Schools like Purdue get knocked down the list because as a large state (and I'd argue co-flagship) school, part of what Purdue and Indiana exist to do is to take as many students from the state that qualify academically as they can. Often that might include taking students who aren't going to graduate. But just as often it means giving an opportunity to a student who is going to work their effing ass off and be a success but couldn't sniff getting into an Ivy.
The baby boom was from 1946-1964. After that a combination of social, cultural, and technological factors led to the "baby bust" of the mid-1970's.
I was born in 1975 with a total of 3,144,198 US births that year. That was, IIRC the lowest number since the 1930's.
In Ohio, as in other states the Baby boom led to a surge in college applications 18 years after birth so 1964-1982 but then as the kids of the low-birth 1970's reached college age, applications plummeted.
In Ohio the State Legislature dictated during the baby boom period that the state schools (including tOSU) take anybody with an Ohio HS diploma. Ohio State had basically no admission standards and their flunk-out rate was sky high.
Ohio State during this period built an unfortunate negative academic reputation that, to be fair, was not altogether undeserved.
After that the Ohio State administration spent literally decades working to change the reality and they are still working on the reputation/perception.
Ohio State today is a very good school. They aren't #1 in the B1G, but they are very much respectable and I think most everyone who follows this knows that. If you go to a recruiter with your tOSU degree, they know that it is a quality institution but the old reputation still exists out there with people who don't follow this closely.
What Ohio did to fill the gap (pickup the students who now cannot get into Ohio State) is two things:
- They expanded lower ranking four-year universities within the state, and
- They added a lot of seats in Community Colleges throughout the state.
There still are those students who:
But just as often it means giving an opportunity to a student who is going to work their effing ass off and be a success but couldn't sniff getting into an Ivy.
Ohio now basically says to these kids "ok, go to Community College for two years and prove it, if you do we'll let you into Ohio State."
In this way Ohio State has been able to tighten up admissions standards while the State of Ohio still offers a lifeline to those students without the grades/scores to get into Ohio State.
Ohio also has a "transfer module" where the core stuff (basically first two years) transfer en-masse between Ohio's colleges and universities. Thus, if you go to Cuyahoga Community College (Cleveland area) or Columbus State (duh) or any other Ohio college or University you can take out the entire module then transfer that module as one piece to any other Ohio College or University.