Why does anyone go to an out of state public school if they can get in to their in-state flagship?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nonsense. That’s just rationalizing. It is fine to say it is not worth it but even one state away is substantially different.

hahahaha. Talk about rationalizing.

I have seen this play out on my Facebook as a parent. The kids who stayed in-state (ex. UMD, UVA) seem to keep most of their same high school friend group. Same high school, but the kids go out-of-state (ex. UNC, Clemson) seem to make an entirely new, additional friend group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because there is an advantage to expanding one’s worldview. That is not a knock on staying in state as there are other pluses and minuses but I view the new frame of reference is important

But is it worth an extra 200,000?

No it is not worth it. These state schools are just as homogeneous as UMD and the Virginia ones, as far as geography. So I don't see it being worth for DC to meet a bunch of people from WI, PA, or CO. If you really want to expand your world view, go to a private school, where you will get demographic diversity. You won't find that at a state flagship.

I went to Wisconsin. There are a lot of students from the east coast there and to a slightly lesser extent, California. It was always funny to me because those students almost universally tended to hang out with each other (ok, maybe if they really wanted to expand their boundaries they'd hang out with kids from Mequon or Lake Forest!!!). They usually lived in private apartments or one or two specific residence halls known to have a lot of coastal/Greek life students - NOT the residence halls with all of the Wisconsin schmucks. They tended to all join the same handful of fraternities or sororities. They definitely weren't associating in any meaningful way with kids from say, the rural Northwoods or inner city Milwaukee schools.

I can't speak to other states, but Wisconsin? Yeah, it didn't seem to be about anything like more than a change of scenery and wanting to go to a party school. Which is fine, no judgment, but expanding one's worldview? Hahahah. Hilariously and adorably gullible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they go to UMD they meet regional kids. If they go to Wisconsin or Michigan or Penn State, they meet kids from all over the country. There is a large DMV population at Wisconsin so your kid will find his tribe but they will meet a lot of others from every state. The cultural, political, and geographic differences are big. Madison is a state capital surrounded by 4 lakes and the hub for a major international research institution. Sports and activities are different. College Park is an urban campus. UMD is a great school but very different from other big public universities.

So while UMD is only about 20% out of state students, UM Ann Arbor, CU Boulder, Penn State and Wisconsin Madison are all around 40%. How much extra money is that additional 1 out of 5 students from out of state worth?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because there is an advantage to expanding one’s worldview. That is not a knock on staying in state as there are other pluses and minuses but I view the new frame of reference is important

But is it worth an extra 200,000?

No it is not worth it. These state schools are just as homogeneous as UMD and the Virginia ones, as far as geography. So I don't see it being worth for DC to meet a bunch of people from WI, PA, or CO. If you really want to expand your world view, go to a private school, where you will get demographic diversity. You won't find that at a state flagship.

For perspective, the extra $100k-200k to a multi-millionaire is like you middle class shmucks going a trim level higher on your Honda CRV crossover, ex. LX to EX. Are you going to hyper-analyze that? No, you just do it, like without a second thought at the dealer. The rich do not care. And again, there is STATUS signaling when everyone else sends their kid to college X and Y and you send yours to out-of-state Z. Look at this thread for proof, all of you pikers are seething with envy.

You’ve made the best argument so far for sending the kids to their in state school. Thank you, sincerely.

[Anonymous]

1) People get into better schools - mine was MIT
2) Flagships screw people that get in - UW you have to apply for majors. Don't have a 4.0? Nope, not going to be a computer scientist
3) People don't get into the school UVA being a great example of that
4) Kids that want to be nowhere near their parents.

[Anonymous]

My kid really wants to live in Colorado as an adult so I could see paying for UC Boulder as the first step towards making that happen. We could easily afford it so not sure what the issue is. Of we had less money, we wouldn't consider it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's what my daughters would call a "flex," a status symbol which makes less affluent people jealous.

Also, private college is the same price as OOS tuition at a public university. If you had the savings to afford private, it doesn't matter if the kid wants to go to Wisconsin or SMU or NYU. The parents and grandparents just let the kid decide; there's immense joy in providing a kid or grandkid with a ticket to go to college anywhere they want.

That's not necessarily true at all, and it can go either direction. Some privates give lots of merit aid to bring the cost down closer to/the same as in-state public schools (I went to a private college for less than the state flagship would have cost at the time due to a large merit scholarship). And some publics don't charge OOS tuition as high as privates. At UMD, OOS tuition is $36,683, and at VT, it's $33,857, which is much less than privates (tuition at Allegheny College, for example, is $51,910). Some publics do charge a lot OOS, though, like UMich at $52,904.

