Wow…interesting…
Of the 65,573 state residents enrolled in institutions, only 36,023 enrolled in their home state. In fact, Illinois is the #2 state (behind NJ) in negative net migration of students. Students leave, but not many OOS enroll in Illinois.
In Wisconsin, of the 32,242 state residents enrolled in college, 25,148 enrolled in-state. It has a positive net migration of students.
The three top states for net migration (more students come to the state, than leave) would be Pennsylvania (by far), Massachusetts and Alabama.
The presentation indicates that in 2012, Illinois had the third largest number of high school students leave the state, trailing only California and New Jersey.
If you look at the numbers on a percentage basis, Illinois is #11 out of 50 states in terms of the number of students that leave the state for college. However, most of the states with higher percentages than Illinois are small and/or rural states like Vermont and Rhode Island.
Furthermore, if you look at page 31 of the presentation, the following is the percent of New Trier graduates leaving the state for college:
• In 2004, 83% of grads went out-of-state
• In 2008, 74% (financial crisis)
• In 2014, 76% went out-of-state
• That’s over 760 students! (per year)
For those out of state, New Trier is a non-magnet public school located in a wealthy part of the North Shore. It is frequently looked at as the most competitive and highest ranked non-magnet public high school in Illinois.
The University of Illinois alumni association is one of the largest alumni association in the entire country. All three campuses use the same alumni association.
New Trier is not a normal school in terms of demographics. You cannot use it to extrapolate any information. The average person is way wealthier than the average Illinois resident. The majority of people go to colleges relatively near their homes.
You can use New Trier as a proxy for the half dozen to a dozen other high income, high stat high schools in the Chicago suburbs. Schools like Lincolnshire, Deerfield, Highland Park, Naperville North and Central, Glenbrook North and South,. Evanston, Hinsdale Central, Libertyville, etc. etc. all share similar traits with New Trier even if they are not as famous.
I think what it does tell you is that New Trier is a school that produces a large number of students that UIUC would like to attract, but most of those students leave the state. Some probably don’t want to attend Illinois, and others can’t get into the high value majors they are interested in because UIUC seems to be more interested in selling most of those off to NRA and OOS students.
Another interesting factoid, Illinois as a fairly low number of enrolled freshman, when compare to other states with a similar population. Illinois has 20% larger population that Georgia, yet Georgia has 8% more Freshman in Georgia 4-year degree granting institutions.
STATE POPULATION NUMBER of Enrolled Freshman(4-year degree-granting institutions)
Illinois 12,86 Million 48,510
Penn 12.8 Million 82,947
Ohio 11.61 Million 68,579
Georgia 10.2 Million 52,526
North Carolina 10.04 Million 47,250
Michigan 9.9 Million 51,500
…
Indiana 6.61 Million 45,808
Wisconsin 5.77 Million 35,148
Illinois simply doesn’t have enough “seats” to support all of it’s in-state students (it’s short by about 17,000 freshman slots). Indiana, with 1/2 the population, supports as many Freshman as Illinois.
Thanks for sharing. Interesting indeed. I will definitely enjoy looking at these links later.
(I’ll make an initial observation,…but I’m watching the Blackhawks so please forgive me if I’m not clear. )
@Zinhead I went to the New Trier page to have a quick look. Something that jumped out at me was the list of popular majors.
Business (255)
Psychology (102)
Biology (82)
Economics (75)
Engineering (72)
English (63)
Communications (54)
Pre-Medicine Studies (54)
Computer Science (51)
Marketing (46)
Having children who are currently attending UIUC in the College of Business, I was drawn to the number of New Trier students who declared their interest in business…225+46, or 271! Remember, UIUC’s CoB had a total incoming freshman class of ~600…and I know we’re not talking just UIUC, but there seems to be some criticism directed at it for the exodus of students from the state.
Then I decided to scan some other high stat high schools…keeping in mind that there are a lot more in our state. Looking at business, engineering and CS, it is no wonder that Illinois students are leaving the state.
The numbers suggest that even if you exclude those who want to go OOS to elite schools, there are probably too many strong students for Northwestern (which technically doesn’t have a business major), U of Chicago and UIUC to accommodate. It would be lovely if the directionals were stronger and more highly regarded, but I’m not sure it would have much of an impact with the demographic about which we are talking. Universities probably limit the number of students they accept from a particular high school in an effort at diversity. And frankly, I think it’s a good thing.
