Would you trade your state's colleges for the UC?

Parents Forum
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<p>The CA college system was set up to reach all strata of college going students, with the different college systems picking up different kids. This is generalizing, of course, but the UCs are meant to pick up the top 15%, the Cal States are meant to pick up the top 40% and all those not ready or financially able start at the community colleges (which have a generous transfer route into a 4 year school). </p>

<p>CA does a pretty good job of offering a way to college for its residents, or at least it did before the money got tight…:(</p>

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<p>Obviously, my state does not have a UC-type public school system because it is not California. It just doesn’t have the resources to support that type of school. While UCs are good for the students who go there, I’m not sure if their current financial system is worth it for the people who don’t attend UCB/UCLA.</p>

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<p>California is about the same size as Canada in terms of population. I would definitely not trade the Canadian public education system for California’s system. But I’m heavily dissuaded by their financial woes as of late and the uncertainty about their future. I would however trade the weather!</p>

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<p>The Univ. of Illinois -Urbana-Champaign is ranked by USNews at #45 - tied with UC Irvine and behind 5 other UCs. If the Univ. of Illinois is world class (and I would agree that it is), then California certainly has more than just three.</p>

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<p>More like, California’s population is such that it needs about 6 (give or take a few of the UCs and Cal Poly SLO) campuses to handle the number of students who would go to the single state flagship in some other state. The alternative would be a single flagship campus with over 100,000 students (though that still would be nowhere near the largest university campus internationally).</p>

<p>Of course, California has 26 other campuses in the UC and CSU systems that fill the same roles that the non-flagship campuses in other states do.</p>

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<p>“In New Hampshire, we have a flagship in the northern part of the state and one campus in the southern part of the state that is a two-year college though it does teach evening graduate courses.”</p>

<p>In the northern part of the state? Isn’t Durham right outside of Portsmouth in the southern part of the state? I swear that was were it was when we looked at it last year!</p>

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<p>We are in Calif. and are looking out of state for our youngest of 4, who is now a Jr. in HS. The financial state of the UC system is only getting worse and has become costly even for in-state residents. Our 3rd one is currently at Penn State which will end up being a quarter of the price of UCLA (originally her 1st choice), even with travel expenses. The UC’s are overcrowded and overpriced.</p>

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<p>{There are 64 SUNY facilities, 2 and 4 year.</p>

<p>My cousins attended Cal schools as they all live there and my aunt worked for the system.</p>

<p>I wouldn’t trade the SUNY system but I sure would trade the weather and the climate." </p>

<p>There is a great variety of state schools in NY and a few good ones for sure but the campuses are all so blah and a sea of sameness. </p>

<p>I would have loved to have gone to Berkeley but I didn’t have the grades to get in. So I went to Colorado instead. It was all about the “scene” for me way back when. </p>

<p>My best friend from college is a Californian and lives there now and her two kids who had to go to Berkeley felt like it was a punishment. They both wanted to go to LACs in the north east but their father is cheap, so.</p>

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<p>S/he must be getting some good scholarships or something, because Penn State’s out-of-state cost of attendance is around $39,400, and UCLA does not cost four times that.</p>

<p>The less expensive out-of-state list price schools include Minnesota and Virginia Tech among those with high reputations, and public schools in the Dakotas. Alabama and UAB offer full out-of-state tuition merit scholarships based on GPA and ACT/SAT stats.</p>

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<p>I live in California, and I’d like to trade my state’s colleges for the UC/CSU/CC system from a few decades ago, please.</p>

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<p>Pizzagirl wrote:

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<p>Because UC campuses other than Berkeley and UCLA account for over half of the 57 UC faculty and researchers who have won [58</a> Nobel Prizes](<a href=“http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/nobel/]58”>Nobel Laureates | University of California), including 25 prizes since 1995.</p>

<p>And because they’ve got great mascots: Gauchos! Anteaters!! Banana Slugs!!!</p>

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<p>SlitheyTove – I second that motion!</p>

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<p>@coureur, sorry to break it to you, but the USNWR rankings are based on arbitrary and meaningless criteria.</p>

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<p>Yes, I had heard of the Banana Slugs. But Merced, Riverside, Davis, Santa Cruz, whatever - they are about as meaningless to this midwestern girl as Springfield, Peoria, Bloomington, Carbondale and Edwardsville would be to Californians. But for some reason, Californians seem to think that the rest of the country is paying rapt attention to them, as noted in the OP! It is somewhat arrogant.</p>

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<p>Is this any different conceptually from most other states - which have a state flagship for the top, directional or satellite campuses for the next tier and community colleges for those not ready or financially able? It doesn’t seem any different. What’s the difference if in CA it’s called a CSU-(whatever city) and in Illinois it’s called Western Illinois University? Same difference, IMO.</p>

