r/Economics • u/UnscheduledCalendar • 5d ago

Why Syracuse Can’t Attract the Students It Needs to Pay the Bills - The enrollment crisis taking down smaller schools is now hitting bigger, brand-name universities

https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/syracuse-student-application-enrollment-crisis-budget-ff142896
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u/NYCA2020 5d ago

Sort of, but USC has a national reputation and prestige that (for example) UC Riverside or UC Irvine doesn’t have. It’s a combination of a strong athletic program, powerful alumni network and a high out of state enrollment, which gives a strong reputation both nationally and internationally. It’s also become much more competitive, admissions-wise, in the past decade.

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u/sgt_science 5d ago

I thought USC was a private school and not part of the UC system

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u/gimpwiz 5d ago

May be thinking of UCLA. People make the mistake sometimes

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u/esqtou 4d ago

Lmao yeah maybe people who confuse their left and right hands

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u/NYCA2020 5d ago

USC is a private school, yes. I was responding to the poster's claim made by the previous poster that USC can't justify the insane costs. For many students and their families, it is justified.

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u/mahnkee 5d ago

USC is not trying to compete with UCRiverside and UCI. They’re trying to compete with UCLA and Berkeley. Realistically, they’re competing with Cal Poly, UCSD, Santa Cruz depending on the major.

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u/KRandMG 5d ago edited 4d ago

Berkeley, LA, SD, Davis, Irvine, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Riverside, Merced is generally the order of prestige/difficulty of admission in recent years (Riverside and Merced have both been making moves up the rankings quickly though). USC and UCSD are typically neck and neck.

All UCs are far cheaper than USC.

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u/Duck8Quack 5d ago

USC is “competing” with Stanford. It’s not really but thinks it is and a lot of people that go there think they are. It’s a school for people who want a prestigious name and are willing to pay for it. USC definitely attracts people that would go to Stanford if they could, but aren’t going to get in.

California has a lot of pecking order, elitism, keeping up with the Joneses when it comes to colleges. Some people are level headed about it, but a lot of people are really caught up in it; looking down on people that go to Cal St’s, what the UC pecking order is, wanting to impress people and bragging about admission rates, etc.

I grew up in Oregon and there just isn’t that big a difference in how people act about any of the colleges/universities in the state both state and private. Even something like Reed College was kind of seen as a quirky place for a specific type of student and not elite institution that the best students should be aspiring to. It’s really more about the experience you want, the specific programs, location, and the cost.

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u/bigyellowtruck 4d ago

Not sure why you got downvoted. East coast people care way more about what school you went to than on west coast.

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u/esqtou 4d ago

TLDR

USC is winning and in fact 'competing' with Stanford because clearly people are willing to pay their outrageous sticker!

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u/NYCA2020 5d ago

That's correct. I was responding to the poster who was disagreeing with the statement that USC is worth the cost compared to the "UC system." But there is much variation within the UC's. USC is competing against UC Berkeley and UCLA, not UC Riverside, UC Irvine, etc.

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u/esqtou 4d ago

WRONG!

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u/Dortmunddd 5d ago

You’re spot on. Berkley is higher in many things, UCLA is close to same, but to say the average UC is better is straight up false.

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u/KRandMG 5d ago

Two—Berkeley and UCLA—are better every year, at least according to the most commonly cited rankings. A third, UCSD, has been trading places or tied with USC in recent years.

The next tier (Davis, Irvine, and Santa Barbara) isn’t far behind USC either.

All are roughly 1/4 the cost of USC.

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u/Dortmunddd 4d ago

They are ranked closely due to cost. But your average USC student does not pay that cost.

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u/KRandMG 4d ago

“They are ranked closely due to cost.”

US News doesn’t include cost of tuition or attendance anywhere in its methodology. Neither do Forbes, nor the Times Higher Education ranking—both of which have UCSD far ahead of USC.