Oh and we haven’t even mentioned all the wonderful private schools like the Latin School, Benet and the U of Chicago Lab school!
"You can use New Trier as a proxy for the half dozen to a dozen other high income, high stat high schools in the Chicago suburbs. Schools like Lincolnshire, Deerfield, Highland Park, Naperville North and Central, Glenbrook North and South,. Evanston, Hinsdale Central, Libertyville, "
Well, sure to some extent, but you still can’t make any blanket statements about Illinois high schools as a whole. NT is exceptionally known for high pressure, is in an exceptionally brand-conscious area, is with spitting distance of Northwestern’s campus, and likely has a disproportionate number of legacy parents to elite schools out of state compared to the other schools you mention. You can’t make any blanket statements that “Illinois high school students have little desire/ enthusiasm for UIUC and trot off to there begrudgingly” based off NT. I have no dog in the UIUC fight - never interested in it for me / my kids and I agree Madison is more exciting from a QOL perspective.
@Pizzagirl The net migration is the total number of OOS students attending 4-year colleges in the state minus the total number of state residents that go to an OOS 4 year college. The federal government is able to track attendance by state residence (colleges have to report that number).
With that being said, it’s clear that Illinois residents are leaving the state. In total number of students that go OOS, it’s ranked a close 3rd, behind California and New Jersey. Who knows the reasons why.
Take a look at page 29 of the following document. It contains a graph that shows the change in enrollment by state in four year college between 2009 and 2014. Illinois had a drop in total enrollment of 17.9 percent, one of five states with a decline in enrollment numbers, and by far the largest decline. Page 30 has the raw numbers. Total enrollment in the state declined from 397,018 in 2009 to 326,329. The state has plenty of seats, they can’t get students to fill them at schools below UI’s level.
Due to the decline in enrollment, Illinois also was one the few states that saw the state’s contribution per student increase, growing from $8,223 in 2009 to $12,293 in 2014. This is on pages 31 and 32.
Page 33 shows that public schools in Illinois rely on tuition to a much lesser extent than other states, and pages 35 to 37 show that Illinois has had the highest spike in education revenue among all 50 states.
@Zinhead Interesting. Why the #$@ is enrollment dropping? Going OOS is expensive (vs an in-state “directional” school). I can see higher SES students going OOS (and high stat students, who usually are also high SES), but why lose the middle income students?
Declines in enrollment is a very bad thing, and with current trends (in healthcare and entitlement cost), state support will start to decline. These institutions need tuition revenue.
wow…I just looked at tuition at Northern Illinois University, it’s $14,295 a year. I can see why a student may want to go to USF (in Tampa, near the beach) and pay $17K a year (before the offer any OOS merit aid)…
Maybe it’s a combination of quality and expense, that drives them out of state (talking Illinois as a whole, and not UIUC specifically)? Either way, you don’t want your state to experience a brain drain…
First, the economy in Illinois is poor. Pockets of Chicago, particularly the tech industry, are doing very well, but outside of the Chicago area, population and job growth are poor, taxes are high and companies are fleeing. There is a long-standing budget problem that will eventually result in much higher taxes. People understand this, and given the high cost of college in the state, many find it a good time to relocate permanently.
The individual schools in the system are not that attractive to students. Many were originally teachers colleges and are typically located outside the Chicago region in smaller, rural cities that don’t have much to offer. None of them are very rigorous academically, so they don’t attract top students.
Consequently, there is also a major quality gap between UIUC and the rest of the system. UIC and the directional schools generally don’t appeal academically to kids that were competitive at UIUC and did not get in, and they prefer to go to Iowa, Iowa State, Indiana, Purdue and that level of school than stay in-state and attend a directional. The state has been marketing UIC as a backstop to UIUC, but there are issues with that school that make it unpopular with suburban families that form the bulk of the higher stat kids.
Traditionally, many of the top kids that leave Illinois eventually come back to work in Chicago. This is especially true for the top students in law, business, medicine and increasingly tech. However, non-elite students may not move back to Illinois, and the loss of college students represents a real possibility of a brain drain in the state, particularly in the areas outside the trendy parts of Chicago.
I said this on the other thread about why students choose to go OOS - my D likely had the stats to be admitted to UIUC in LAS. Two friends of hers with slightly lower stats were…
My D applied to OOS directional schools because she liked the size and she wanted merit aid. To her, a smaller state school is a “just right” fit between a small LAC and the state flagship.
