UT Austin is one of the most prestigious public universities in the nation, the Texas equivalent to UC Berkeley. Texas just strictly limits how many from out of

UT Austin is one of the most prestigious public universities in the nation, the Texas equivalent to UC Berkeley. Texas just strictly limits how many from out of state can come (also, in state tuition is only $5000/semester, so it heavily incentives even the wealthy / those who can achieve a Harvard or, say, Pomona College admission to attend). Full disclosure: I did not attend UT Austin. Also. as someone who grew up in Texas and now lives in California, I can tell you the UT System has more than its fair share of gaming attempts -- as such, you're ineligible for the automatic-in based on rankings if you switch schools in the last 2 years (i.e. you need to get in holistically), and those who attend private high schools also need to get in holistically (because top private schools got caught saying more than 7% of their students were in the top 7% and have non-state-standardized ranking criteria). Granted, being automatically admitted to one of the UT schools via rankings often does _not_ mean admission to UT Austin, but rather a satellite campus. It's a decently progressive and fair system. https://news.utexas.edu/2020/06/18/new-ranking-puts-ut-austin-among-top-universities-in-the-world/ https://news.utexas.edu/2020/06/18/new-ranking-puts-ut-austi...