Does SUNY present a uniquely New York problem? (Buffalo, Rochester: middle-class, lawyers)

[7 Wishes]

SUNY is kind of trying to do that with Buffalo, sometimes calling it UB or University of Buffalo (it's original name before it was taken over by the state for the SUNY system in the early 60s to avoid bankruptcy) and also pushing their sports teams into full Division I status, particularly football and basketball.

[edsg25]

Originally Posted by NYCAnalyst

It will never happen. Here is why:

• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in California that want to stay close to home will go to UCB, UCLA, or Stanford.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Texas that want to stay close to home will go to UT-Austin or Rice.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in North Carolina that want to stay close to home will go to UNC or Duke.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Michigan that want to stay close to home will go to U-Mich.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Virginia that want to stay close to home will go to UVA or Johns Hopkins.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in New York State that want to stay close to home will go to Columbia, NYU, Cooper Union, Cornell, Princeton, Harvard, MIT, etc. Not a SUNY. The SUNYs get the "leftovers"

Well, Analyst, you certainly nailed down a key concept:

private universities altered the landscape in the northeast in a way unlike any other part of the United States. Public higher education just never was going to get the status along the eastern seaboard the way it did in other parts of the nation.

This explains why UConn and UMass, both representing states with large populations, don't register on people's minds the way that so many state universities do throughout the nation.

It also explains why a huge state like Pennsylvania followed the least audacious route to major university for its public flagship, Penn State, a school that didn't emerge as a university and one with a comprehensive role until Ike's brother made it rise after WWII.

And it also shows why New Jersey had to scramble and turn a private university like Rutgers into its flagship public university so it could join the club.

I'm a Chicagoan and my region, the real Midwest (the part built around the Great Lakes) was created by your part of the country in your image. But ours was a place whose development occurred in the American era, not the colonial one. And with it came the equalitarian push for public higher education.

In many ways, the Big Ten area has been the real creator of the modern public flagship university. While UVa and UNC predate it, it was the University of Michigan and its development that became the model for the comprehensive public university.

I would say one could make an argument that no region does public higher education than the Big Ten. As noted, our region is probably more like yours than any other in the nation, but ours differed by the extent to which public education was stressed over private. As such, we have developed a blockbuster assortment of state universities with ones like UW and U of I**, like U-M, among the nation's best.

Clearly we beat out the Deep South, Great Plains, Southwest, and Mountain West by far in this regard. Along the southeast seaboard, UVa and UNC are outstanding, but the Midwest schools, top to bottom, far exceed that region.

Along the coast, California is a nation state and its comprehensive plan and support for public education that was so strong until it began to unravel in the later part of the last century, gives us the best one two punch of any state with Cal and UCLA. UWashington, too, is an excellent institution. However, past those and other UC's, schools like WSU, UO, Ore St, UA, and ASU don't really match up with the best of the Midwest.

----

**The University of Illinois is an interesting case based on what you said about the northeast in your post. The U of I has always been an outstanding school, but its reputation is somewhat affected by special circumstances. First, Illinois is a very large state with only only flagship public university. Thus the pressure of admission and available slots keeps it overwhelmingly in-state in enrollment (over 90%) with so many of those students top notch from the excellent high schools that spread throughout suburban Chicago. So there is a parochial quality to the U of I, based on demographics of large state. In the nation state of California, the overwhelmingly California nature of similiar percentages at Cal and UCLA play out more diverse than the Illinois model.

And secondly (relating to what you said), Illinois alone among the midwestern universities has to contend with not one but two private powerhouse universities, Northwestern and Chicago, both located in the heart of the metropolitan area and some 150 miles or so from Champaign-Urbana.

The likes of U-M or UW never had to face such competition.

[edsg25]

Originally Posted by 7 Wishes

SUNY is kind of trying to do that with Buffalo, sometimes calling it UB or University of Buffalo (it's original name before it was taken over by the state for the SUNY system in the early 60s to avoid bankruptcy) and also pushing their sports teams into full Division I status, particularly football and basketball.

Given the distance from NYC and the who NY metro area, wouldn't gaining statewide status be a daunting task?

[7 Wishes]

Originally Posted by edsg25

Given the distance from NYC and the who NY metro area, wouldn't gaining statewide status be a daunting task?

