They don't know what they're missing

While the Boston Globe reports that students are bypassing their local university system for far-off places (Hampered by years of cuts, Amherst campus struggles to draw ranking Bay State students), the same Globe, by way of the Telegram, quotes a Times of London story that puts the UMass system among the world's elite educational institutions - UMass ranked as one of top 200 universities worldwide. (The Times list is here - University top 200 in full - Times Online)
Granted, the schools mentioned in the earlier Globe article, such as Michigan and North Carolina, ranked higher than UMass. But, given that the tuition costs are double at the out-of-state schools, well, you do the math.