Should this year's high school juniors plan for applying DURING a gap year?

StudyEcon
Thu, 30 Apr 2020 00:30:43 +0000

Interesting thread but what has become apparent with many recent stories about the financial hit colleges are taking is that state colleges are going to be more dependent on OOS students and their higher tuition costs to make up some of the shortfall. That will change the admission decision process more than gap students.

In California, there have been attempts to limit the percentage of OOS admits, but in this economic environment, the schools are going to do what they need to as a means of maximizing tuition. The state is broke, so politicians are certainly not going to send any more money. And what people don’t realize is that many current students cannot stand online classes and will likely skip a quarter/semester if this continues on into the Fall (which it already has at several CA schools). So there goes more tuition dollars.

I suspect the budget impact and shift to OOS students will have a much bigger impact on the class of 2021 than the gap year impact. It’s not just going to be California, but other states with public schools that are difficult to get into will be even more difficult for in-state students (see Michigan, Washington and so on). People will gripe all they want, but all bets are off when public school funding and tuition dollars are reduced so dramatically.