UVa Going Private?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Virginia
41

<p>
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Virginia's economy is stagnant and uncreative

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A story to the contrary was</a> published just a few weeks ago.
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Virginia grabbed the top spot in Forbes.com's first-ever Top States for Business thanks to its strong economic growth, low business costs and excellent quality of life.</p>

<p>The state, called "Earth's only paradise" by poet Michael Drayton, dominated our rankings, placing in the top ten in each of the six categories we examined: business costs, economic climate, growth prospects, labor, quality of life and regulatory environment. No other state placed in the top ten in more than three categories.</p>

<p>We looked at a total of 30 metrics within the six general categories, and Virginia scored in the top half of all but three of them (high school attainment, five-year income growth and cost of living). The next best-performing states, North Carolina and Colorado, scored in the bottom 50% in nine metrics. Our second-ranked state overall, Texas, had 12 metrics where it ranked outside the top half.

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One of Virginia's strongest attributes is its two highly ranked institutions of higher education. The University of Virginia and the College of William and Mary graduate up to 5,000 graduates a year, many of whom stay in-state. They help contribute to Virginia's college attainment rate of 34% which is the seventh highest in the country. Life sciences businesses have popped up in and around Charlottesville because of UVA's highly rated medical school.</p>

<p>Add up a smart labor force, low costs, good regulatory environment and a great quality of life, and you get Virginia, the runaway winner in our listing of the Top States for Business.

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<p>Just for fun, you can compare various stats between Virginia and other states on</a> this website. I haven't played with it much, but it looks like an interesting tool.</p>

42

<p>What is the purpose of UVA? If it is to educate the people of virginia, then it shouldn't try as hard to get out of state students, but to get the best of in-staters. Certainly some highly talented Virginians are going out of state-keep them! If the purpose of UVA is to increase their USNews&WR rankins, then a different appriach may be needed. I am in Texas and went to UT (a while back). Here 90% af the students are in-state by state law and UT's purpose is to educate Texas students. Given that approach, the rankings will always be a little lower than schools that have more leeway in selecting their student body. Many students want to go to a state school for very good reasons and that pushed them up in that student's ranking above higher ranked private schools. It is not always money, but if you are bright, a self-starter and can get theough he initial crowds: is the difference in your education at UT vs. Rice really $60k-75K better?</p>

43

<p>Dear Dean J-</p>

<p>With all due respect, Michael Drayton was a Renaissance/Elizabethan poet who was talking about Virginia 400 years ago. As for that Forbes article, they are just appealing to quaint notions of bucolic countrysides and rural landscapes to sell magazines to the Martha Stewart crowd. Just so you know, it pains me to be critical of Virginia, especially since one of my ancestors was a founder of Charlottesville and Albemarle County not to mention that another ancestor was an officer on the Southern side from Virginia. I'm critical because I think my ancestors would be dismayed by how little this state has progressed in the last 100 years, especially with all of the federal "charity" (i.e. government jobs) it has received (probably more than any other state). No matter how you slice it, you really can't get a good meal in this state, find great theatre or get a good selection of wine & spirits. In other words, quality of life issues are poor here. I don't know whether to blame the Baptists or just some sort of misplaced Puritanism. Anyway, this backward thinking and low expectations is going to bite us in the patootie as other Southern states become wealthier and we just continue to lapse into perpetual denial. I don't want the unofficial motto of this state to be "our better days are behind us." Yes, Virginia has tradition and history in spades but we can't be like France and think that's going to carry us forever. The barbarians (Duke, Emory, Vanderbilt, Wake) are at the gate and its time to wake up.</p>

<p>P.S. Why does Richmond have only 3 Fortune 500 companies? Are there even 10 in the total state? The public sector has too much control here (I feel like I'm in Moscow every time I go to the liquor store). We need more corporate engines or private clusters for growth.</p>

44

<p>lol, tool.</p>

45

<p>"I think Viscious is a W&M rejectee. All I know is, W&M has an out-of-state acceptance rate equal to UPenn (~20%)."</p>

<p>I'm attending the college right now. I live in Gooch.</p>

46

<p>Richmond has [url=<a href="http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/cities/%5D7%5B/url"&gt;http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/cities/]7[/url&lt;/a&gt;] Fortune 500 companies (that's the 10th highest of all U.S. cities), and Virginia has [url=<a href="http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/states/V.html%5D18%5B/url"&gt;http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/states/V.html]18[/url&lt;/a&gt;] total in the Fortune 500.</p>

