• The KillerFrogs

UT gives free tuition to in-state undergrads from homes of $65K or less

Eight

Member
I could be wrong, but I believe schools are at liberty to accept who they want and consider factors outside of academics, subject to protected classes of course. While there are some minimums, athletic ability can be considered for acceptance in addition to their academic standing.

I don't believe "His academics aren't good, he was accepted because he is an athlete" would be any more of a scandal or impermissible benefit than "Her academics aren't good, she was accepted because she's a world class Cellist" or something to that effect.

Could be wrong, that's just always how I've understood it.

this is my understanding as well.

the ncaa has a mandate of the minimum academic requirements for accepting an athletic scholarship.

member institutions may apply higher requirements and some schools do in fact (i.e. rice)

as far as i know texas does not require anything above the ncaa minimums (i.e javonne shepherd from north brook)
 

Mean Purple

Active Member
so, is the endowment contigent on continued revenues, or is it big enough in current sum to sustain the continued and possibly increasing students who may qualify?
 

Mean Purple

Active Member
last i saw it was over 30 billion, second largest in the country
Is that 30 B the endowment for the whole school, or is it for the scholarships that are the subject of this thread? For example: 150 million is a far cry from even 10 billion. My earlier question, obviously, is does it sustain during an oil downturn, etc.
I'm not an accounting gooroo, so that's why I am wondering. Certainly someone in Austin ran the numbers on how many might qualify based on trends and how that matches up long term... or one would hope they did.
 

Eight

Member
Is that 30 B the endowment for the whole school, or is it for the scholarships that are the subject of this thread? For example: 150 million is a far cry from even 10 billion. My earlier question, obviously, is does it sustain during an oil downturn, etc.
I'm not an accounting gooroo, so that's why I am wondering. Certainly someone in Austin ran the numbers on how many might qualify based on trends and how that matches up long term... or one would hope they did.

all great questions and when i ask my texas friends they talk a bit in circles.

the best explanation i have ever been given is that the majority of the that fund is directed towards the austin campus. i would be shocked it ut-tyler came out with the same type of announcement though it would be a great way to address the problems ut is having with having a landlocked campus in austin.

can't tell you where that assets are invested though there was a story years back about ut having a fairly large holding in gold.
 

Dogfrog

Active Member
Certainly a good question. As expensive as competitive baseball has become you're probably right. Another thing that would keep this from benefiting the baseball program is that the elite baseball player would not only have to come from an extremely low income family, but he'd also have to graduate in the top 5% - 6% of his class or whatever the requirement is these days. That's probably going to be an even rarer bird. Much more likely in rural communities, IMO, where $65K for a family can go much further, you still see multi-sport athlete more prevalent, and it's easier academically to graduate with a high rank in the class.

Good points but it never ceases to amaze me how folks find a way to do things they deem important whether they can afford it or not. It’s a crap shoot at a dream.
 

Pharm Frog

Full Member
Ron and Purp..... I would think both of your assumptions would be correct. That number is gonna be real low.

If it’s only 2 or 3 it’s a real big deal when the total is 11.7 scholarships. It would be less of a big deal for UT than it would be for TCU but still a big deal IMO
 

Pharm Frog

Full Member
all great questions and when i ask my texas friends they talk a bit in circles.

the best explanation i have ever been given is that the majority of the that fund is directed towards the austin campus. i would be shocked it ut-tyler came out with the same type of announcement though it would be a great way to address the problems ut is having with having a landlocked campus in austin.

can't tell you where that assets are invested though there was a story years back about ut having a fairly large holding in gold.

Maybe not UT-Tyler but I bet Derek Matlock is on the phone saying....Hey, we’re UT too
 

MTfrog5

Active Member
all great questions and when i ask my texas friends they talk a bit in circles.

the best explanation i have ever been given is that the majority of the that fund is directed towards the austin campus. i would be shocked it ut-tyler came out with the same type of announcement though it would be a great way to address the problems ut is having with having a landlocked campus in austin.

can't tell you where that assets are invested though there was a story years back about ut having a fairly large holding in gold.
UT Tyler has some pretty big money issues so I highly doubt they are close to offering anything close to this
 

Eight

Member
UT Tyler has some pretty big money issues so I highly doubt they are close to offering anything close to this

funny thing is they are in the very same system and supposedly have access to the same funds which get directed to the flagship school in austin instead of developing the rest of the system
 

MTfrog5

Active Member
I read about the international student scholarship debacle but is there more?
Yeah just one small example is their new business building having an entire floor taken off from the original plans after construction already began. That’s before they announced the plan to move to D2.
 

TCUdirtbag

Active Member
Is that 30 B the endowment for the whole school, or is it for the scholarships that are the subject of this thread? For example: 150 million is a far cry from even 10 billion. My earlier question, obviously, is does it sustain during an oil downturn, etc.
I'm not an accounting gooroo, so that's why I am wondering. Certainly someone in Austin ran the numbers on how many might qualify based on trends and how that matches up long term... or one would hope they did.


