Could California face a "brain drain" of college students?
In the 2007-2008 academic year, California did something it had not done since the 1980s: sent more college students out of state than it received from elsewhere. For years, the Golden State’s public universities were a draw, offering a low-cost, high-quality education to its high school graduates and drawing talented people from other states and countries. With fees rising and student slots shrinking in the midst of the state budget crisis, some worry that a process that has helped boost California’s economy will reverse itself — and do so at a time when the state’s economy needs more educated workers than ever. "Absolutely the state is moving in the wrong direction in terms of closing the education skills gap," said Hans Johnson, a demographer with the Public Policy Institute of California.
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by Malcolm Maclachlan, Capitol Weekly.