Nah, lots of NY area kids want to "get away" for college and that's about as far as you can get and not be in the "middle of nowhere" (though some kids like that too and go to the SUNYs in Cortland, Oswego, and Oneonta). I know lots of people down here who went to SUNY-Buffalo and my sister got here master's and PhD there after getting her BA at Cornell (but she stayed in the Buffalo area after graduation).

I do think they would've more logically (and I think even tried) to do the same more with SUNY-Albany, but to be honest, the place doesn't even LOOK like a college, it's like a very large skyscraper apt. complex with some class buildings attached. We drove a neighbor up there when I was 13 years old to start college and it almost scared me out of going away to schools thru the years thinking that all colleges you live at were like that (ironcially I ended up not going too far from there, to RPI).

Originally Posted by edsg25

This explains why UConn and UMass, both representing states with large populations, don't register on people's minds the way that so many state universities do throughout the nation.

I think UConn is starting to register a lot more, especially after the success of their basketball teams (at least the northern suburbs of NYC like Westchester are close enough to CT to generally know them well) and the increasing promotion of their football team. I know of a woman in her 30s who got her Masters degree from UConn (and is not from CT), and NBA star Ben Gordon, who went to HS in my southern Westchester hometown, was the key of their 2004 championship team. I know quite a few other NYers of the 30s and under generation who went there and didn't grow up in CT. Which by the way is actually a small population state of a little over 3 million people, it's just very small in area so pop density-wise it is a "big" state.

It may not have the national reknown of Penn State or Cal-Berkeley or UCLA, etc. but people are aware of UConn to a much bigger degree than they are UMass or SUNY or the state schools of the rest of New England.

[edsg25]

Originally Posted by 7 Wishes

Nah, lots of NY area kids want to "get away" for college and that's about as far as you can get and not be in the "middle of nowhere" (though some kids like that too and go to the SUNYs in Cortland, Oswego, and Oneonta). I know lots of people down here who went to SUNY-Buffalo and my sister got here master's and PhD there after getting her BA at Cornell (but she stayed in the Buffalo area after graduation).

I do think they would've more logically (and I think even tried) to do the same more with SUNY-Albany, but to be honest, the place doesn't even LOOK like a college, it's like a very large skyscraper apt. complex with some class buildings attached. We drove a neighbor up there when I was 13 years old to start college and it almost scared me out of going away to schools thru the years thinking that all colleges you live at were like that (ironcially I ended up not going too far from there, to RPI).



I think UConn is starting to register a lot more, especially after the success of their basketball teams (at least the northern suburbs of NYC like Westchester are close enough to CT to generally know them well) and the increasing promotion of their football team. I know of a woman in her 30s who got her Masters degree from UConn (and is not from CT), and NBA star Ben Gordon, who went to HS in my southern Westchester hometown, was the key of their 2004 championship team. I know quite a few other NYers of the 30s and under generation who went there and didn't grow up in CT. Which by the way is actually a small population state of a little over 3 million people, it's just very small in area so pop density-wise it is a "big" state.

It may not have the national reknown of Penn State or Cal-Berkeley or UCLA, etc. but people are aware of UConn to a much bigger degree than they are UMass or SUNY or the state schools of the rest of New England.

you point is well taken. much of that private school allure in the northeast was historical in nature. If you (arbitrarilly) date back the real rise in northeast public higher education to the post-WWII era (servicemen returning home and getting an education through the GI Act; baby boomers coming of age), then you see throughout the northeast a real growth and much more parallel with the rest of the nation.

New York, of course, consolidated its schools into SUNY at this time and, I believe, incorporated CUNY into a state system as well. Penn State didn't only expand to a comprehensive university, but private schools like Pitt and Temple also became state related PA institutions. Rutgers, UConn, and UMass have increased their academic profile with both Rutgers and UConn having turned themselves into typical big state school athletic programs. And in the last half century of so, UMd really built its College Park campus into a real flagship although it is not the oldest branch in the system.

