Like most state-supported universities, the schools of the University of North Carolina system have a limit on the percentage of out-of-state students they can accept. The General Assembly has set the limit at 18 percent for each campus in the system. There is a move afoot to raise the limit to 22 or perhaps 25 percent. Should we?
The 18 percent cap is an arbitrary number, and you can always argue that an arbitrary number should be higher or lower. How strong are the arguments in favor of the proposed upward adjustment of the out-of-state enrollment cap?
One argument made by UNC Chancellor James Moeser in his recent “state of the university” speech is that the cap imposes “a barrier to our enrolling more academically outstanding students.” That’s correct. At Chapel Hill last year, more than 1,000 out-of-state students with high SAT scores (over 1,400) were turned away because the school couldn’t admit any more non-North Carolinians. The North Carolinians who were admitted instead had lower scores than that.
OK, but why is that a problem?
One answer given by UNC leadership is that if Chapel Hill could admit more of those academically gifted out-of-staters, it would “help stem the brain drain leading many of North Carolina’s best and brightest to attend out-of-state colleges.”
Brain drain? Are we to seriously believe that our sprawling state of more than eight million people suffers because some of the sharpest college-age students decide to go to schools such as Harvard and Princeton? Is the welfare of the state really harmed when top students head off to college in other states? It’s hard to see how. Employers in North Carolina can and do hire top talent in the national labor market. Research Triangle Park is full of highly trained people who have degrees from universities in other states. Where someone went to college means almost nothing in this day of mobility. Talking about a brain drain of college students is silly.
Now, suppose that UNC gets its way and is allowed to admit more top students from other states. That won’t make North Carolina any better off, for the reason that those students will also go wherever the best jobs are. Sorry, but we can’t pull the languid North Carolina economy up by its bootstraps by getting a few more bright students to attend UNC. The solution to that problem is a better economic climate, something that the education establishment can’t produce.
Another claim made on behalf of raising the cap is that it will give UNC “more diversity.” Moeser said many of North Carolina’s best students choose “out-of-state colleges that enroll more geographically diverse student bodies.” True, the great national universities have “more geographically diverse student bodies,” but that has nothing to do with the reason why students go there. Does a National Merit scholar from Raleigh think, “I’d rather go to Harvard so I can be with kids from Connecticut and Illinois rather than just a bunch of North Carolinians?” Of course not. Geographical diversity of students has nothing to do with enrollment decisions at Harvard, UNC, or anywhere else. “Diversity” has become an all-purpose justification for just about everything universities want to do these days. It’s usually a very weak justification and this case, preposterous.
Let’s try another reason. Admitting more top out-of-state students will give UNC a “more intellectually stimulating environment,” Moeser said. Well, having a few hundred SAT 1,400-plus non-North Carolinians replace an equal number of SAT 1,200 in-staters might make a tiny bit of difference on campus, but let’s keep in mind that the students are the ones receiving the education. The intellectual environment is overwhelmingly determined by the professors, not the students.
The above arguments seem so weak that you suspect that they’re cover for something else. I believe they are: prestige and money.
One of the barometers of higher education is the annual “Best Colleges” issue of US News and World Report magazine. Using a formula based on inputs rather than educational quality, which is impossible to quantify, the magazine ranks colleges. Student selectivity is a factor. For the last several years, Chapel Hill has narrow missed making the Top 25. The UNC brass would love to crow over making the Top 25 and admitting a slightly brainier student body would help.
Fine, but UNC prestige is of no more benefit to the state than are basketball championships. It just doesn’t matter whether UNC ranks No. 1, No. 25, or No. 50. It’s a meaningless statistic.
What about money? The out-of-state students would pay substantially more in tuition, thereby giving the UNC system several million dollars more to spend. At least the money is something concrete. Compared to the entire system budget, though, it’s a fairly small amount. And just because the university has more to spend doesn’t mean that the typical North Carolinian will be better off. His taxes won’t go down.
The drawback to the plan is obvious — some North Carolina families whose children would have been able to attend Chapel Hill or one of the other campuses that is at the cap, will have to go elsewhere — perhaps UNCC or East Carolina. In turn, some students who would have gotten in at those schools may have to go elsewhere. More out-of-state students means disappointment for some North Carolinians, whose taxes support the system.
In short, raising the cap doesn’t look like such a great idea.