<p>Hate to split straws, but “rednecks” have red necks because they are out in the sun and looking down at the ground (while plowing it up or something). I agree that it has become more of a lifestyle brand than an agricultural marker, and more in opposition to sophistication than any specific program of its own, but it certainly has its origins in farm work or herding.</p>
<p>Forty years ago, the country charts had a song whose bridge went:</p>
<p>Oh we don’t fit in with that white-collar crowd
We’re a little too rowdy, a little too loud
There’s no place that I’d rather be than right here
With my red neck, white socks
and Blue Ribbon beer</p>
<p>I don’t think the results are entirely “duh.” I think Pizzagirl is correct that there is a sense that the Ivies have done a better job than “regional” elite colleges in attracting students from all over the country. The results show that is not really the case, except perhaps for MIT. This is a different perception from perceptions about quality or prestige, and I have to say that it is a perception I also shared. I would not have guessed that Wash U. was more “national” in this respect than some Ivy League schools. I’d still be interested in how this may have changed over time.</p>
<p>The latter is a perfect description of the mindset of H’s late parents. Midwesterners. I think some people are just naturally like that, everywhere.</p>
<p>WashU also did some heavy marketing, and that combined with increased competition for spots in the NE schools, led lots of student from our area to start applying there. </p>
<p>When S was looking at schools, 6 years ago, WUSTL was incredibly aggressive in mailing to anyone who indicated interest at all. I mean, I think he got something from them at least every two weeks. They were also offering a lot of merit money that their NE and MW competitors generally were not, being mostly need-only.</p>
<p>Would the first step of expressing surprise or duh not be to evaluate the correctness of the “study” and the purported results? </p>
<p>Before “establishing” that WashU is more national than CHYMPS, should one not question the validity of the “data.” Again one has to accept that the number of students, especially after adding dubious elements to create an index, for a poorly defined area is … telling. </p>
<p>To keep it simple, I remain unconvinced that the fact that WashU enrolls fewer students from “its” defined region than HYPS do from their own does ANYTHING to establish a truly national “presence” let alone a reputation. </p>
<p>There are much simpler checkpoints available. For instance, inasmuch as WashU is EXTREMELY popular in large cities in Texas (among a specific SES) it remains largely unknown to most of the state, and probably the country. One might ask a parent with kids in high school the following:</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Now, repeat the exercise with HYPS and check the results! </p>
<p>THAT is what a national appeal means! Coupled with the pesky FACT that students from about every state do enroll at the elite schools. And, fwiw, you can safely add a good number of schools to the HYPS list. For instance, people might not write it correctly but they know what Johns Hopkins is known for. </p>
<p>“WashU also did some heavy marketing, and that combined with increased competition for spots in the NE schools, led lots of student from our area to start applying there.”</p>
<p>And to me this is a big … so what? How else are you supposed to increase awareness of a brand – cross your fingers and hope? ALL universities do branding efforts. Every single one. They differ on the amount of $ they have to spend on it, what their objectives are, and what their positioning and communication strategies are – but it’s rather like chiding Dr. Pepper for advertising and thinking it’s too big for its britches when Coke and Pepsi advertise all that time. (Advertising’s not marketing, of course, but the same concept.)</p>
<p>WUSTL started the transformation from regional to national university a long time ago. When I was in high school in the 1970s, they were already working on this. As @Consolation points out, they started giving lots of merit money away. Back then, I think they automatically offered substantial merit scholarships to every National Merit Finalist. They offered me a very generous package. Everyone knew what they were doing back then. And they succeeded. A long time ago. I’m surprised that anyone wouldn’t think they’re a national university. </p>
<p>By the way, according to this “analysis,” I’m from the “northeast,” although I live south of the Mason-Dixon line. LOL.</p>
<p>"I think Pizzagirl is correct that there is a sense that the Ivies have done a better job than “regional” elite colleges in attracting students from all over the country. The results show that is not really the case, except perhaps for MIT. This is a different perception from perceptions about quality or prestige, and I have to say that it is a perception I also shared. "</p>
<p>It’s illuminating that what I posted was intended to spark discussion of the job the various <em>colleges</em> did in attracting a national student body, and it so quickly got turned into what people in the different <em>regions</em> thought and didn’t thought.</p>
<p>And yes, Hunt, that was exactly the hypothesis I set out to prove / disprove when I got access to the data. Who does a better job of attracting a national student body? It actually only occurred to me yesterday that I could also take the enrollment data and thus answer the question about whether elite students in certain regions were more or less likely to go out of region. (I’m still not convinced my analysis of THAT aspect is 100%, because it’s self-defined by “attend one of these top 20 schools” as opposed to a marker such as “got a score of X on SAT/ACT,” but it’s at least a start.)</p>
<p>xiggi, I understand your point, but mine is really a different one: a measure of the degree to which a college has in fact attracted and enrolled students from all around the country. I think the figures show that Wash U, in particular, has done a good job of this. As others have pointed out, Wash U made a concerted effort to achieve that very result. The surprising thing, to me, is that it doesn’t appear that at least some of the Ivy League schools have accomplished this as successfully, despite my impression that this was also something important to them. This is not the same thing as having at least one kid from every state.</p>
<p>Chicago is another example that has had a campaign for many years to expand its appeal, and it appears to have done so pretty effectively.</p>
<p>You’re certainly right that Harvard has way more recognition nationwide than Wash U does–but does it have as much more recognition relative to Wash U as it did ten or twenty years ago? I don’t think so.</p>
