Which Colleges are Illinois Students Leaving the State For?

As school begins across Illinois, in coming seniors are preparing to finish their secondary schooling strong preparing to launch into college. Illinois has had a problem of keeping kids in state for college. So where are they going…and why?

Illinois college bound high school seniors have been choosing to leave the state

Decisions to leave the state for college obviously vary. Some colleges feature specific areas of study out of state that aren’t available at the same elevated level in state. Some students desperately want to get away from their hometown area. It’s common for some to want to get out and experience life away from home. Finally, -and most importantly- Going to college in Illinois is more expensive -on average- than leaving for other out of state schools, by a considerable amount. So which schools are pulling Illinois students away from in state universities?

These universities lure Illinois students out of state

The most obvious data point to highlight is that border states are luring Illinois students away for college more than universities further away. Iowa, Wisconsin, Missouri, Indiana and Michigan grab the attention of high school students and families because of affordability primarily. Beyond the border states, the University of Alabama is pulling students away from Illinois too.

Get our free mobile app

There will always be high achieving students who are destined for elite universities on the coasts, whether an Ivy league school, M.I.T., Georgetown or Duke on the east coast, or Stanford or Southern California on the west coast. The tough part about that is there are academically elevated universities in Illinois in the form of Northwestern, U of I in Champaign/Urbana or University of Chicago. Depending upon the graduate program, these highly sought students may come back to Illinois, but more often than not, when they are gone – they are gone.

Illinois has elite level universities too

We all know someone who have college age kids in out of state schools, and that percentage of Illinois college bound kids leaving keeps going up. If given the choice of comparable schools in Illinois or Missouri, Illinois or Indiana, Iowa or Wisconsin, those out of state universities are increasingly winning Illinois students.

Leaving for college has meant going further away in recent years

The Illinois state board of higher education has had discussions over recent years on how to make Illinois universities more competitive and the Illinois state colleges different from each other. This current reality didn’t occur overnight. Short of a reduction in tuition and fees, it will take time to correct.