Middle-Class Families Increasingly Look to Community Colleges
I went to a community college and transferred to a prestigious public university.<p>In my experience, if you find a good community college, the high volume classes tend to be better than they are at a big school.  There are usually less than 50 students (vs up to 400), the teachers actually enjoy teaching, and the material is easy enough that the teachers understand it just as well as top tier professors.<p>Honestly, California is the only state where I'd unabashedly recommend this path though. 
 The community colleges are consistently good, you have multiple choices in terms of top tier public universities, and transfer students are given priority.