<p>It’s not a so what because it goes back to the fact that colleges need to have neutral admissions policies relative to geography for your analysis to be accurate. Clearly WUSTL wanted to broaden its national draw, so we can extrapolate that they may have adjusted their admissions priorities accordingly. Had Princeton decided it wanted more kids from Missouri and fewer from Princeton High School (I heard they accept some 100 PHS students per year, though I am not sure that’s correct), their admissions data would probably look different. </p>
Well, that’s the interesting question, to me. Based on the rhetoric I read from the Ivies, I had assumed that they had done this more than they apparently have. The reasons for it are harder to tease out, as Pizzagirl noted from the beginning of the thread. It may be all about the applicant pool, for example.</p>
<p>This is a simple concept. It really is. How national of a student body do these schools enroll? Whether or not you like the results, WashU does a better job at enrolling a national student body than Harvard. I certainly understand quibbling over VA in the Northeast (and again I apologize for not having the ability to unspool that), but there is absolutely nothing mathematically incorrect over what I’ve done. Of course it could be improved if I could look at MSA’s, or high/medium/low socioeconomic groupings, or students who score above X on the SAT/ACT. </p>
<p>To Hunt’s point, I <em>would</em> think that the Ivies, etc. would want to do better on that dimension, to fit with the mission of being the country’s premier national universities. Of course, they have to deal with the applicant pool they are given which likely skews strongly to home-region, and they have legacy to consider, and fac brats, and good-neighbor policies and all the rest. </p>
<p>But this is part of why it’s frustrating on CC when you hear of someone who says “But my (invariably NE, well-to-do suburban or magnet) school always sent 10 kids to Harvard every year, and this year they only accepted 5 - what gives?” – it’s like they don’t even understand – well, maybe Harvard would like to spread the wealth around a little. </p>
<p>Yes, Hunt, you are correct. I probably should have posted my opinion without quoting a part of your post. I also agree about the concerted efforts as most of us have heard or received the “reaching out” material dispatched from St Louis. As we know, it has worked for other schools such as Tulane or Chicago in more recent memory. By design or by necessity? It really does not matter as we can safely assume that EVERY school has access to enrollment gurus who have their pulse on the markets. </p>
<p>Nothing is ever black on white. Perhaps I should also apply more grey to my analysis of PG’s conclusions! Charité bien ordonnée commence par soi-même. Or something along those lines! </p>
<p>PS Fwiw, the broadening of the market is quite common everywhere. I made references to the annual report by Dean Shaw at Stanford. Since he moved from Yale about a decade ago, he has relentlessly made changes in the “marketing” of Stanford in terms of admission. While one could expect the most selective school in the country to “take it easy” as they inch towards 50,000 applications, the reality is different with efforts to reach every corner of the US. All the way to the Florida Keys or the edges of Vermont. The school is increasing its alumni participation in terms of interviews – yes, the same interviews I have often called worthless for the … students. </p>
<p>I, for one, was not in the least criticizing WUSTL by describing their aggressive marketing plan. I didn’t see anyone else doing so, either.</p>
<p>FWIW, back when I was in college, I was aware of WUSTL as a good school. IIRC, my primary impression at the time was that it was known for its architecture program.</p>
<p>“It’s not a so what because it goes back to the fact that colleges need to have neutral admissions policies relative to geography for your analysis to be accurate. Clearly WUSTL wanted to broaden its national draw, so we can extrapolate that they may have adjusted their admissions priorities accordingly. Had Princeton decided it wanted more kids from Missouri and fewer from Princeton High School (I heard they accept some 100 PHS students per year, though I am not sure that’s correct), their admissions data would probably look different.”</p>
<p>Every single university has their own version of “Princeton High School” - the backyard school (where there are undoubtedly a lot of applicants and likely a concentration of legacies and/or fac brats as well). My guess is that Clayton HS serves that purpose for WashU. Just as nothing prevents WashU from saying “Hey, I’m going to deliberately over-favor kids not from the Midwest this year so I can build a more national student base”, nothing prevents Princeton from saying “Hey, I’m going to under-favor the Princeton High kids this year.” </p>
<p>And is there anything wrong with either thing? Not as far as I can see. </p>
<p>If Princeton decides they’d rather stroke the Princeton HS applicants than open up some space for other parts of the country, that’s their prerogative, but then they have to be mindful that they are working against their brief of being a fully national school. Hey, all of these schools have all decided that they prefer being in bed with Exeter, Andover, Choate, etc. to some extent even if it works against being fully national. That’s their call to make; it’s not for me to say that’s wrong for them to do. </p>
<p>The methodology that universities use to raise their ranking interests me. </p>
<p>A number of universities that we are familiar with seem to do it by “playing the game”: sending out large amounts of paper and email spam to increase their number of applicants, big $$ to Nat Merit to increase the scores of their student pool, and strategies for increasing the yield from their admit pool. </p>
<p>GFG mentioned the World University Rankings (Times Higher Education), so I’ve been looking at those (<a href=“World University Rankings | Times Higher Education (THE)”>http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/</a>). Those rankings are more by research output, research funding, citation indexes, and peer reputation. The rankings are very different, though there is overlap in the HYPS area. It seems to me that that the universities ranked higher here become “world universities” by focusing on hiring high-powered faculty in their fields of focus. </p>
<p>Being as how I hang out with a bunch of scientist types who pay attention to grant funding, Nobel Prizes, etc, the World University Rankings seem to be a closer match to how I personally perceive the prestige of various schools.</p>
<p>Harvard does in effect claim to be a national school in their mission statement via the direct reference to it’s original charter from the year 1650: “…the education…of the youth of this country…”</p>
<p>Yale does not claim to not only be a national school, but also an international school per it’s mission statement: “Yale seeks to attract a diverse group of exceptionally talented men and women from across the nation and around the world…”</p>
<p>Wash U In St. Louis claims to be a local, national, and international school all at the same time. Maybe Capt. Kirk can take them where no person has gone before?</p>
</p>