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<p>Yeah, I give the USNWR rankings about the same credibility as I do rankings based on Universities Pizza Girl Had Heard Of. (Sorry, PG, don’t mean to insult.)</p>

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<p>No insult taken!</p>

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<p>We did trade the UCs for another state’s system. With 5 kiddos we moved from the Northern CA region to NC.</p>

<p>After years of research I picked up and moved the family from CA to NC because of the UCs, and CSU’s. Having been in the system myself and knowing the costs it was more than beneficial for us as a family.</p>

<p>The NC system is similar to the UCs. But different where it counts. The schools within the system are extremely varied and offer many different options. With 16+ campuses across the state there are so many choices.</p>

<p>UNC Chapel Hill is the state flagship, has a med school (ranked #2 for primary care, and tuition is $16,000 for the YEAR), dental school, business, law school, a fantastic school of public health…
NCSU has the engineering school, the vet school with a great undergrad program to support it, college of textiles (specializes in plastics and other high tech polymers), college of agriculture that in my opinion rivals UC Davis and SLO’s animal science programs by ofering a more varied track for animal science majors, residential programs for the animal science labs (7 of them including an equine breeding program with horses placing in the preakness)…schools of education, comp sci…the list is extensive. An award winning digital animation major/department placing many with Disney’s imagineers.</p>

<p>There are several HBCU’s that were private and have since been absorbed into the state system but have retained their LAC feel, size and teaching philosophies. NC A&T, an HBCU is opening a brand new facility with UNC Greensboro granting BS, MS, and Phds in Nanoengineering and Nanoscience. Tuition is $2300 per semester, unlimited eating plan at the BEST dining facility is $1100 for the semester. HUGE difference to the UCs. And Greensboro, A&T location is beautiful.</p>

<p>UNC Wilimgton has a fab marine biology program and is right on the beach in Wilmington. UNC Charlotte is in the hub of much US banking and is a huge campus. UNC Asheville is an artists’ onclave and is nestled in the Smokey Mtns, gorgeous! Small LAC and tuition is a few thousand. East Carolina also has a med school and is the cheapest med school in the US and a brand new dental school. NCCU is another HBCU, Fayetteville State services many of the members of Fort Bragg and Seymour Johnson AFB…the list is huge.</p>

<p>UNC School of Fine and performing Arts not only is a pipeline to NYC and Chicago but offers a 2 year boarding school for high school students for fine and performing arts for FREE to all NC residents. Tuition for the undergrad is again a few thousand for the year.</p>

<p>With 16 campuses that are so varied it was a clear choice to easily change up for the UCs. </p>

<p>The main benefit, even beyond undergrad is really in the grad school programs. With a daughter wanting vet school, another in med school, one pursing dental school… the in-state options were great ESPECIALLY with some of the lowest tuitions in the US for said grad programs.</p>

<p>Not only is son’s med school tuition low but they have been more than generous with scholie money, not happening at the UCs. He has a full-tuition scholarship+ extras for med school not available at most med schools. Even the Ivy med school unit loans lost out to the generosity of the UNC system.</p>

<p>So yes, we traded and would do it over and over again. Recommend it to anyone still looking at the UC. OOS matriculants are capped at 18% but OOS tuition is still lower than many in-state options in other states. CC tuition here is $50 per unit. And the CCs here have classes that are numbered the same as the 4 year system, making it easy for transfers. Full transparency.</p>

<p>NC population is no where near CA and the COL here is much, much less. </p>

<p>Kat
UNC Chapel Hill undergrad tuition is around $5000 for the year, its $16,000 for the med school and that includes the fees, unlike the UCs where the fees are so high. NC A&T population is around 4000, UNC CH- 15,000, NCSU 20,000+, huge range</p>

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<p>So annasdad, what rankings do you look at?</p>

<p>And thanks katwkittens, what a thorough run down you gave us on NC. I had heard it was hard to get into those schools if you were OOS.</p>

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<p>Yes, that’s perpetual song of anyone whose favorite school isn’t as highly-ranked as he would like. Sorry to break it to you, but the fact remains that, despite its flaws, the USNews ranking is by far the one most widely used by the colleges themselves to establish, judge, and compare their quality. </p>

<p>This institutional focus on the USNews ranking includes the Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. When discussing its own ranking let’s see what that school leads with:</p>

<p>[Rankings</a> | Illinois](<a href=“http://illinois.edu/about/overview/facts/rankings.html]Rankings”>http://illinois.edu/about/overview/facts/rankings.html)</p>

<p>Yup. They’re all over that USNews stuff too.</p>