It’s the UT System endowment. Remember, UT and A&M (at a lesser %) are beneficiaries of the massive oil and gas revenues from state-owned minerals. The value of those minerals are included in the endowment value. The UT System regents have set aside a relatively small part of the endowment to fund this UT-Austin tuition/fee exemption program.

I’m really impressed by the move. It’s a phenomenal way to deliver opportunity to underserved populations.

A question was posed about the difference of the top 5% at Highland Park and Poly. Not touching that with a 10-foot pole. But will say that nearly every family with a kid at HPHS can afford to pay full cost at UT-Austin. This policy makes true access to a UT-Austin education, and not just admission to the school, much closer to equal for those top 5% auto-admits. That’s going to make a difference in what auto-admit students actually end up attending from schools in lower socio-economic demos—especially for students in big, urban schools.
 
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TCUdirtbag

Active Member
UT Tyler has some pretty big money issues so I highly doubt they are close to offering anything close to this

The first half of the sentence is over blown in the short term. The second half is likely entirely true.

The UT System Board or Regents Chair is from Tyler and swung a big stick in his state senate days. So that regional campus is pretty safe for now. It’s longer term future will be interesting. Its enrollment is small and if it doesn’t go up substantially in the next decade it’s a possible candidate for spinoff to another System—UT has discussed a 20,000 enrollment minimum for its schools (though hasn’t acted on the proposal yet to my knowledge). The same can be said for UTPB, who like UTT has enrollment between 8k and 10k, primarily made up of commuter undergrads (which I suspect Tech would be happy to pick up UTPB as they won’t realize their dream of getting UTEP or WTAMU and pushing UT and A&M entirely out of West Texas ). No clue who would take UTT—A&M would be the natural fit in East Texas with the flagship, Commerce, PVAMU, and Texarkana.
 

TCUdirtbag

Active Member
Yeah just one small example is their new business building having an entire floor taken off from the original plans after construction already began. That’s before they announced the plan to move to D2.

I’m not sure about the accuracy of this. The square footage in the groundbreaking and opening articles are the same and the rendering and completion picture both show 4 stories. There might’ve been a vanity exercise by the then-outgoing/now-former president in an initial rendering, but that’s par for the course in higher ed construction FWIW. Remember TCU’s initial plans for AGCS? Neeley? The music school?

Forgive my annoyance on this thread. I previously worked at a firm that did outside counsel work for 3 of the Texas higher ed systems—a practice area I did little in but have a couple close friends/former colleagues who continue to do that work almost daily.
 

kidkarr

Full Member
I would imagine being in the Top 5% at FW Polytechnic or Trimble Tech is not the same as being in the Top 5% at Carroll HS or Highland Park HS.
There have been discussion of this in the past, not sure how Universities can quantify the difference though. Maybe sat/act scores. I think this I why the top 10% went to 5% at state schools, so that the 7% kid from HP or wherever can use other activities/scores/etc to still get in.
 

Frog-in-law1995

Active Member
There have been discussion of this in the past, not sure how Universities can quantify the difference though. Maybe sat/act scores. I think this I why the top 10% went to 5% at state schools, so that the 7% kid from HP or wherever can use other activities/scores/etc to still get in.

I think it’s because they are using the class rank to fill roughly 6000 freshman spots and WAY too many kids in the top 10% at their school would matriculate.
 

MTfrog5

Active Member
I’m not sure about the accuracy of this. The square footage in the groundbreaking and opening articles are the same and the rendering and completion picture both show 4 stories. There might’ve been a vanity exercise by the then-outgoing/now-former president in an initial rendering, but that’s par for the course in higher ed construction FWIW. Remember TCU’s initial plans for AGCS? Neeley? The music school?

Forgive my annoyance on this thread. I previously worked at a firm that did outside counsel work for 3 of the Texas higher ed systems—a practice area I did little in but have a couple close friends/former colleagues who continue to do that work almost daily.
Considering what I said is straight from one of the higher ups, I stick to what I said. UT Tyler is already over 10k students as well. They plan on going D1 in the near future but their mighty leadership aka their president and AD didn’t know they have to go D2 first. They want to be “Gonzaga of the south” and that’s from the presidents mouth.

Edit: so you’re right about the initial ground breaking so I guess they made the decision right before the groundbreaking. What they changed was the professor’s office area. That was completely changed and downsized considerably.
 
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Eight

Member
Considering what I said is straight from one of the higher ups, I stick to what I said. UT Tyler is already over 10k students as well. They plan on going D1 in the near future but their mighty leadership aka their president and AD didn’t know they have to go D2 first. They want to be “Gonzaga of the south” and that’s from the presidents mouth.

so they want to be a small, roman catholic private school located in tyler, texas.

hmmm....bold strategy
 
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