Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seriously why are people looking or choosing OOS Alabama? It’s one of the lowest ranked schools and keeps declining. What am I missing?

High levels of merit aid for academically qualified kids. Especially if your kid is planning on graduate school (where they can chase a "name"), getting through undergrad for less money is a huge draw. There is a good honors college, and a motivated kid can get a good education there.

Is it Harvard? No. But it's not a clown college either, and it's not like they lock you in the state after graduation.

But this means kids and parents are just incredibly lazy in looking at schools. LSU, Oregon, Iowa, Iowa State, South Carolina..the list is actually fairly extensive...they all give high levels of merit for academically qualified kids.

Anonymous wrote:Seriously why are people looking or choosing OOS Alabama? It’s one of the lowest ranked schools and keeps declining. What am I missing?

High levels of merit aid for academically qualified kids. Especially if your kid is planning on graduate school (where they can chase a "name"), getting through undergrad for less money is a huge draw. There is a good honors college, and a motivated kid can get a good education there.

Is it Harvard? No. But it's not a clown college either, and it's not like they lock you in the state after graduation.

Alabama doesn’t play the USNWR game. Their admission rates are high, and as a result retention low. Scholarships are public and the same standards for everyone. Professor to student ratio is less favorable because they let their professors focus on research and teach fewer classes than higher ranked schools (e.g., Yale requires profs teach 4 classes a semester, Alabama requires 1). Professors can avoid teaching lower level classes. The prestige of the faculty at Alabama way outweighs the general student body. They pay professors very well and research funding is high. Their research is excellent and their grad programs ranked high - med and increasingly law. It is undeniable the opportunities for motivated and academic kids at the school. Upper level classes are fantastic and rigorous and small. Med, grad and job placement is notably high among the program kids. For people focused on “rankings” or social prestige, probably not a good fit.

Bama is a perfectly fine school. You aren't going to get a worse education compared to most flagship universities. It will be up to the student to make the most of it.

The rankings system does not measure the things kids or families use to make decisions.

Anonymous wrote:I just find it hard to understand that DCUM is so rank obsessed but then bottom of the barrel schools like Bama get recommended.

it is one bama booster.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a crap school, but it's notorious for Sorority Rush. In case you didn't know, that's a HUGE deal for a certain type of southern family whose goal in life is to get their daughters and sons married to other kids of well-to-do families of the south who are in sororities and fraternities in those types of institutions. They're the state politicians, business owners and company managers of the South, and their world is encompassed within those boundaries. The rest of the world does not exist. All blonde, all white, all Barbie, of course. Brunettes tolerated, POC need not apply.

Except they aren’t. Maybe a state politician and maybe somebody that owns some piddly business…but most of the folks with real money send their kids to the same top schools OOS as people everywhere.

There was a recent article about how some of the Bama sorority girls became famous online and earned some bucks as influencers. Nearly all mentioned how “great it was to not have to take any loans” and graduate debt free.

Not really. In the south, flagships are considered equal to private. I’m sure Bama parents own more successful businesses and have better political careers than you lol

First…most of the families at Bama are from OOS, so of course your premise is flawed. But it’s easy enough for you to look at the matriculations from top Alabama private schools and see most (like 85%) of the kids go to school OOS and most to private colleges. I work with one of the richest people in Alabama and his kids go to Vanderbilt and Princeton.

You don’t actually appear to know anyone in the south.

To be in the top 1% of earners in Alabama, you would need an annual income of approximately $577,017 as of September 2025, according to a recent study cited by Yahoo Finance.

Sorry, but $577k is DCUM middle class.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My high stats kid briefly entertained the idea of applying just to get the $$ offer. But, in the end, they didn't apply b/c it wasn't the type of place where they could actually see themselves going. They needed to try for a dream school and Bama wasn't it.

Ok.

But some prefer going to a big school with a gorgeous campus and lots of sports/activities in a warm climate.

Yes, but there are different types of students who go there. The ones who are going for the full ride may find that the environment is not the place where they want to spend their four years. Other kids are going for a different reasons and they love it there. My kid could’ve gotten a hefty scholarship for merit, but felt that the school was not a good fit and chose to go elsewhere.

