re: Will the 28 TOPS requirement keep students in LA?

I think that the state average IS 20!

Northwestern wanted him in their Honors College and offered him a full ride(with TOPS factored in) but he is going Pre-Med and Northwestern just won't cut it for that. He considered Tulane and they did offer a nice amount of money but it would still be $$$$.

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I think that the state average IS 20!

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That's correct. The lowest level of TOPS (not the technical college version) is tied to the average ACT.

If they have under a 28, they really are not the TOP students in the state and we don't really care if they leave because they are not part of the "brain drain" that caused use to enact TOPS in the first place. But, as in state students their tuition will be about half of what it would be in other places. Since they won't be in the top 10% nationwide no other colleges, save Mississippi, will be clamoring for them. So I don't think it will affect our top students at all. The lowering of TOPS standards has been a problem for some time and its high time we raise the standards back up again, as it should have been in the first place.

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Perhaps if would stop a lot of marginal students that really shouldn't go to college from going, which would probably affect a lot of the smaller schools, which in turn might actually cause a few of the small schools that should be shut down to actually shut down.

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This. A campus that graduates less than 15% of its students is a waste of resources.

I'm astounded at the idea in Louisiana that people think they are entitled to a low cost four year degree at the flagship universities.

Penn State has the idea model IMO--if you can't get into Penn State Happy Valley, you get two years at a satellite campus to get good grades and transfer in. If you don't make it by then, you stay at the satellite campus.

LSUBR shouldn't be letting in students with a 21 ACT and a 2.5 high school GPA, let alone giving them money to attend. That's what the smaller schools are for--that and serving the immediate community and people who can't afford to move away for college.

It's not unreasonable to think so, it just depends on what the colleges look for. Where I grew up, most people took the ACT because that was what area colleges preferred. Probably the same in Louisiana, though I received my scholarship to LSU based on my SAT score

I took the "percent of graduates tested" as EVEYRONE who graduated took the ACT ... I'm sure there are graduates with didn't take either, right??

That's a model that makes sense.

When Louisiana greatly expanded the community college system in the late 1990's, the intention was to capture those students who were not (yet) well suited for the rigors of a 4 yr university. Spend 2 yrs at a comm college and then your credits transfer to a 4 yr univ.

Before the comm college option, people who were not good students just went to LSU or wherever and just failed out within a year. Essentially one-and-done with any type of higher education.

My guess is there might be a negative stigma about having to attend a comm college, and average students went to LSU in somewhat of a denial about college readiness since TOPS was paying for it.

Comm colleges have good reputations in other states, maybe because they are more well established, and here it's still relatively new.

Those numbers are very misleading in my opinion. LA had 100% of graduates tested....and we all know that not a 100% of high school graduates are college material. The states that had the overall best average score also had the lowest number of high school graduates take the test.

Massachusetts had the highest national average at 24.3, but only 23% of graduates took the test. Do you think that 23% was comprised of the lowest level students?