But I thought HYP were national universities! Why are ALL schools so regional??

Parents Forum
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<p>“I have some interest in discussing regional preferences and in noticing that schools many on this board claim to be national turn out to be just as regional as the rest.”</p>

<ol>
<li><p>I don’t really consider this “analysis” to be methodologically worthwhile. GIGO. I keep mentioning that even though I live below the Mason-Dixon line, we’re getting counted as northeasterners. That’s just one methodological problem, and it’s a big one. This “analysis” has taken three of the highest scoring jurisdictions (which is kind of the playing field for the northeastern elite schools) and stuck 'em into the region that already starts out with the highest test scores. Just the admits from the Washington, DC area would have shifted 3% of total admits from the “northeast” (and they’ve put Texas, TEXAS in the southeast!! LOL!!). I’m sure there were other admits from the state of Virginia.</p></li>
<li><p>As well, related to the GIGO theme, I’m not sure the numbers match up with those of the most authoritative source, which would be Harvard’s admissions folks. Here’s a link:</p></li>
</ol>

<p><a href=“Admissions Statistics | Harvard”>https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>They cut the country differently, into more regions. As you can see from the link, the New England area accounts for 17% of enrollment, as does the SOUTH. The MID-ATLANTIC region, which is where I’d place DC, Maryland, and Virginia, has 23% of enrollment. Why, that’s even more than New England!</p>

<p>It’d be nice if Harvard’s table told us which states went into which regions, because then we could map their actual results with what is in this thread.</p>

<ol>
<li> I wouldn’t define a “national” university by such a trivial metric, even if I thought the data analysis was worth anything. As I said previously, to maximize geographical representation, you’ll have to give something else up. Here’s one: African Americans comprise 14% of the US population. Harvard this year had an admission rate for African Americans of about 12%. WUSTL was something less than 7%. Hispanics comprise 17% of the US population. Harvard’s admitted class is 13% Hispanic. WUSTL, less than 5%. Which do you think really represents national diversity?</li>
</ol>

<p>How does ethnic diversity intersect with geographical proportionality? Is it possible that maximizing one reduces the other?</p>

<p>What other factors does one sacrifice to have more proportional geographical representation? Which of those factors are actually more important to “national” status than more precisely proportional geographical representation?</p>

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<p>PG: “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>different than the answer to my question, 'What is the point of this thread"?</p>

<h1>141 Sally wrote:</h1>

<p>alh, I can’t speak for PG, but we have both observed a tendency here for people to exalt east-coast elite schools over those in other parts of the country and to dismiss schools in other areas as more “regional” compared to the ones they are familiar with. It gets frustrating to respond to people who won’t consider a school like WashU over, say, Penn because “WashU is so midwestern”–when in fact WashU is one of the most “national” of all elite universities–more than any Ivy. As PG has pointed out, this happens with LACs too–Carleton is “too rural” while the far more remote Williams is not. (Those are just a couple of examples, but you get the idea.)</p>

<h1>142 pizzagirl:</h1>

<p>Thank you, sally. That’s exactly it.</p>

<h1>144 pizzagirl</h1>

<p>You keep saying that. The data doesn’t tell you absolute <em>rates.</em> It does not enable me to answer the question “of students interested in a prestigious college, what % travel outside home region and what % don’t.” It’s also important to note that in the midwest, Michigan IS a prestigious college; in the South, GA Tech IS a prestigious college; in the West, Berkeley and UCLA ARE prestigious colleges. The world of prestige is not just defined by the northeast view</p>

<p>It seemed to me, with those posts, the point of the thread was to change perceptions that lead some “to exalt east-coast elite schools over those in other parts of the county”. I suggested a few hundred posts later (more or less) the best way to accomplish that goal was to try and “sell” the other schools instead of shaming those wrong thinking northeasterners but the suggestion wasn’t well received. </p>

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<p>Just clarifying: so is your point that colleges “have” to accept local residents because it is politically expedient for them to do so (and not because the law/code requires it)? </p>

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<p>@notjoe. </p>

<p>this thread, inspite of the latest comments is not about Harvard. I mean, eventually, everything on CC is about Harvard. I once put Harvard in a thread title just to see what happened. I did the same thread title without Harvard? Crickets.</p>

<p>There are a lot of schools being discussed. </p>

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<p>“It doesn’t answer the question if quality of education drops if the student body is uniformly concentrated in a certain region. I would claim that it doesn’t. If you claim otherwise, you must also believe that all the state schools are formed around a mission statement that inherently lowers their quality of education, hence the mission statement is flawed.”</p>

<p>I wouldn’t say that a highly regionally concentrated student body lowers the quality of the <em>education</em>; after all, Physics 101 is Physics 101 regardless of the origination of the student body. It is, however, not a desirable characteristic from <em>my</em> personal point of view. it may not matter to you, and that’s cool too. I’m not the arbiter of what you should want. </p>

