The Next Shocks

[Ha Who]

I know that Kentucky ranks lower than UConn in most undergraduate academic metrics, and I didn't claim otherwise. But kids in Kentucky and other states are still more likely to choose their state flagships and other nearby institutions over higher ranked out-of-state schools, including UConn. In addition, some students are attracted to a school because it excels in a particular discipline -- geology, for example, or environmental science, or physics, or aeronautical engineering, or architecture, or creative writing. In which areas of study is UConn so superior that it would attract students away from their home states?

If you think that UConn is better equipped to weather the coming demographic storm than those other schools because it might rank higher on USN&WR (and it doesn't when compared to many), then you'll have to come up with a more persuasive argument than your feeble ad hominem attacks on my understanding of the situation. I note with considerable interest that UConn's endowment and its research activity don't compare favorably with a lot of seemingly inferior institutions, even with those of UK.

Actuarial Science

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I know that Kentucky ranks lower than UConn in most undergraduate academic metrics, and I didn't claim otherwise. But kids in Kentucky and other states are still more likely to choose their state flagships and other nearby institutions over higher ranked out-of-state schools, including UConn. In addition, some students are attracted to a school because it excels in a particular discipline -- geology, for example, or environmental science, or physics, or aeronautical engineering, or architecture, or creative writing. In which areas of study is UConn so superior that it would attract students away from their home states?

If you think that UConn is better equipped to weather the coming demographic storm than those other schools because it might rank higher on USN&WR (and it doesn't when compared to many), then you'll have to come up with a more persuasive argument than your feeble ad hominem attacks on my understanding of the situation. I note with considerable interest that UConn's endowment and its research activity don't compare favorably with a lot of seemingly inferior institutions, even with those of UK.

Because why go to the home state school if another school is just better? It doesn't need to be 100% of the students making this choice. It needs to be maybe 20%, and the school will go into a doom loop. The overhead and infrastructure at many of these schools is so big that unwinding it becomes almost impossible.

 

[hank970]

Actuarial Science

Actuarial science makes sense, given the number of insurance companies headquartered in Connecticut. But is that it?

 

[dayooper]

Because why go to the home state school if another school is just better? It doesn't need to be 100% of the students making this choice. It needs to be maybe 20%, and the school will go into a doom loop. The overhead and infrastructure at many of these schools is so big that unwinding it becomes almost impossible.

Cost is a huge factor. Many public universities charge less tuition for instate students than out of state. I know Michigan universities do. I don’t know the instate tuition of Kentucky and the out of state tuition of UConn, but that could be a huge deciding factor.

 

[Rdkid]

Because why go to the home state school if another school is just better? It doesn't need to be 100% of the students making this choice. It needs to be maybe 20%, and the school will go into a doom loop. The overhead and infrastructure at many of these schools is so big that unwinding it becomes almost impossible.

Because of the basketball and football teams, or because mom and dad or some cousin went there. Is that not a huge part of why all this conference stuff is playing out this way? Bread and circus and branding and all that? Maybe they won’t be pumping out Rhodes scholars but they’ll gladly find room for Eastern Kentucky or Bowling Green’s best prospective students.

 

[Rufus]

I know that Kentucky ranks lower than UConn in most undergraduate academic metrics, and I didn't claim otherwise. But kids in Kentucky and other states are still more likely to choose their state flagships and other nearby institutions over higher ranked out-of-state schools, including UConn. In addition, some students are attracted to a school because it excels in a particular discipline -- geology, for example, or environmental science, or physics, or aeronautical engineering, or architecture, or creative writing. In which areas of study is UConn so superior that it would attract students away from their home states?

If you think that UConn is better equipped to weather the coming demographic storm than those other schools because it might rank higher on USN&WR (and it doesn't when compared to many), then you'll have to come up with a more persuasive argument than your feeble ad hominem attacks on my understanding of the situation. I note with considerable interest that UConn's endowment and its research activity don't compare favorably with a lot of seemingly inferior institutions, even with those of UK.

Kentucky will be fine. If anything, students in the past that could not get into Kentucky and went to Western Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky, etc. will go to Kentucky in the future. It will be the non-flagships that suffer the most. They might have to make some budget cuts at some point, and maybe they decrease total student enrollment, but they will exist and they will be a basketball school. Just like UConn.