[machiavelli1]

Originally Posted by NYCAnalyst

It will never happen. Here is why:

• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in California that want to stay close to home will go to UCB, UCLA, or Stanford.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Texas that want to stay close to home will go to UT-Austin or Rice.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in North Carolina that want to stay close to home will go to UNC or Duke.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Michigan that want to stay close to home will go to U-Mich.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in Virginia that want to stay close to home will go to UVA or Johns Hopkins.
• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in New York State that want to stay close to home will go to Columbia, NYU, Cooper Union, Cornell, Princeton, Harvard, MIT, etc. Not a SUNY. The SUNYs get the "leftovers"

Actually, in Texas the bright kids will choose TAMU or UT Austin. Rice is mostly foreign students or out of staters with a few Texans mixed in

Regarding bright kids choices in NY, many do choose to go to the SUNY schools. Binghamton and Geneseo are very highly regarded

[ckhthankgod]

Originally Posted by machiavelli1

Actually, in Texas the bright kids will choose TAMU or UT Austin. Rice is mostly foreign students or out of staters with a few Texans mixed in

Regarding bright kids choices in NY, many do choose to go to the SUNY schools. Binghamton and Geneseo are very highly regarded

Exactly...I think people don't realize how good those two schools really are. I had quite a few classmates that went to both. SUNY-ESF in Syracuse is very good too.

[nunoco]

Originally Posted by NYCAnalyst

It will never happen. Here is why:

• All the bright kids (top 10% of class) in New York State that want to stay close to home will go to Columbia, NYU, Cooper Union, Cornell, Princeton, Harvard, MIT, etc. Not a SUNY. The SUNYs get the "leftovers"

This list of examples is correct: for bright rich kids.
But you're missing three important points.
1. Syracuse. It's a private school, but it functioned largely as New York's Big State School for most of the 20th century, with national-championship caliber DI sports (even in football--how quickly we forget Donovan McNabb, not to mention Jim Brown and Ernie Davis), highly regarded programs, especially in journalism and some of the sciences. If there was a NY STATE U, it was the 'Cuse. Affluent New Yorkers who wanted something more like Penn State or Iowa rather than the Ivies could go there, and the rest could get loans.
2. City College of New York. Used to be known as the "Harvard of the proletariat," and its list of alums, including nine Nobel laureates, is impressive. And they didn't pay any tuition. It served the same function as a lot of land grant universities, but in an urban setting. And it used to win national championships in basketball, until the 50s gambling scandals forced CCNY to de-emphasize big-time sports.
3. Catholic colleges. St. John's, Manhattan, Fordham, Siena, St. Bonaventure, to name a few, grab a lot of other students.

In short, there's a lot of competition, but the SUNYs, with their more affordable tuition these days, have been improving the caliber of student for the most part, and holding their own.

[juppiter]

Originally Posted by ckhthankgod

Exactly...I think people don't realize how good those two schools really are. I had quite a few classmates that went to both. SUNY-ESF in Syracuse is very good too.

Exactly, you just made the OP's point. SUNYs are good but nobody knows how good. They are a great value. But they never get the fame a lot of state schools get.

[7 Wishes]

Originally Posted by nunoco

This list of examples is correct: for bright rich kids.
But you're missing three important points.
1. Syracuse. It's a private school, but it functioned largely as New York's Big State School for most of the 20th century, with national-championship caliber DI sports (even in football--how quickly we forget Donovan McNabb, not to mention Jim Brown and Ernie Davis), highly regarded programs, especially in journalism and some of the sciences. If there was a NY STATE U, it was the 'Cuse. Affluent New Yorkers who wanted something more like Penn State or Iowa rather than the Ivies could go there, and the rest could get loans.
2. City College of New York. Used to be known as the "Harvard of the proletariat," and its list of alums, including nine Nobel laureates, is impressive. And they didn't pay any tuition. It served the same function as a lot of land grant universities, but in an urban setting. And it used to win national championships in basketball, until the 50s gambling scandals forced CCNY to de-emphasize big-time sports.
3. Catholic colleges. St. John's, Manhattan, Fordham, Siena, St. Bonaventure, to name a few, grab a lot of other students.

In short, there's a lot of competition, but the SUNYs, with their more affordable tuition these days, have been improving the caliber of student for the most part, and holding their own.

Interesting side note about Syracuse is that it has the only domed stadium in the northeast, and it is almost the size of a pro football stadium (seats about 50-55K I think)

CCNY does not have the "Harvard-like" reputation it had 50+ years ago. While the betting scandals did effect sports (the basketball team won BOTH the NCAA and NIT in 1950 since you could participate in both back then), I'm not quite sure what watered it down, my guess is that for awhile the big schools, the Ivies, etc. went gung-ho with scholarships and financial aid to lure the kind of kids who a couple of generations ago would've gone to CCNY or it may be that more kids want to go "away" to school.

I agree that Catholic colleges are quite prevalent in the Northeast compared to other places and pull from state schools; in many cases non-Catholics go to them too (i.e. Fordham and Manhattan have significant Jewish student populations).