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<p>It’s no more about Harvard,or any NE elite school, than the MIT threads are about MIT. </p>

<p>imho</p>

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<p>“It gets frustrating to respond to people who won’t consider a school like WashU over, say, Penn because “WashU is so midwestern”–when in fact WashU is one of the most “national” of all elite universities–more than any Ivy.”</p>

<p>I think when people say that, they mean WashU is, after all, in Missouri. WashU can’t change that. Students don’t live in a bubble in the dorm and in the classroom. Someone going to school in Columbia or NYU is getting the education that is New York City. Whether it is superior to the education that is St. Louis is besides the point. The point is that St Louis is not New York City, and New York City is not St. Louis. Some prefer one over the other. That’s freedom of choice, and I don’t know why anyone would try to argue against that.</p>

<p>Anyway, that’s what I believe people mean when they say some college is rural, or Midwestern, or … you get the point. It is not all about the student body. The location matters too. It’s all about fit.</p>

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<p>“I wouldn’t say that a highly regionally concentrated student body lowers the quality of the <em>education</em>; after all, Physics 101 is Physics 101 regardless of the origination of the student body. It is, however, not a desirable characteristic from <em>my</em> personal point of view. it may not matter to you, and that’s cool too. I’m not the arbiter of what you should want.”</p>

<p>Exactly. We all have our personal preferences. But then why get upset when some people prefer Ivies over any other school? Isn’t it simply a matter of personal preference as well? As this thread clearly shows, many prefer UMich and GA Tech and whatnot over the Ivies, so it is not a phenomenon specific to Ivies.</p>

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<p>Who is upset?</p>

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<p>"
I was kind of waiting for that. you’ll find most of us attended top schools, too, and have kids who have or are."</p>

<p>Catalan, I attended a top school, as did my husband, and my two kids are currently attending two top schools (one on the uni list, one on the LAC list). The Ivies are all great schools. I think it’s weird to divide the world of top schools into Ivies and all others for purposes other than athletic discussions, but whatever. </p>

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<p>“Who is upset?”</p>

<p>I quote (from another poster):</p>

<p>“It gets frustrating to respond to people who won’t consider a school like WashU over, say, Penn because “WashU is so midwestern”–when in fact WashU is one of the most “national” of all elite universities–more than any Ivy.”</p>

<p>I equated being frustrated as being upset. If you prefer to use frustrated vs. upset, that’s fine too. But I was not talking about you. I really am not addressing all my posts to you, despite what you seem to believe. There are so many posters here.</p>

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<p>Alh - the purpose was not to try to “exalt” non-NE elite schools. The point was to show that a common CC misperception - that NE schools had national draws and non-NE schools had regional draws - was actually not true. </p>

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<p>Not joe -Talk to the US census. They put TX in the South. Not me. </p>

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<p>“Catalan, I attended a top school, as did my husband, and my two kids are currently attending two top schools (one on the uni list, one on the LAC list). The Ivies are all great schools. I think it’s weird to divide the world of top schools into Ivies and all others for purposes other than athletic discussions, but whatever.”</p>

<p>I agree. That’s why I was very surprised why you focused on some select Ivies (as in your thread title) and instead didn’t just say that all top schools are regional. I really dont understand the separating out of the Ivies.</p>

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<p>“Here’s one: African Americans comprise 14% of the US population. Harvard this year had an admission rate for African Americans of about 12%. WUSTL was something less than 7%. Hispanics comprise 17% of the US population. Harvard’s admitted class is 13% Hispanic. WUSTL, less than 5%. Which do you think really represents national diversity?”</p>

<p>Well, obviously in this regard, Harvard has better diversity. </p>

<p>The intersection of regional representation with ethnic / race representation is an interesting one, and I wish I had the data for it. </p>

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<p>You have 24 posts on CC. 6 were directly addressed to me. It’s tough to keep track. </p>

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<p>adding: cross posted here</p>

<p>* I think it’s weird to divide the world of top schools into Ivies and all others for purposes other than athletic discussions, but whatever*</p>

<p>Your thread title is:<br>
But I thought HYP were national universities!</p>

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<p>"2. As well, related to the GIGO theme, I’m not sure the numbers match up with those of the most authoritative source, which would be Harvard’s admissions folks. Here’s a link:</p>

<p><a href="https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics"&gt;https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics&lt;/a&gt;". </p>

<p>You might have missed this, but there were actually about 40 unis and LACs in the analysis. Not just Harvard. </p>

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<p>You have to put HYP in the title, alh. sheesh.</p>

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<p>oh yeah- I forgot</p>

<p>ETA: and just for the record I didn’t go to a top school. </p>

<p>Welcome Catalanumbers!</p>