I know two girls who went there on full rides. One from VA and one from Long Island. Both are what DCUM would consider middle class. They both love it and seem to have drank the kool aid.

Alabama isn't a good school, but that doesn't really matter if you get a hot wife and want to live in the South. They are a very fun, beautiful school and your frat brothers will get you a good job.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My high stats kid briefly entertained the idea of applying just to get the $$ offer. But, in the end, they didn't apply b/c it wasn't the type of place where they could actually see themselves going. They needed to try for a dream school and Bama wasn't it.

Ok.

But some prefer going to a big school with a gorgeous campus and lots of sports/activities in a warm climate.

Yes, but there are different types of students who go there. The ones who are going for the full ride may find that the environment is not the place where they want to spend their four years. Other kids are going for a different reasons and they love it there. My kid could’ve gotten a hefty scholarship for merit, but felt that the school was not a good fit and chose to go elsewhere.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seriously why are people looking or choosing OOS Alabama? It’s one of the lowest ranked schools and keeps declining. What am I missing?

It’s the full ride. My sample size is one but I know one kid who went there. Hated it and transferred to William and Mary after a year.

Well let me give you another data point so your views are balanced. Our kid who was a NMSF/NMF turned it down over our instate flagship. No way sending my kid down there. We are not even white.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seriously why are people looking or choosing OOS Alabama? It’s one of the lowest ranked schools and keeps declining. What am I missing?

Money. My DS's friend chose it over Virginia Tech for Engineering. He's OOS for both, Alabama gave him $28K per year, VT gave him nothing.

There are probably 20 other schools ranked much higher that would have provided $$$s to bring the COA lower than Alabama (based on the above, this means the kid is paying $30k out of pocket).

It’s fine if there were other things bf s the kid wanted, but apparently didn’t do his homework on what other schools would offer.

Name them and the scholarships than would make them cheaper, please.

Iowa, Iowa State, Oregon, Oregon State, South Carolina…my kid received enough from UGA that would bring the cost below what PP was paying to Alabama and that was just normal merit aid, not some special honors college scholarship…lsu…I could go on. NC State is another that gave my kid merit to bring it lower than what PP is paying for Alabama.

If you spend anytime researching you will find these and many other schools award lots of merit to any kid with decent stats.

Again, PP wasn’t getting a full ride…just enough to bring total cost down to $30k/year.

Anonymous wrote:I just find it hard to understand that DCUM is so rank obsessed but then bottom of the barrel schools like Bama get recommended.

It's probably just the same handful of people posting just to get a reaction.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a crap school, but it's notorious for Sorority Rush. In case you didn't know, that's a HUGE deal for a certain type of southern family whose goal in life is to get their daughters and sons married to other kids of well-to-do families of the south who are in sororities and fraternities in those types of institutions. They're the state politicians, business owners and company managers of the South, and their world is encompassed within those boundaries. The rest of the world does not exist. All blonde, all white, all Barbie, of course. Brunettes tolerated, POC need not apply.

Except they aren’t. Maybe a state politician and maybe somebody that owns some piddly business…but most of the folks with real money send their kids to the same top schools OOS as people everywhere.

There was a recent article about how some of the Bama sorority girls became famous online and earned some bucks as influencers. Nearly all mentioned how “great it was to not have to take any loans” and graduate debt free.

Not really. In the south, flagships are considered equal to private. I’m sure Bama parents own more successful businesses and have better political careers than you lol

First…most of the families at Bama are from OOS, so of course your premise is flawed. But it’s easy enough for you to look at the matriculations from top Alabama private schools and see most (like 85%) of the kids go to school OOS and most to private colleges. I work with one of the richest people in Alabama and his kids go to Vanderbilt and Princeton.

You don’t actually appear to know anyone in the south.

Anonymous wrote:My high stats kid briefly entertained the idea of applying just to get the $$ offer. But, in the end, they didn't apply b/c it wasn't the type of place where they could actually see themselves going. They needed to try for a dream school and Bama wasn't it.

Ok.

But some prefer going to a big school with a gorgeous campus and lots of sports/activities in a warm climate.