So now that we know Ariel's staying in the Los Angeles area, what might that mean for Alex next year (and beyond)?
The most obvious ramification is that it will be highly unlikely that Alex will be written out of the show for now, since Ariel has said she wanted to stay on the show even while going to college – had she chosen a school outside of southern California she probably would not stay on the show.
However, I wonder if at some point she will still have to choose one or the other – while UCLA probably isn't nearly as demanding as CalTech it's still a somewhat prestigious school with presumably a fairly heavy course load (especially if Ariel does indeed goes on to study law as she's said she'd do in the past). If law truly becomes her passion (and that is entirely up to her – I want her to follow her heart not her fans' hearts and certainly not mine) then I can easily see her deciding to give up acting, at least for a while, or at least cut back on it (i.e. she'd probably stop playing Alex, and limit her acting to less time-consuming voice work).
The other on-screen ramification I could think of is could this lead to a change of schools – i.e. could Alex transfer from CalTech to UCLA? It's total conjecture on my part (IOW this is not even a rumor) and in some ways it's not ideal (I'll get back to that shortly) but I think it's possible - since Ariel will already be there in real life every day it will probably be easier to film an occasional scene or two on that campus with less disruption of her real-life studies.
I suppose it's also possible that we may finally see an episode or two with more focus on Alex's life at school instead of with her family (though I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for that).
And if Alex has become homesick, it is a much shorter commute, at least distance-wise (about 4 miles to UCLA as opposed to 20 to CalTech), although since the shortest distance would not involve traveling on a freeway (I-405 and I-10 is an option but it's a longer route with minimal time saving) the time difference isn't nearly as great (but it would still only take about ½ the time). She could even bike from home to school more easily.
And since UCLA is a state-run school, her tuition rates will be lower since she's a resident. That would certainly be good for Phil and Claire, presuming Alex's tuition isn't totally scholarship-funded. (Since she's already talked about moving back home and commuting to CalTech in the future, there might not be as much room and board savings.)
However, getting back to reasons why I wouldn't totally like this possibility, by far the biggest one is I'd still find it disappointing that she'd at least partially abandon her ambitions and ideals by dropping out of CalTech, even though she could still get a very good education at UCLA. As it is, remember CalTech wasn't Alex's first choice (she was bitterly disappointed not to get into Harvard) – a transfer to UCLA might feel almost like a failure for her.
And given how driven Alex is, I'm not sure her stress levels will drop as much as we might think even with a slightly more relaxed academic atmosphere. In other words, she may not get much relief from dropping her sights a notch.
We might get a hint as to whether or not a change is coming by the season finale (maybe even with the press release which should come next week, if it's more detailed than what was announced in ABC's May Sweeps press release). Since the episode was taped almost two months ago (long before Ariel made her decision and thereby leaving her availability for next season at least somewhat up in the air) the prospect of a cliffhanger for Alex is very much in play. We don't know yet why the rest of her family is unaware that she's come home for summer – could it be that something happens at CalTech (e.g. maybe she drops out?) which leads to her coming home early?
Of course there could be any number of reasons (some more plausible than others), so we'll just have to wait and see.
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