Wow. That is a pretty damning indictment. However, I didn’t need these tables to know that kids from out of state who were choosing to go to U Vt wanted a particular experience, that usually ranked skiing/boarding as more important than academics. And forgive me, but if a person is 18 years old, and hasn’t figured out how to resist social pressure to not do well in school, they’ve got bigger issues than the fact that their minimally selective flagship state U is admitting partiers, both in-state and out-of-state.
As the cost of college has skyrocketed, families that don’t qualify for tuition assistance are choosing their state flagships. This has led, in many states, to much higher selectivity and higher academic standards, since they are no longer admitting B- students, but now A minus students, on the average. So in general, the atmosphere at certain flagship state U’s has greatly improved. No more annual spring party riots.
Interestingly, many of the state U’s that lead in the percentage of out-of-state students are minimally selective schools from states with low populations. Vermont, Delaware, New Hampshire, Rhode Island - how many flagship level college-bound graduates do these states even produce, annually? So sure, that middle class kid who wants to party and cannot get into their own state’s flagship (and besides, who wants to go there, it’ll be just like high school all over, since everyone from their high school is going to the in-state flagship), decides to go to a neighboring state’s flagship. Besides, it’s less selective than their own state’s flagship, which they probably weren’t going to get into, anyway.
The reality is that many students who are admitted to only minimally selective schools (meaning that they accept >70% of applicants) are not particularly interested in working hard in school, or don’t have the preparation or innate ability to do college level work. Whether private or public, these schools are filled with students who see college as the thing you get to do after high school - you get to leave home (but not earn your living), you’re supposed to do enough schoolwork to not flunk out, but mostly, you’re having a good time doing the things that your parents wouldn’t have put up with - sex, drugs, alcohol, all to excess. The selectivity of the schools is the issue, not the percentage of students whom they admit from out of state.
One might just as easily say (ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM) that minimally selective colleges are largely enrolling people who really shouldn’t be in college. It’s not the effect of out-of-state students on flagship universities. It’s the expansion of colleges in order to very expensively warehouse kids who are having an extended, dependent adolescence.
A possible solution is re-directing some of the public education dollar toward good, effective technical high schools and good, cheap, college-aged technical education with apprenticeships in the traditional trades and high-tech trades. We already have this for ancillary medical fields - the community colleges train and place LPNs, RNs, respiratory therapists, X-ray techs, lab techs, etc. We need the same for all the trades.
The solution is not that flagship state U’s shouldn’t admit some out of state students. It’s that they need to be more selective, overall. U Michigan Ann Arbor is #17 on that list, has about 45% out-of-state students, and certainly no one could say that the out-of-state students are detracting from the academic experience there!
As for low socioeconomic students leaving the flagships for another state college - they’re realizing that they can live at home far more cheaply, and get the education they want at a branch campus, or a 4 yr state college, while saving about 15K/yr in room and board costs. I seriously doubt that a motivated low socioeconomic student, who has made it through the misery of being an achiever in a school district where peers at best denigrate and ostracize, and at worst physically attack students who work hard and do well in school, is going to be driven out of their flagship state U by out-of-state sorority “mean girls”.