I made her apply to at least one school in-state, her choice - she chose SIU-Carbondale - again because of the size, the majors offered that she was interested in, and she loved the campus when she visited. She also got a nice merit scholarship from them.
Her friends and peers gave her a LOT of flack for applying to SIU-C, instead of applying to UIC or UIUC. Told her she was “better than that”, she is wasting her time/ruining future career prospects, etc.
It seems that, around our local area anyway, the directionals are seen as a last resort for those who could not go anywhere else, and given that, other kids were - well, just flabbergasted that anyone with a 30+ ACT score and decent grades would take them down to SIU-C and roll around with the perceived riffraff… They actually professed to be concerned about her. One girl actually asked if she was depressed or had low self-esteem. Really.
Many kids around here also apply to, and attend the directional state schools on the Midwest Exchange list because they are cheaper than attending even some directionals in IL, especially if there is no merit aid to be had for that student. And I’m guessing that because these schools are OOS, there is not the stigma of going to an IL directional.
So, it may be true that enrollment at the IL directionals is down because of this perception by some high-stats kids in some suburbs that the directionals are some kind of educational death sentence.
Interesting that the presentation says that the reason students leave are, “Romanticized ideas about place and price.”
Price:
I think that Illinois in-state vs. Wisconsin OOS is about $10,000/yr. Then I believe Illinois adds another $5-6k if you are in engineering, so difference is not as large as a many people imagine.
Furthermore, UIUC does very little to keep the best and brightest.
DD1 is a top student. She was offered money and special programs at Michigan offered her $80 k in unsolicited merit, Virginia offered Echols Scholar, Berkeley paid to fly her out for a visit and offered a Chancellor’s scholarship, a CS major, research, and housing. She applied to 4 Ivies and was admitted to 3 (one via likely letter) and waitlisted at 1 (she rejected it). Washington University (STL) had a Dean call her personally to discuss attending their school. All 3 Ivies were contacting her trying to be sure she was coming to their campus for admitted student days. Since this is cc: most of your kids probably had the same experiences. Schools were emailing and calling her like she was a recruited quarterback.
In contrast, Illinois offered her honors college via letter, but that was it. No money, no real effort to recruit her, it seemed like she was just a number to them. It was interesting to see that the very top schools made her feel like she really mattered to them, but her state flagship did not. I know what the other schools are doing is just marketing, but it matters. I am sure that UIUC view that as a win because they could free up one more seat for a Chinese student, but from the perspective of the state of Illinois, I think they are blowing it by letting the states best and brightest get away without a fight.
The first one is UIUC could make an effort to make a student feel wanted. I agree that they can do a much better job in this area. We actually laughed the spring of my son’s senior year at how little he heard from UIUC. But I question, to what degree is that needed…and at what cost. (Is it “needed” if UIUC is very happy with their acceptances? How much of an already tight budget can/should they devote to it?) Note: If they asked for my opinion I would tell them to improve their communication with prospective, admitted students. But I also don’t feel like these students should be made to feel like a “recruited quarterback”. There is a middle ground and I probably lean toward their current position.
The second issue I see is the mentality we foster in our children where we expect them to be wooed. Is it an offshoot of the “everyone gets a trophy generation”? Do they really need to be treated like a “recruited quarterback”? Imagine if it escalates?
Being warmly welcomed is one thing. Validation of accomplishments is another. However, sometimes I get the feeling that people are looking for validation of their perceived superiority. (I’m not saying that about you, Much2learn. I’m actually thinking of a few people in my own community.)
I disagree with this to a certain degree. One way of trying to keep “the best and brightest” (and the most important in my opinion) is to build strong, desirable, marketable degrees. UIUC is certainly doing this in some areas of study…and doing it with less state funding.
Lastly, I just want to reiterate that Illinois has a huge number of very capable students, many of whom would think they are a part of “the best and brightest” pool. UIUC can’t accommodate them all…and as others have said a lot of the “best and brightest” would not find UIUC desirable, whether that’s due to prestige, location, sports or whatever. So I’m not sure what people are proposing…stronger directionals to stem ‘brain drain’? I agree with BeeDAre that it would take a lot to change how they are viewed in-state, especially with so many established, affordable neighboring state schools.
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