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[quote=Anonymous]This topic was recently on the A2C Reddit (not referencing the New Yorker article) and a poster there made some great points about IL, in particular, and NJ is very similar.

In IL there is one big flagship, it is competitive for acceptance especially in certain areas (like Engineering) and it is pretty expensive in-state. Additionally, none of the other public options in IL have a lot of name recognition, or big sports scene and the like. Contrast that with nearby states: Indiana has IU and Purdue, Michigan has UMich and Mich St., even Iowa has U of Iowa and Iowa St. So the IL kids that can't get into UIUC apply to Indiana and Iowa and Mich St and the like, and in many cases it's not that much more $ and it's a less competitive admit.

NJ has a similar situation but maybe *worse*. Rutgers is the only flagship and only state school with any national name recognition, and even then, since it's not "University of NJ" or whatever, some people have no idea it's the NJ flagship university. Many out-of-staters could not name another public NJ university, even though there are plenty. Moreover, because NJ is a high population density state, has a good public transportation system, and Rutgers is basically in the middle of the state, it's an hour (and a train or bus ride) from most of rest of the state. For the same reason, most of the other public options have pretty large commuter populations. So students often don't feel they are "going away", in going to Rutgers, and they don't like the campus experience of the other publics, they just want to experience something different. Also, a lot of the parents are high income and will pay for that OOS experience even though their kid got into Rutgers and it's the better ranked school and has a lot of excellent programs.

Although Rutgers is Big 10 for sports now, it just doesn't have the feel of Big 10. So kids go to Penn St, or down south. Or they go to IU (but only to Kelley or Jacobs) or to Purdue but only for Engineering. Or to CU because they want some mountains. Or to URI or UNH because they couldn't get into Rutgers NB and definitely didn't want to go to Rutgers-Newark. And the schools are happy to take their OOS money, and happy to have them as students because they are often well-prepared for college by their excellent suburban public or magnet school.

Our school publishes a survey every year of the Seniors, and the class of 2025 data showed that only 18% of the college-bound seniors (the vast majority of the class goes to college) were going to in-state schools. All in-state schools combined, not just Rutgers. Which is insanely low. Meanwhile, about half were going to a public university.[/quote]

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