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<p>I think this concerned is misplaced at a top public with a diverse student body like Michigan or Wisconsin. In the first place, a third of the students are OOS at these schools, so an OOS student is hardly alone in that category. At Michigan, for example, there will be some in excess of 8,000 other OOS undergrads on campus. Second, the states themselves are big and diverse, and the schools are not located in the major population centers. Sure, in-state kids may know a few people from their HS, but frankly so so a lot of OOS kids, and so do kids at the privates. Going to the same HS doesn’t necessarily mean they’re close friends, and residence halls, classes, and extracurriculars are great randomizers; you make friends with the people you live with and share academic and extracurricular interests with, same as at any school. Some HS friendships may survive, but they’re hardly dominant. </p>
<p>As for in-state kids going home all the time, I just don’t think it happens much at places like Michigan or Wisconsin; campus is the center of your life in college, and there’s too much going on there to be leaving all the time. When I was an (in-state) undergrad at Michigan, I went home for Thanksgiving and at the semester break, that’s it. Most of my friends who came from metro Detroit, less than an hour away, went home maybe once a semester on average. Also , Michigan’s a big state. Due to the peculiarities of geography I actually lived farther from Ann Arbor than OOS kids from Chicago, Indianapolis, Louisville, anywhere in Ohio, Pittsburgh, upstate New York, or even parts of the DC metro area. (Yes, it’s true; you can look it up).</p>
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<p>This is just completely wrong. Certainly at the top publics, the state legislatures don’t presume to prescribe curriculum. Each school has its own curricular requirements, but these are set by the school, not by the legislature, and I don’t think you’ll find much difference at all between the top publics and their private peers.</p>