<p>Considering Richmond's relative obscurity as a major U.S. city, I'd say it's pretty damn impressive that it has more Fortune 500 companies than San Francisco, Denver, Cleveland, Seattle, etc.</p>

<p>You've cited North Carolina's biotech and banking economy, but Northern Virginia has a huge telecom and technology industry that has led it to be called the "Silicon Valley of the East Coast".</p>

47

<p>for tb,</p>

<p>I am a Richmond native who has closely followed the Richmond business scene for the last several decades. Yes, Richmond's current claim of 7 Fortune 500 companies sounds impressive...until you consider the fact that this is half of what it was a little over a decade ago and two of the current 7 are spin-offs-CarMax (out of Circuit City) and Genworth (out of GE and arguably controlled from an out-of-state location). The other 5 companies are the local utility (Dominion Resources), Circuit City, Performance Food Group, Brinks and LandAmerica Financial. Not exactly household names, except perhaps for Circuit City.</p>

<p>The truth is that Virginia has had its business lunch handed to it by North Carolina in several different industries, most prominently banking (where the NC banks acquired virtually all of the significant VA banks) and biotech (where VA made a lot of noise about investing in this area, particularly in Richmond, and developing a lot of jobs, but little of significance has actually resulted while NC has had some decent success in the Raleigh-Durham Research Triangle). </p>

<p>AOL and other tech/telecom firms had a hugely positive effect for job and overall economic growth in the late 90s (at least in NoVA), but we all know how that turned out. Since that time, the major saving graces for Virginia have been the real estate boom and the creation of businesses in Northern Virginia that have the government (primarily the DoD) as their raison d'etre. Compare this record of the state and the capital city to another east coast state with a strong technology industry, eg, the Route 128 corridor in Massachusettes, and then compare the business environment in Boston versus that in Richmond and you see a pretty big difference. </p>

<p>I still have family in Richmond, I was there this past weekend, and I would personally prefer to live and raise a family in Richmond over Boston. The pace and style of living in Richmond and most of Virginia is very attractive, but Virginia (and Richmond) is not a business juggernaut and to think otherwise because a handful of Fortune 500 companies are based there is looking at the scene through very rose colored glasses. </p>

<p>As for what this means for the University, UVA can play a critical role in the future business development of the state by attracting and retaining the best and the brightest students and faculty to the University and then enticing them to stay in the Commonwealth. Put me in the camp that wants to see the University of Virginia go upstream in its academic approach (and I don't think we have to go private in order to do this). </p>

<p>The University of Virginia is a fabulous place and has arguably the best blend of academic and social life of any school in the county, yet it continues to lose the cross admit battles to nearly all of these schools. IMO, the priority should be making UVA the academic equal of some of the Ivy League schools and more competive with Duke and other top privates and non-privates. If the University can modify its approach in a fashion that will allow it to win more and more of these competitions, the benefits for the school and the state will be important and long-lasting. Among other changes, unleash the University from its 67% obligation to enroll in-state students and see the quality and reputation of the student body, faculty, and school blossom. That would be a reputational win for the University, a boost for the value of the degrees of current students and alumni, and ultimately, a win for the state as a higher performing, more diverse student body would likely stay in the state and contribute to its future growth.</p>

48

<p>i am curious about when the 2/3s rule came into affect. At least as of the 1940s, there were more oosers at UVa than virginians. I wonder when that changed...</p>

49

<p>I have no dog in this fight, because I live in California and my son is a freshman at USC. But as an outside and possibly more objective observer, it seems to me that dajada07 is dead-on right and that the 67% rule is somewhere between seriously counter productive and completely insane.</p>

50

<p>It's time to loosen the in-state-student requirements at both UVa and W&M. What is more productive? Educating in-staters (principle case) or growing the Virginia economy (pragmatic case)? Studies have shown that OOS alumni out-donate in-staters by a wide margin which leads me to believe that they are probably earning more which is a boon for the Commonwealth if they stick around (most do).</p>

<p>P.S. Three Southern cities equal or exceed Richmond in Fortune 500 presence: Atlanta, Charlotte and Houston. This only benefits Emory, Davidson and Rice. Just goes to show the detriment of not having an active private sector.</p>

51

<p>mascuile,</p>

<p>neither uva nor w&m will ever get rid of the 2/3 rule. also, i highly doubt that just because oos people donate more means they make more money. remember people living in virginia pay education taxes which goes straight into the public universities pockets. in essense there is 100% giving rate by instaters.</p>