Purdue's OOS tuition is $28,794. So if you're interesting in engineering, it's interesting to think about whether you would prefer UMD, Purdue for about 70k more, or UMich for about 160k more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nonsense. That’s just rationalizing. It is fine to say it is not worth it but even one state away is substantially different.

hahahaha. Talk about rationalizing.

I have seen this play out on my Facebook as a parent. The kids who stayed in-state (ex. UMD, UVA) seem to keep most of their same high school friend group. Same high school, but the kids go out-of-state (ex. UNC, Clemson) seem to make an entirely new, additional friend group.

My experience is that those who stay in state remain in touch with their old friend group but build an additional entire new friend group too. My kid sees high school friends he goes to UVA with when he comes back home and maybe a couple times a month at school, but his primary friend group is primarily people he met there.

[Anonymous]

Because in my state, the in-state options are middle of the pack for quality, and I know when we lived in NOVA that it was hard to get accepted into top Virginia schools, even as a resident.

Without merit, private schools are still largely more expensive than out of state publics-- so that may or may not be an option.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nonsense. That’s just rationalizing. It is fine to say it is not worth it but even one state away is substantially different.

hahahaha. Talk about rationalizing.

I have seen this play out on my Facebook as a parent. The kids who stayed in-state (ex. UMD, UVA) seem to keep most of their same high school friend group. Same high school, but the kids go out-of-state (ex. UNC, Clemson) seem to make an entirely new, additional friend group.

+1. Haha has a chip about being provencial.

[Anonymous]

If you are a Dc resident, DC-TAG is worth $68,000, so that "extra 100-200K" becomes a lot more manageable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1) People get into better schools - mine was MIT
2) Flagships screw people that get in - UW you have to apply for majors. Don't have a 4.0? Nope, not going to be a computer scientist
3) People don't get into the school UVA being a great example of that
4) Kids that want to be nowhere near their parents.

Yes, I can see why someone would pay extra for an MIT. I was asking why someone would pay double for an out-of-state public school, over their in-state public school , assuming they get in to both. There have been a lot of reasonable answers and some astonishingly defensive angry answers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nonsense. That’s just rationalizing. It is fine to say it is not worth it but even one state away is substantially different.

hahahaha. Talk about rationalizing.

I have seen this play out on my Facebook as a parent. The kids who stayed in-state (ex. UMD, UVA) seem to keep most of their same high school friend group. Same high school, but the kids go out-of-state (ex. UNC, Clemson) seem to make an entirely new, additional friend group.

My experience is that those who stay in state remain in touch with their old friend group but build an additional entire new friend group too. My kid sees high school friends he goes to UVA with when he comes back home and maybe a couple times a month at school, but his primary friend group is primarily people he met there.

You're romanticizing how college used to be before social media and iPhones. NoVa and District rich and umc kids who to to UVA hang out with most of the same damn kids they all knew in high school, whether they were literally at the same high school or not. I didn't say they make literally zero new friends, but almost always their core is going to be the same orbit from high school. Unless you're some kid from podunk nowhere and NEED to make all new friends, of course. Which might be why you're personally defensive about this, because you had to make all new friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because there is an advantage to expanding one’s worldview. That is not a knock on staying in state as there are other pluses and minuses but I view the new frame of reference is important

But is it worth an extra 200,000?

No it is not worth it. These state schools are just as homogeneous as UMD and the Virginia ones, as far as geography. So I don't see it being worth for DC to meet a bunch of people from WI, PA, or CO. If you really want to expand your world view, go to a private school, where you will get demographic diversity. You won't find that at a state flagship.

For perspective, the extra $100k-200k to a multi-millionaire is like you middle class shmucks going a trim level higher on your Honda CRV crossover, ex. LX to EX. Are you going to hyper-analyze that? No, you just do it, like without a second thought at the dealer. The rich do not care. And again, there is STATUS signaling when everyone else sends their kid to college X and Y and you send yours to out-of-state Z. Look at this thread for proof, all of you pikers are seething with envy.

Yes many do. Just like make “rich” people don’t spend $5000 to carry a Chanel purse because the recognize is an absurd and stupid amount of money for what you are getting. Many wealthy people value their money and aren’t flippant with how it is spent

[Anonymous]

"For what you are getting ...." ?
PP, you have no idea
You have no idea re: each individual's circumstance
and why an out of state choice is better