40,000 in 2017

In light of the fact that so many of our readers are pushing for this NC State Athletics blog to NOT discuss NC State Athletics, we wanted to try to find something of interest.

So, we went back into our archives and found this interesting story from Technician that will bring us up to speed on developments on campus.

Private developers have plans to bring a 10-story apartment complex and parking deck west of the N.C. State campus to aid the growing student population.

(Tim) Luckadoo has no doubt as to why Capstone Development is choosing to build student housing facilities near the University.

“I think a lot of developers are looking at N.C. State as a growing university,” Luckadoo said. “Enrollment is expected to grow to 40,000 by 2017, so it’s an attractive market opposed to other schools that aren’t growing as fast as we are.”

“It is unusual in the college market to build a high-rise building these days,” Luckadoo said. “We have plans to knock down Lee and Sullivan. Oklahoma State took down some high-rises a few years ago, and UNC-Charlotte is thinking about taking down their high-rises.”

Here is an additional question that would be interesting to discuss here — is the news that NC State is projected to grow to 40,000 students by 2017 a ‘positive’ story or a ‘negative’ story?

Since other articles that do nothing but share factual information and reality-based statistics are deemed “negative” by many of our readers and many adminstrators at NC State, I’d be curious to know the read on this development?

In 2006, Princeton Review ranked NC State as the second-best value among the nation’s public colleges and universities The same year, U.S. News & World Report ranked NC State 5th in Best Overall University Value among public universities. In 2007, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance placed NC State as the 12th best value among the nation’s colleges and universities.

Is this ‘positive’ or ‘negative’?

I just want to be clear on what we can and we cannot discuss out here on the internet? Since both sets of rankings are based on actual events happening in the world, what makes one set of rankings more ‘positive’ and one set more ‘negative’?

If you were an old-school Carolina fan who hated NC State…which set of rankings would you consider postiive and which set are negative?

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51 Responses to 40,000 in 2017

  1. spanky 04/23/2008 at 5:07 PM #

    I accidently had this in the previous thread, but it’s more appropriate here..

    I understand that NCSU does in fact offer an amazing academic education, and truly believe it’s one of the best I could hope for. I especially believe this considering my plans involve going to Vet School and getting my DVM, (NCSU-CVM is 3rd in the nation and only 30 years old, thats pretty d*mn impressive). But do the kids know that? Some do yes, thats why I’m here. But how many kids apply to UNC and use State as a back up school because “carolina is harder to get into.”? I can think of 15 kids that went to my high school off the top of my head who went to carolina strictly because it was harder to get into. That is the answer I got when I asked why they weren’t going to State even though they were going to school for something that would’ve been more suited for what State can offer.

    I’m not talking about stupid kids either, all 15 of these were top 20% in the senior class.

    As long as Carolina is considered “harder to get into” there will always be the inclination that it is a more difficult and “better” (puke) school.

  2. one00_proof 04/23/2008 at 7:03 PM #

    Could it be negative? I mean it really depends on your perspective. The requirements at State are only getting harder so it’s definitely not becoming “easier” to get into State. I think with Raleigh being voted one of the best cities in the Nation for young professionals and families alike, a surge of college undergraduates is to be expected. Wake County is known for having one of the best school systems in the nation and that only attracts more people to the state. Feeding more kids into Wake’s school system will only churn out more qualified undergraduates that meet State’s criteria for undergraduates.

    And just look at Centennial Campus. How much of that campus is actually being utilized by the university for the undergraduates? And let’s face it, the University still has hundreds of acres of Centennial that have not even been utilized and I know for a fact that many of the colleges (COM for one) are making a petition to move over to Centennial.

    I am currently a senior in Accounting in the COM and I know Dean Ira Weiss personally and I can tell you he is very serious about putting State on the map. The Masters of Accounting Program at State is quickly surging to be one of the nation’s best. This past semester, NC State only received an honorable mention in the Top 25 Accounting Schools in the nation versus a ranking of #20 the year before. Ironically, during this most recent admission, the administration jacked up the requirements of admission with only 90/245 applicants being accepted who have an average GPA of 3.52 and a GMAT of 601. To put that in perspective, 500 was considered the “safe” score to get in, so obviously the COM is pretty peeved they dropped out of the rankings. All the firms recognize that while UNC’s program is rated higher (which i think is kinda BS), that State graduates pass the CPA exam at a higher rate and are more prepared for the rigors versus UNC graduates.

