re: College is a racket

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Without getting too far into politics, this is the result of cutting budgets and cutting taxes and 'allowing a freer market'. For better or worse

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Yeah, the loans / college debt are much more symptomatic of the entire American way. People increasingly enticed run up credit, the government operating at a loss while increasing the billions it pays out privately owned companies that make a killing like military contractors.

At least, the universities are perhaps producing a few people that are able think critically along the way.

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This is an example of why I think Alabama's plan of boosting out of state enrollment is a bad idea. How many of these kids from California, Illinois, etc. are actually staying in Alabama?

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If the state wants to reap more of the benefits from higher education, it needs to put up more of the money. Pretty simple, really.

To give an example...

Alabama's website tries to hide the exact origin of most of its students for some reason. I've never seen another SEC school give fewer details about where their students originate.

With that said, Alabama's current enrollment of 38,400 kids is made up like this:

40.1% are from the state of Alabama
17.0% are from neighboring states (GA, FL, TN, MS)
14.4% are from other "Southern" States (TX, OK, AR, LA, KY, SC, NC, VA, WV, MD, & DE)
25.4% are from states outside the South (I imagine CA, NY, NJ, IL are probably the Top 4)

When 40% of your students originate from states that don't border Alabama, that's pretty incredible. I would love to see where these kids end up after graduating.

Quite frankly, the job market in Alabama is not good enough for most of these kids to stay in state. I'm sure a bunch end up in Atlanta and Nashville, but I bet most end up closer to where they came from.... How many of these fall off the radar and become inactive alums? I would bet a pretty high percentage.

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15k+ actually seems like a lot of in-state students for a university in a state the size of Alabama.

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It's actually not.

Auburn has more in-state kids than Alabama.... a total of 16,988.

The number of in-state kids at Alabama was higher in 2009 than it is now. Back in '09, Alabama had 16,688 kids from the state of Alabama.... making up 68% of its total enrollment. Now 9 years later, they've decreased the number of in-state kids by nearly 1200 yet increased total enrollment exponentially. Today just 40.1% of kids are from in-state.

It's not necessarily a bad plan, I just think its interesting. Not sure a major State University has ever expanded its enrollment so drastically almost exclusively with kids from not only out of state, but kids from other regions of the country.

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The University of Alabama has faced much criticism from within the state of Alabama and even outside the state for recruiting so many out of state students. But UA has never made it easier for out of state students to get admitted than in state students. And in fact, it has frozen in state tuition two years in a row, and is now offering merit scholarships for in state applicants with an ACT as low as 21 as long as they have GPA's of 3.5. Of course, the higher the ACT, the bigger the scholarship, but it is still very generous to offer scholarships to students with an ACT of 24 or less.

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With Alabama joining Ole Miss at the near 70% out-of-state line, I can see how in-staters would be mad.

However, what you reiterated is more of a systemic problem for Alabama. Plain and simple, there aren't enough qualified applicants in Alabama that meet the standards of the applicant pool at large. This can be easily explained, three-fold:

(1) Alabama as a state has less people than several southern cities like Atlanta, Dallas, or Houston. These mega-cities fight for in-state spots at not-much-bigger in-state schools. Many very qualified students, who come from good families, send their kids to Alabama instead. Alabama also gives away merit scholarships quite frequently. Over a 10-20 year period, the quality of the school's professional network has and will continue to see an incredible boost due to the influx of new talent.

(2) "There's a problem, Happy. You're not any GOOD." Alabama as a state ranks 50th in education. 50 out of 50. Last. No one behind them. As Alabama (and Auburn) continue to run away from their in-state base, it should be the mission to play catch-up, not hold the schools back.

(3) Funding: Georgia, Texas, and Louisiana all participate in the lottery. In Georgia, so long as you are admitted and maintain a 3.0 GPA, you get the HOPE scholarship, which pays the cost of tuition, books, and boarding for 4 years of college.

If Alabama again could get their collective head out of their arse and stop worrying about children that are actually born, maybe they'll get the support needed to get that passed.

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College is a racket by RatRodDawg

FakeTailbackU (AU)...I take it that you couldn't get into either Georgia or Georgia Tech, right?

Schools have the right to choose whomever they want. If you don't like it, try applying to the University of Moscow...I'll bet they'll take you.

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Listen boy, I grew up in the state of Alabama and I got into all 5 schools to which I applied one of which was Georgia. I've made plenty of money running my own company for years so I don't owe you any goddamn thing. This was a good thread until you fricked it up, but then every thread you're in is fricked because you are a troll.

There's already reports of Gen Z bypassing on college.

It's also a good model to expand enrollment. Any forward-thinking administrator is laying the foundation for an online future.

Praxis does apprentice type stuff, as an alternative to the college rat race:

LINK /

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Ideally, it would be. However, I think the biggest growth many people have in college is the very, very underrated social aspect. I'm not talking about fraternity parties, or long evenings at Gallettes and Rounders (though, quite fun); I'm referring more to the actual adulthood skills of being able to network, work together on projects, get to know different people from different backgrounds, and step out of your comfort zone.

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Why, that is not the direction of the working market today. How many jobs are being converted to "distant working" functions ?

Weird. We dont have that problem. 95% of students at A&M are Texas residents.