<p>^ noimagination, I suspect you are referring to the “Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index” (FSPI) put out by Academic Analytics. It counts publications, citations, awards, and funding levels. It does not measure “prestige”.</p>
<p>^ Yep, that’s the one :)</p>
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<p>Just because an institute is part of a league doesn’t make it prestigious and may be that’s the reason you now resent the word 'PRESTIGIOUS".</p>
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<p>Correct. If I interview/meet a person who graduated from Harvard I will assume a certain minimum level of smartness and education until that person proves me wrong. If I interview/meet a person who graduated from the University of Idaho, I will not assume anything. I will certainly not assume that the person from the U of Idaho is less smart or less educated than the person from Harvard. But I will want more information.</p>
<p>So if a smart student gets into both the University of Idaho and Harvard and is now trying to choose, that student needs to be aware that if he chooses Idaho, one of the downsides is that future employers or acquaintances will not assume that he is in fact a very smart student. Prestige just becomes one of many factors that one has to consider. There are many downsides to choosing Harvard too.</p>
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<p>What kind of success matters, and how do we observe and measure its influence?</p>
<p>Harvard University has educated more US Presidents than any other institution. I suppose this should count as one kind of success. CalTech alumni earn more PhDs per capita than any other school’s alumni. That is another kind of success, right? How do we measure and compare the influence of N Presidents v. the influence of M PhDs? How do we compare Harvard’s role in the President outcome to CalTech’s role in the PhD outcome?</p>
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<p>Are you familiar with the work of economists Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger? In two separate studies, they concluded that attending an elite college does not appear to give most graduates an earnings advantage. The same very capable student is likely to have about the same earnings outcome whether he chooses Harvard or Idaho.</p>
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<p>True, being more subjective prestige is harder to measure, but that doesn’t stop hundreds of kids on CC from trying. But what I mean is being wealthy carries baggage with it that some people object to. Same with prestigious. </p>
<p>A billionaire is undoubtedly wealthy. And some people resent that. HYPSM are just as undoubtedly prestigious (even if less precisely measured), and some people resent that too. But in both cases if the shoe fits wear it. If someone is wealthy and it pertains to the conversation in some way, go ahead and talk about it. Same with prestigious.</p>
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<p>Interesting. To me, “elite” means excellent, high caliber … and “prestigious” means “gets gasps of admiration from lots of others” (is very outer-directed). The two are often, but not always, found together. I wanted my kids to have an elite education … but whether it was prestigious (as in, the masses gasped when they trotted out their sweatshirts) was irrelevant. As an example, both Harvard and Williams are elite … Harvard is prestigious among both the masses and those-in-the-know, whereas Williams is largely unknown among the masses but prestigious among those-in-the-know.</p>
<p>I think there is also the concept of prestigious and prestigious-enough. Because at the top 20 or top 30 level, yes, some may be more “prestigious” than others - but they all have more than enough prestige for anyone’s needs. </p>
<p>And, frankly, how do most people judge colleges that they really know nothing about? By hearsay. I’ve personally never visited Dartmouth (just to pick an example). How do I “know” it’s good? Well, I’ve heard it’s good, and that’s reinforced by rankings, so it must be good, so therefore I’ll consider it prestigious. But that’s not really based on much actual information, is it? Likewise, schools that have big sports presence such as Duke or Georgetown are prestigious among the masses – but that’s because they become known through their sports, and the masses here “oh, those are good schools,” not because they really know the actual strength of their programs.</p>
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<p>If the goal is to get into politics than Harvard has more prestige but if the goal is to get a Phd in theoretical Physics than Caltech has more prestige.</p>
<p>That is why success mean proven reputation that people don’t question.</p>
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<p>There are lots of way to objectively measure success of an institute. Here is one way</p>
<p><a href=“http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/kauffman-study-0217.html[/url]”>http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/kauffman-study-0217.html</a></p>
<p>Here is another way</p>
<p>[college-big-investment-paltry-return:</a> Personal Finance News from Yahoo! Finance](<a href=“http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/109946/college-big-investment-paltry-return?mod=edu-continuing_education]college-big-investment-paltry-return:”>http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/109946/college-big-investment-paltry-return?mod=edu-continuing_education)</p>
<p>[definition</a> of prestige from Oxford Dictionaries Online](<a href=“Oxford Languages | The Home of Language Data”>Oxford Languages | The Home of Language Data)</p>
<p>In thinking about prestige, it may be helpful to distinguish between “treatment effect” and “selection effect”.</p>
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Basically, an institution following the principles of treatment effect is less selective because the “treatment” undergone within the institution ought to be rigorous enough to garner the intended results. So, the goal of the treatment effect is to turn you into what you need to be. On the other hand, a selection effect institution believes that selecting for certain traits will create a group in which the desired results will be observed. The article gives a great example of the Marine Corps vs. a modeling agency, but notes that while the ideology of Ivy League institutions is based in treatment effects, the practice of admissions is definitely selection effect designed.<a href=“source:%20%5Burl=http://jasminllenadegracia.blogspot.com/2010/05/winners-losers-and-college-admissions.html]Winners,%20Losers,%20and%20College%20Admissions[/url]%20,%20bold%20added”>/quote</a></p>
<p>“Prestige” seems to be associated more strongly with selection effects than with treatment effects. Several colleges seem to exercise academic treatment effects that are at least as rigorous as Harvard College. Yet they continue to be less selective, less exclusive, and therefore less prestigious.</p>
<p>Ban the culture of citing USNWR as an evidence for claiming A school is better than B. I’m sick and tired of seeing ranking-obsessed ignorant kids with no life experience whining about which school is better merely based on USNWR bullcrap.</p>
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<p>Pardon me while I gag. This goes to show you that it’s all a matter of one’s personal perspective.</p>
<p>How about banning the prestige whores and elitists? Just a thought… Carry on.</p>
<p>if prestige is synonymous with better than I like its use! The idea that Harvard academics are better than most schools is true. some things are better, some people are higher performers than others, and some places and people have earned a type of prestige.</p>
<p>there’s nothing wrong with using prestige. Or elite!</p>
<p>Prestigious was not a word I thought of much before finding CC and I agree that it seems to mean “something everybody has heard of” here. I think it might help the OP’s cause to know that as I am a single parent and teacher, the essential element of the college search for my kid was getting into one that met full need. Prestigious meant generous - and my kid’s college search has a HPY ending.</p>
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<p>OTOH, Harvard may attract kids who are already looking to go into politics whereas Caltech attracts kids who are already looking to get PhD’s. It’s rather like saying that going to modeling school turns ugly girls into beautiful models. Uh, no, it doesn’t. Beautiful girls went to modeling school in the first place.</p>
<p>To tk’s point about treatment vs selection effect, all too often hs kids on CC seem to think that these schools have treatment effects – look at discussions about what’s better if the goal is to get into law school or med school. I think you get yourself into law school or med school. Your school can’t “elevate” you to that if you don’t have what it takes.</p>
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<p>I don’t agree that there shouldn’t be rankings. I think that everyone needs to be realistic about their abilities and aim for a list of safeties and reaches within their own abilities. If we didn’t have rankings, how would kids know where to begin. When D1 decided she wanted to study communications/PR, I would have had no idea what we would have done had we not read up on which schools stand out in this area. </p>
<p>But you’d be a fool if you only looked at rankings. It’s a tool to be used judiciously.</p>
<p>My first reaction to the title was YES PLEASE, but then I realized CC would be boring without the ■■■■■■.</p>
<p>If I could ban one word from CC it would be “amazing.” Based on the incredible overuse of this word, I’d say that nearly every person here is way too easily amazed.</p>