    That’s just one school and I know our Engineering school is one of the best in the nation, so it’s hard to see NC State being headed in a wrong direction “academically”. Athletics on the other hand is a whole different story but that’s for another day. My point is, even if there is any negativity in those articles, I think it’s fair to say State is making huge strides academically and I think it’s only a matter of time before State becomes a prestigious academic institution. We’ll never reach Duke or UNC’s academic prestige, but you won’t hear many high school graduates “settling” for NC State like they did in years past.

  3. hai17 04/23/2008 at 7:55 PM #

    100proof – I completely agree. As a current student in aerospace engineering, I’ll say that our AE department is one of the best in the country. I know when I was “considering” where to go to school (as if it were in doubt) I checked out GA Tech, among others, and felt like State’s was superior. The quality of the education is just as good as any of the other schools (with the possible exception of MIT) and State’s program is much more hands-on than GA Tech’s (the only other one I researched in depth).

    The senior design project requires you to design and build an airplane from scratch (you are only given the jet turbine), and to graduate your plane has to fly. GA Tech, however, only requires a computer design for their senior design project. Overall, I believe our AE program is pretty cutting edge, and the College of Engineering as a whole seems committed to further improving all of their degree programs.

    I also know several people at my high school that chose State as their “safety school”. This is pretty funny because State really isn’t that much easier to get admitted to, especially if you are applying to engineering or first year college. Needless to say, a few of them ended up at App State. And don’t waste time worrying about us being looked at as “inferior”, that won’t change as long as the N&O is around…

  4. howlie 04/23/2008 at 7:55 PM #

    “In light of the fact that so many of our readers are pushing for this NC State Athletics blog to NOT discuss NC State Athletics”

    WHAAA?

  5. PackBAEProf 04/23/2008 at 9:14 PM #

    I am a longtime reader of Statefansnation, but have never posted. But as an alumnus (94,95,97) and a tenure-track professor at this school, I felt compelled to do so on this thread. Thanks for bringing it up.

    There are several things to consider, some of which have been already stated:

    1. NCSU is going to grow and to an extent our administration is preparing for this. Sen. Marc Basnight has spearheaded legislation to increase the number of engineering professors by 100. That’s a tremendous amount. As it stands right now, money has been budgeted for 50 more profs. I can not underscore how significant that is. The reasons for this hiring are many-fold. (a) Our College of Engineering ranking which had been around #20 in the US in 1990 had dropped to the low-mid 30’s according to several national ranking services. (b) prominent alumni and other business leaders in our state – one of the 5 or 6 fastest growing in the US – decided it was time to reverse our decline. (c) University administrators from the Chancellor to the Dean of the College of Engineering lobbied like crazy, and (d) Sen. Basnight is looking to leave a legacy of support for several of the state’s universities.

    The efforts with faculty hiring – and new facilities (sound sports-like doesn’t it?) on the Centennial Campus – has reversed the downward trend and the COE has finally begun its upward climb. The most recent US News & World Report will have us ranked at #30 in the US and (I think) #18 among public engineering schools.

    Is that where we want to be? No. The nation’s 10th largest (& 6th fastest growing) state should have AT LEAST the 10th best public engineering school. But we would all agree that we are moving in the right direction.

    2. Raleigh is a very attractive place for out-of-state students to come. Each year my department hosts a graduate recruitment weekend – so do lots of others at NCSU. And each year we are able to attract a lot of great students to State because in part of how nice a place this is to live and to graduate from. That coupled with the fact that NC State offers an outstanding APPLIED education helps attract students to us. Just this year I had folks pick NC State over Carnegie-Mellon, the University of Michigan, and Stanford.

    As state alumni, I am asking you not to undersell the value of your degree. To compare UNC-Charlotte favorably to us is mind-boggling, to be honest.

    3. We will never compete with UNC-Chapel Hill. Good news, they will never compete with us either. Both schools are excellent (or very good) at different things. Our degrees tend to be more applied – theirs more theoretical. It takes all kinds to make the world go round. I just like “our kind” more. If you are going to compare NC State to anybody, please let it be Clemson, Auburn, Virginia Tech, Penn State, etc. Those are our peer institutions.

    In the southeast, you’ll find that our Vet School is the best. Our College of Ag & Life Sciences is the Best (as long as you don’t think Texas A&M is a Southeastern School). Our College of Engineering is arguably 2nd best (after G.Tech). Our Forestry/Natural Resources is either the best or 2nd best, etc. Our College of Textiles is the best in the World. That doesn’t even highlight programs in other departments that are considered national leaders.

    Please stand tall as State grads, but please continue to demand the best of this institution. We all deserve that.

    Sorry for the long-winded reply.

