Best State University?

sakky
Sat, 10 Sep 2005 10:34:18 +0000

California has to win the prize at having so many Public Unversities doing so well. In one recent, over quoted, ranking they dominate…because there simply are no other states with so many quality universities…and before you throw population statistics…If there are 8 UCs in the top fifty (SF doesn’t count because it doesn’t have undergraduate colleges like the others.) then states like NY and Texas, Florida should have multiple states in the top 50 as well. Merced will join the top 50 list in a few years. (Over 200,000 students attending top UCs) a round of applause please.



First off, I don’t think tht Merced will join the top 50 anytime soon. After all, Riverside is nowhere close to being in the top 50. Let’s face it - schools need time to develop. Merced is going to need a few decades just to catch up to where Riverside is now.

Furthermore, I would point out that a big reason why the UC’s are so strong compared to the public schools in the East is because there was a void to be filled. If UC seized its opportunities, it is because there were opportunities that were available to be seized. Let’s face it - the West Coast has a paucity of strong private schools compared to the East. Stanford, Caltech, the Claremont Colleges, USC, and a few others, and that’s about it. Contrast that with all of the Ivies, the slew of elite LAC’s, MIT, and so on in the East. The truth is, the East Coast public schools were basically strangled in the cradle because all of the best students and best profs would rather go to the elite East Coast private schools, which collectively suck out all the oxygen in the room.

Take the state of Massachusets for example. It’s pretty darn hard for UMass to ever become strong as long as Harvard and MIT are sitting right there. Contrast that with Berkeley that had decades to develop with no serious local competition which stopped only with the rise of Stanford (Stanford was born a weak backwater of little consequence and serious financial problems and who ascended to elite status only around the mid 20th century).

Now don’t get me wrong. I give credit where credit is due - the opportunities were there, and UC seized them. There are plenty of other parts of the country, which shall remain nameless, where there are neither strong private schools nor strong public schools. Hence, the opportunities are there too, but nobody seized them. So give credit to UC for seizing the opportunities, but also recognize that there were opportunities available to be seized.