<p>Dad II-
Many posters have kindly responded to your questions. Will you be returning the courtesy and respond to theirs?</p>
<p>I think hawkette’s post #19 is a bit misleading-add about 9-10K on for Room & Board, her numbers only include the tuition & fees for OOS students. If you are OOS, you will probably be paying for Room & Board. (unless you are commuting across state lines)</p>
<p>The State of Florida has a program called Bright Futures that gives full tuition scholarships to qualifying IS students. A large majority of IS students accepted to UF (90% maybe) get this. UF waives OOS tuition for many students. IS tuition is less than $5k and OOS around $23.5k. Just a wave (no pun intended) of their magic wand “gives” you about $18k. What do they get? Top student, diversity, and the equivalent of a full paying IS student. Bird in the hand…</p>
<p>slumom,
Sorry if you felt that my earlier post was misleading, but I was trying to present information that is standard at each school and for all OOS students. </p>
<p>I agree that students should consider costs like Room & Board, Books & Supplies, Personal Expenses. However, I would caution against a standard amount for these as the costs will vary more than most folks realize. I didn’t include these costs in my earlier numbers as a) I don’t have the info for all of the 33 colleges that I posted T&F data on; and b) estimates of personal expenses will vary.</p>
<p>I live close to both NC and VA flagship schools…and will comment that although it is hard to beat the iconic beauty of The Lawn on The Grounds 
and the kids at UVA are tops…my impression is that the class sizes and the honors programming offered at UNCCH are better buys for the outrageous OOS tuition you will fork over. UVA considers all its students to be honors students, and does not offer honors classes much…they do offer Echols which gives one year of honors dorms plus advantages in course selection and they do offer The Jefferson…paid for by a foundation…full rides. However, it is well known that scores of people not in Echols have Echols like stats…and there are not special paths for honors kids really. All UVA students have equal opps although the Commerce school is selective after you are there a while However you will not find that the class sizes at UVA compare well in my opinion with what your same dollars will buy at a private college. Depending on your child and his/her goals and temperament…class size may mean nothing or alot. UVA has the number one undergrad business program in the USA and has many other very successful tracks and I never met anyone who didn’t love it there.</p>
<p>However, if you are willing to pay the high OOS rates, take a look at what the honors program means for OOS students at Chapel Hill. There are more perks for the dollar.</p>
<p>Just my comparison of two wonderful flagship colleges where outcomes are great for all…for OOS kids. YOu can always enter the extremely difficult paths that lead to Morehouse and Jefferson outcomes but you will be pitted against amazing students from all over the USA.</p>
<p>Our son gets invited to the Honors program at his state U every year and they often ask him why he doesn’t join the honors program with his high GPA. He has his own apartment so honors housing isn’t an issue and his apartment is much closer to the building where he takes most of his courses. The honors program has additional requirements which may be useful but I’m far happier that he has multiple part-time jobs that are related to his major. I am hoping that he picks up a research assistant job this semester. There are several available on or near campus. His major is fairly demanding and sometimes he doesn’t have spare cycles between courses and part-time jobs.</p>
<p>The large lecture and weeder courses didn’t bother him. He learned how to navigate working with TAs and figuring things on his own without outside help. Life can be like that in the real world. He’s taking upper-level courses now so class sizes are in the 8-15 students range and the students remaining are usually serious. I don’t really think that class size matters to him that much. He usually tries to learn all of the material before the course starts.</p>
<p>We are in CA, but D1 took a look at Pitt. COA is not much more than in-state, living on campus at Cal. Throw in a little merit money and the possibility of some big tuition increases at UC in the next few years and voila, the OOS premium disappears.</p>
<p>D loves to be in Honors. Lots of benefits, including few Merit scholarships but most importantly is priority registration. She used to live in Honors dorms too (not as noisy), but at her school kids are not required to be in Honors to live in Honors dorm. She is in apatment now.</p>
<p>Our son came in with a year of dual-enrollment credits so he’s ahead of his classmates in registering for courses. In upper-class courses for his major, enrollment isn’t a problem. Priority registration in publics is a nice perk though given their economic attraction this year.</p>
<p>S2 just received an email from UC Berkeley saying he meets their profile for admitted freshman and urges him to apply. I found this to be odd since they notoriously do not accept OOS students (many here have been accepted by Stanford and rejected by UCB). Are they trying to recruit more OOS because of the budget shortfall? They do generate an additional $20,000 per year or so for OOS students. If they admit 1000 more than usual, that’s an extra $20 million a year, so it kind of makes sense. I have heard, though, that because of the CA cutbacks and the resulting lack of some courses, it is increasingly difficult to graduate in 4 years from UCB, which even makes it more expensive. S2 is not all that interested, but may apply (he is more enamored with UCSB if he were to attend an OOS public).</p>
<p>"Are they trying to recruitment more OOS because of the budget shortfall? "
you got it!
“I have heard, though, that because of the CA cutbacks and the resulting lack of some courses, it is increasingly difficult to graduate in 4 years from UCB, which even makes it more expensive.”
you got it again!</p>
<p>To add to Faline’s post: I just want to point out that UVA also offers special opportunities for Rodman Scholars (the Echols counterpart in SEAS). Smaller classes, a modified curriculum, numerous advising opportunities, peer support, yes, “honors” housing (although that almost seems more like a punishment than a perk!), priority registration, great activities, special seminars. D is really enjoying it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard “Mom, I love it here!” </p>
<p>Currently UVA meets full need for all students; don’t know what UNC-CH’s policy is in that regard.</p>
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<p>These are pros of large schools, not OOS publics.</p>
<p>^^True 'nuff^^
But looking at my son’s list, every public has >20,000 undergrads and every private has <10,000 (except for Northeastern). And any LAC he was even remotely interested in had <4000 (and rejected precisely because of those cited qualities).</p>
<p>Well, not all publics are like that… just most of them are. I’m applying to UMin- Morris, one of the <4000 student LACs you cited. It happens to be an OOS public for me.</p>
<p>momread, that is fabulous! Congrats to your son.</p>
<p>Yes, the list of large >10,000 privates with major sports is pretty short.</p>
<p>^^Unfortunately for us^^
But UWISC remains near the top of the list (not a reference to size; but a plug for barrons)!</p>
<p>The list of >10,000 private universities with major sports isn’t THAT short. It includes USC and the University of Miami, either of which ought to satisfy on many scores. And Stanford, Boston College and Northwestern are close enough to 10,000 for the difference not to matter; they have some pretty nice sports, too. Penn and Cornell qualify size-wise, and their sports can feel big.</p>
<p>+Syracuse</p>
<p>And of course in son’s case there are other qualifiers, like a reasonable chance of acceptance…so not top 20.</p>