The Great Out-of-State Migration: Where Students Go

Public colleges and universities have historically served their own state residents, but the number of out-of-state freshmen attending them has nearly doubled since 1986, according to Department of Education data.

Exodus of Public University Students

Arrows are in proportion to number of freshmen leaving their home state to attend public universities in other states.*

Students leave behind state financial aid, incur added transportation costs and pay ever-higher out-of-state rates set by underfunded universities. Why do they go?

Some yearn for independence or fun (ski Colorado! Vermont!) or are lured by merit aid (the University of Alabama, Ohio State, University of South Carolina). They may have been shut out of their own flagships (California, Texas, Illinois) or are taking advantage of reciprocity agreements (Midwest Student Exchange Program), which allow neighbors to pay reduced or in-state tuition.

Thomas G. Mortenson, senior scholar at the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education, offers another explanation. “The surge in emigrants,” he says, “bespeaks troubles in the public four-year institutions in the home states of these residents.”