@snarlatron By “success” I mean the ability to achieve what a typical college applicant’s parents are looking for, especially when they veto a certain school: research/career opportunities upon graduation, a stable income, etc.
Unfortunately, in a lot of fields a student who attended Dartmouth will have better odds of achieving these things, ceteris paribus, than a similarly capable graduate of (insert college with 60% admit rate here). I think it’s ridiculous, but in some professions (especially law, consulting, or finance) you are your alma mater.
Of course, this is true only to the extent that you need to attend a very good school, with the actual school mattering little in most cases-maybe one stubborn firm will be composed solely of Harvard grads and another will laugh at those same Harvard grads as inferior to the clearly better Yale, but these industries as a whole will always have room for a student from Penn, Notre Dame, or UNC-CH.