakota Mines or South Dakota State?”</p>
<p>The counselors in Michigan don’t seem open-minded enough to even investigate the possibility that an out-of-state public might be a cost-effective option. They went to Central or Eastern or Grand Valley, and by gum, if it was good enough for them it’s good enough for everybody. Even U of Mich in Ann Arbor is often considered an unseemly extravagance in many quarters…I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard of people who didn’t apply to UofM, and chose MSU or Central or Wayne State because UofM is “too expensive.”</p>
<p>By the way, the relatively high number of Michigan residents enrolled at U of Toledo (which was mentioned in a previous post) is NOT evidence that there are some exceptions to the obsession with in-state bargain-hunting…U of Toledo offers in-state tuition rates to Michiganders with decent grades, and it seems to advertise on Detroit-area radio stations more than any colleges based in Michigan do.</p>
<p>And the concept of financial aid given by private colleges is also almost unknown in Michigan. The public high school counselors don’t seem aware of it. And I went to a presentation by Vanderbilt recently that drew a well-heeled crowd. When they explained their generous full-demonstrated-need financial aid program, and mentioned some estimated aid packages, much of the crowd could not believe what they were hearing…</p>
<p>By the way, the school I mentioned in post 104 is in a suburb where driving a Lexus, BMW, Mercedes or other expensive car is very common, where having a second home “up north” is almost mandatory, etc. In other words, it’s an area where many people could presumably afford out-of-state tuition without breaking a sweat. </p>
<p>It also baffles me how many people in Michigan eagerly shell out thousands of dollars for private K-12 schools, but when it comes to college they begin hunting for bargains.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If I generalized about “the counselors in Illinois” based on observations in one schools - or for that matter, in a handful of schools - I think I’d run the risk of being pretty far off the mark.</p>
<p>Have you done a study covering a representative sample of Michigan school counselors?</p>
<p>“Have you done a study covering a representative sample of Michigan school counselors?”</p>
<p>I have to admit I missed a couple school districts in the upper peninsula.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Doesn’t that exceed the ncaa limit for football scholarships? :D</p>
<p>Since the Chicago Tribune article the OP posted required registration, I assume many people did not read it. The article is titled: </p>
<p>“Illinois’ presence shrinks at U of I: At Urbana-Champaign campus, 25% of freshmen are from out of state” </p>
<p>The article notes “a rapid increase in students from other states and especially other countries.” (at nonresident tuition) at UIUC. </p>
<p>Anyway, since the thread developed more into a discussion of why a lot of Illinois residents might choose out of state schools instead of UIUC than about the increase in nonresident enrollment at UIUC, I wanted to make a few comments. </p>
<p>First, the state of Illinois has one of the largest populations of college-bound students and there would not be room for all of them if they were limited to Illinois schools. </p>
<p>Next, there are lots of choices. Students choose colleges for many reasons including size, finances, choice of major, the campus/social feel, rigor, alumni networks, architecture, Greek life, lack of Greek life, sports, etc. I just looked at the list of colleges chosen by students in a recent year at one public high school in a North Shore suburb of Chicago. The amazing thing about this list is that for a senior class of roughly 600 college bound students, there were more than 200 colleges and universities represented. </p>
<p>The largest enrollment number for any single school was at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, with 25 students, but 30 other colleges and universities in Illinois also were represented. Students from this graduating class were planning to attend 70 colleges in the midwest outside of Illinois. The eastern section of the U.S had around 40 colleges represented. There were around 30 colleges from southern states, 30 from western states and 5 from other countries. In the majority of cases, the enrollment from this senior class was one student per college! So many choices.</p>
<p>I mentioned this because I think the discussion has oversimplified the issues to give the impression that students are rejecting one state flagship for a few others. Also, this thread has included a number of critical comments about UIUC as possible explanations for why many Illinois students choose out of state schools, while not addressing why out of state and international student enrollment has increased to 25%.</p>
<p>Regardless of what you read on CC, a lot of students from the Chicago area, Illinois as a whole, other states and countries have a high regard for UIUC. It is among the top public universities in this country. I know lots of students who attend or who graduated from UIUC who love it. Many of the graduate programs, including ones outside science and engineering are highly ranked. By the way, the tuition may seem high, but the freshman year tuition price remains the same for all four years. The financial aid is limited, but Illinois as a state has big financial problems. For those who don’t like UIUC, for whatever reason, there are so many other great choices. </p>
<p>Because of all the competition and rivalry that exists among schools discussed on CC, I would suggest that anyone looking at colleges try to get as much firsthand information as possible rather than bring swayed by what you read on CC about the quality of a school, including what I wrote here. Before you criticize a school based on third hand or otherwise unreliable information, think about how you feel when your alma mater or your kids’s college is mischaracterized/maligned on CC.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>ALL colleges are mischaracterized/maligned on cc. (That’s half of the fun.) Don’t take it personal.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Not an “impression” at all. It’s a fact! (And it happens in every state.) I know of Californians who have forsaken UC for Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin…</p>
<p>Thanks bluebayou. The Parents Forum can be a good source of entertainment for veteran posters and lurkers. But it is not always the most objective, unbiased source of information about schools. By the way, in that high school I mentioned in the North Shore suburb of Chicago, a few students have forsaken Illinois for UC’s. Forsaken to one state means out of state tuition to another.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>One would think that the new default GC answer would be “talk to your parents about what they are able and willing to contribute toward your college costs, and run the net price calculator found on every college’s web site to get an idea of what its need-based financial aid is like”, rather than giving not-necessarily-good guesses about what colleges are too expensive or not.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Speaking as an academic, I’d question two links in your hypothesized causal chain. First, I’m not persuaded that better undergraduate students necessarily lead to better professors. That may be true to some extent at LACs where the teaching of undergraduates is the principal mission. It’s less true at research universities where the (perceived) influence of one’s research and scholarship is what makes or breaks reputations and careers. Other things equal, most academics would prefer to teach better students, but other factors–teaching load, availability of internal start-up research grants, the quality of labs, libraries, and other facilities, the reputational strength of one’s colleagues in the same or allied fields, institutional history in scoring big external research grants and support services to promote the same–will tend to dominate. And other factors like compensation, desirability of the community as a place to live (which might vary depending on the preferences and life circumstances of the individual), and access to national and international transportation, will also matter.</p>
<p>Second, better students would lead to more and better research grants only by way of strengthened faculty; the big grant-making agencies like NSF and NIH don’t give a hoot about the quality of undergraduates. They might marginally care about the quality of grad students and post-docs, but mostly they care about the faculty and the quality of the research proposals. And it’s hard to see how landing a few National Merit Scholars is going to affect that.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This basically sums up what I’ve witnessed also.</p>