  6. Keystone 04/23/2008 at 10:43 PM #

    Great post PackBAEProf. I couldn’t agree more. As was suggested earlier, I’ve heard from many people who are attending grad school at NCSU talk about how our senior engineering design programs are far better than the schools they attended for undergrad. NC State excels in many areas and I feel that translating frustration from athletics performances to criticism of the school’s academics is unfortunate. I think the anticipated growth of our university holds a lot of exciting opportunities and it will be interesting to watch it develop.

  7. packpigskinfan23 04/23/2008 at 11:18 PM #

    great post PackBAEProf!

  8. packof81 04/24/2008 at 3:34 AM #

    “I don’t know what you are seeing and hearing packof81, but to compare the engineering programs of ncsu and charlotte is a big stretch, imo. I do know that charlotte is making efforts to improve their program, but I do not see how they are on the same level as NCSU.”

    I’m seeing the graduates of both schools and their work. I don’t have much dealing the Chem. Es but I assure that comparing the undergrad education at Charlotte in such areas as EE, Computer E and CSC is not a stretch. I’ve worked with some very bright people who’ve graduated from Charlotte with those majors during the past 15 years.

    I will agree with you that getting a great education is up to the student. This is particularly true in a big engineering school.

  9. mafpack 04/24/2008 at 5:49 AM #

    Wow, didn’t exactly expect that kind of reply to my comment, but its nice to see so many readers actually posting again…

    As a thought, could increasing our enrollment and thereby increasing our standing as an academic institution (hopefully as Prof says) in anyway help our recruiting efforts through sheer name recognition and availability of majors for incoming recruits to plug into?

    I’ve noticed many fantastic recruits going to schools like Duke and Stanford on the idea that basketball can provide a free-ride to a solid academic institution and not just a trip to the NBA (though obviously that is/will be a goal for most players). Just a thought…

  10. Wulfpack 04/24/2008 at 7:27 AM #

    I have no reservations that a person or entity can and should strive to be better. The issue is precisely is bigger, better? If we are going to grow at such an intensely significant pace, is the infrastructure going to follow? My hunch is a resounding “no”. Hopefully they prove me wrong.

    There is nothing at all wrong with “commuter” students. Hell, I was one. But I also worked very hard to become more a part of the fabric of the school by taking on a variety of activities. The issue I have as an alum is I very much feel detached from the school. I can only guess that this sense will be magnified if we are going to grow leaps and bounds.

    All I am asking is bigger really better? Quality often times is better served than quantity. And if we are going to grow at this rate, you can bet the standards will decline.

  11. Trout 04/24/2008 at 7:53 AM #

    First, PackBAEProf’s post was one of the best things I’ve ever read on ANY NC State related blog, message board, etc. Well done. Glad to have you in CALS, COE and NC State.

    Second, there is difference between commuter students and commuter school. EVERY large school has commuter students, but not every large school is a commuter school. A commuter school, IMO, is one where there isnt a real student experience. At commuter schools, the students attend class, but they dont really attend the school – socially, culturally, etc. As NC State grows, they MUST protect and enhance the student and campus experience. Athletics is a big part of that, so are student cultural and social opportunities.

    Third, I don’t think it is NC State’s choice to grow to 40k students. This is being mandated by the UNC System. It is interesting to note that UNC is not being asked to grow as rapidly as NC State, ECU and UNC-Charlotte.

    FTR, I enjoy topics like this and appreciate SFN for bringing them up for discussion.

  12. Ed89 04/24/2008 at 8:25 AM #

    How I wish they would’ve built the RBC on Centennial Campus…:(

  13. RAWFS 04/24/2008 at 8:27 AM #

    Do you think that NC State can maintain our quality of education and selectivity if we focus on growing to be so large?

    State needs to grow as the state’s population grows.

    It seems to have worked fine for Texas, Wisconsin and some of the other schools in the list of top ten by undergrad enrollment:

    1 Ohio State University 52,586
    2 University of Florida 51,913
    3 Arizona State University 51,481
    4 University of Minnesota 50,880
    5 The University of Texas 50,201
    6 Central Florida 48,699
    7 Texas A&M University 46,542
    8 Michigan St University 46,045
    9 Penn State 43,252
    10 University of Wisconsin 42,041

  14. whitefang 04/24/2008 at 9:03 AM #

    I also enjoy topics like this occasionally. For once I read most of the comments because other than athletics, I don’t get a whole lot of other news about State since I don’t live in the area. Especially PackBAEProf’s comments
    Personally I think the 40,000 should be a good thing. It should translate into more fans, more money, more support, more alumni, etc.
    But I think we have to improve the quality of our education at the same time. It bothers me that our College of Emgineering ranking has fallen (a graduate of that school). And you can say all you want that rankings don’t matter, but they do. I know my kids paid attention to that when they applied to schools.
    As I have said here before, I “adopted” Virginia as my second school because 2 of my sons picked it (I could not of course have done that if they had picked UNC!). I know UVa’s high ranking was one of the main reasons they applied there.
    But what I wanted to say was I was invited to a reception by the UVa president where he gave a talk about the future of the “University” as they call it. One strong point he made was that UVa needed to model themselves more like NC State in that State does one the best jobs in the country partnering with businesses and industries to work together on projects. I made me proud to hear that compliment from that “stuck-up” institution.

