NYT Graphic: An analysis of migration patterns among college freshmen

I have no real dog in the UIUC fight, my kids were never interested, but I am not sure exactly what the benefit is to me the Illinois taxpayer for UIUC to have a great global reputation, and why do I care about its reputation in China in particular? Many of those “reputations” are built on very little knowledge and there’s often a “I heard of it so it must be good, or I never heard of it so it can’t be any good” mentality, so why would I care?