  15. backinpack 04/24/2008 at 9:04 AM #

    As long as Carolina is considered “harder to get into” there will always be the inclination that it is a more difficult and “better” (puke) school.

    As long as they have less students and even equal numbers of applicants UNC-CH will be ‘harder’ to get into than NC State. I’ve always wanted to see a comparison of the top 70% (or whatever it would take to get the class sizes equal) of freshman at NC State vs UNC-CH — I’m guessing the classes would compare quite favorably from an academic perspective. In fact, I’d like to see the UNC System do this to help compare all the schools — of course several of the smaller ones probably wouldn’t be too happy about the results. I also find it interesting that many kids I know can no longer get into State or UNC-CH and find themselves at App, UNC-W, or ECU or going out of state.

  16. RAWFS 04/24/2008 at 9:44 AM #

    ^ As little as 2-3 years ago, a BS earned more coming out of school from NCSU than UNC. Those numbers came from the UNC-GA but mysteriously ‘disappeared’ from their website.

  17. Dr. BadgerPack 04/24/2008 at 9:48 AM #

    “…carolina is harder to get into”

    It’s a pretty well laughed about fact amongst my high school friends that I got into Carolina having filled out the application in bright red crayon.

    Thought some might get a kick out of that…

    On enrollment- I won’t delve into specifics, but the “bottom of the barrell” at UF and UW is, umm, horrid. Great for my wallet during finals week, but in general the bottom quartile of students at these larger schools is much weaker than the smaller schools I’ve been associated with. The upper quartile’s are comparable, and the larger schools occasionally garner more accolades/recognition because by the numbers, there’s a lot more of the top students.

  18. choppack1 04/24/2008 at 9:54 AM #

    I think you walk a fine line. I’d love for NC State to have the resources that most of the schools on that Top 10 list have. But I also want the campus and possibly more importantly, the community around the campus, to have a distinct NC State-centric, positive feel to it.

    Having been to 4 college towns, which I believe share much in common w/ NC State – Tallahasse, Columbia, Columbus and Austin – I think it’s easy to get lost in the combination of big, fast growing, young city and fast growing university. I wasn’t really impressed w/ the intimacy walking through tOSU or Tejas. OTOH, when I’ve been to Blacksburgh, Clemson, Charlottesville, and ugh, even Chapel Hill – these have a decidedly different feel. Of course, the common denominator is that these towns would wither up and die w/out the university, while the ones mentioned earlier – are state capitals. They are part of these communities, but the community probably has a mixed relationship w/ the schools.

    But, this shouldn’t be leveraged as an excuse to write us away as a commuter school. NC State’s AND Raleigh’s leaders need to realize the benefit a more cohesive college community can offer the college and Raleigh.

    This will sound corny – but I want the college to grow like a good family would. You don’t want chaos, you want order – but there should also be that feeling of security and happiness. And I think this is why leadership is so crucial. If you use the family analogy, think about a large family w/out strong leadership from the parents – I think we all know what would happen…

  19. geojim1990 04/24/2008 at 11:29 AM #

    State needs to grow as the state’s population grows.

    I tend to agree to a certain point. NC is now the 10th most populous state at ~9 million. However, the difference between 9 million & the 20th ranked state (~5.5 million) is not such a big difference when you consider Florida (4th) at ~18 million & Texas (2nd) at ~24 million. That said, Ohio (7th) is at ~11.5 million & so not such a far cry away. But I don’t know if Ohio State is thought of as a leading academic institution (except maybe in specific fields here & there), I think it’s just thought of as BIG. The commuter campus issue is something else but that may have something to do with Raleigh & it’s commitment (read: lack of) to the major public university that it has. The university is of course at fault too. Besides a lack of campus life there is not much of an effort by the university to reach out (connect to) the Raleigh community at-large.

  20. Trip 04/24/2008 at 1:00 PM #

    If they ever want NCSU to become a “Commuter school” then they are going to have to do something about the traffic. Dan Allen is absolutely obnoxious most of the day and some of the time it’s quicker to walk to class from the west lot than ride the bus in the traffic nightmare.

    As a current student I did 3 years of living on campus, and I enjoyed every year of it. There was always stuff to do, they always bring concerts, fun events, free food, free movies, ect. that you just don’t get living off campus. I can’t tell you how many cases of red bull/Amp I got for free from some of the events we’ve had here. I moved off campus this year and I miss the experience, and driving to class is killing my meager part time job paychecks with 4$ gas looming. Bleh.

    I can tell you one thing though, it really is all about what you make it. You can live on campus and stay holed up in your dorm room and it’ll suck, as I did one semester mostly due to 19 credit hours, or you can get out and do something as there is never a lack of things to do around campus.

    I don’t think NC state wants to become a commuter school… If they really wanted to become that they wouldn’t have built Wolf Village 4 years ago, they wouldn’t constantly have an event every week, they wouldn’t recommend students to live on campus their first year. It’s unfortunate that it’s easy to become a school like that just because space is at a premium when you’re locked inside of a city.

    I think that it’s all a matter of working together with the city. If Raleigh and NCSU get together and work together such as with Hillsborough street, then I can’t imagine the school becoming a commuter school. I don’t want it to become one, and you can damn well guarantee that when I graduate I’m going to bitch as much as possible to prevent it from happening for my children.

    40,000 sounds like a good number. The admissions department weeds out bad apples incredibly well considering the amount of students they admit every year. To have a GOOD chance of getting in to NC State you need around a 4.0 weighted GPA (Higher if you’re in engineering/design) and a 1800 SAT based on the new SAT. Degrees from NC State are well-received everywhere, my dad works in Florida and he said that NCSU has an excellent reputation and that they actually have quite a few engineering grads from NCSU working on the power plants down there.

  21. choppack1 04/24/2008 at 1:48 PM #

    Trip – Nice post. I think you make an excellent point about the businesses on Hillsboro Street. IMHO, as much as anything – this is holding NC State back. I really think one of the unintended consequences of the RBC was to put the final nail in the coffin of a lot of Hillsboro Street restaurants.

    There are still some there, but we really need some more institutions. Mitch’s and Player’s Retreat are great – they should be required watering holes for NC State students at least once or twice a year.

    What Stafford should be doing instead of creating tailgating restrictions is working w/ the community to ensure that Hillsboro Street and Western Blvd are entertaining and safe areas.

  22. Alex_01 04/24/2008 at 1:50 PM #

    Both are great schools, just different. I’m a NCSU grad and a CPA, the other manager in our office is a UNC grad and also a CPA. We both have masters degrees and are equally competent, but take different approaches to doing things.
    I feel that he is more skilled at preparing correspondence and non-technical writing to express concepts.
    He is constantly impressed with my problemsolving abilities, such as today when I fiddled with his IP based phone to successfully change the settings, even though I had no idea what I was doing.
    Oh yeah, its also hilarious to watch him try to assembly a banker’s box!!

  23. Pack92 04/24/2008 at 8:17 PM #

    PackBAEProf, thank you for the excellent post. I come from one of the smallest degrees offered at NC State (WST -you guys figure out what that means) and we NEVER play second fiddle to other schools graduates in our field-even if they have graduate degrees. We compete with Penn State, Va. Tech, and Michigan State to name a few. GT used to have a WST program but it is no longer offered as a degree and they concentrate more on Pulp and Paper anyway.
    A professor I respect greatly told us in a Senior Problems class that we would be technically prepared when we left NC State. Our biggest challenge was going to be thinking well enough to use what we knew. He did his absolute best to make us think “out of the box” for 4 years and I see time and time again how that has helped not only myself but others. We are not all contributors in the field of our degree anymore but we are contributors in society and being able to think will never let you down.

  24. wolfman 04/24/2008 at 9:43 PM #

    The quality and value of the education is about the institution as well as the students it admits. I will proudly put my NC State education up against any other any day. My professors in MSE were graduates of those revered places like MIT, Cal, RPI, and their research was and is cutting edge. I work with some who are highly revered and respected in their field, and they never cease to tell me that they are pleased with my work, ability, and insight. It does sadden me that NC State would become a commuter school, but that is mainly a side effect of being located in a fast-growing mid-sized metropolitan area, partly which NC State can be thanked for to begin with. And, there are still plenty who will do the Hillsborough hike and toilet paper campus when we beat Curlina.

  25. GoldenChain 04/25/2008 at 8:00 AM #

    DAME! NCSU is becoming West Virginia University.
    A really big school with no identity.

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