<p>Not that it's really important, but what do most people count as the southern ivy?</p>
<p>Duke?
Vanderbilt?
Emory?
Rice?
Other?</p>
<p>My parents say Tulane and SMU are southern Ivys, but I don't buy it. UVA and William and Mary are better than Emory and Vandy in my book (and "Public Ivys"), so I guess you could put them on your list.</p>
<p>In terms of faculty quality, departmental strength, and resources, it has to be UT-Austin. Look at the National Research Council Rankings - Rice, Emory, UVA, and Vanderbilt were nowhere close to UT-Austin (and UT is #1 in Texas in 30 of the 37 of its ranked fields per the NRC, totally eclipsing Rice) Duke was the only Southern school that came close to having as many highly ranked departments. On top of that, NO Southern universities have anywhere near the quality of libraries (UT's Ransom and Benson libraries are literally among the greatest in the world, its general libraries are the fifth largest collection in the US, and its Tarleton law library is #1 in the South), museums (the Blanton at UT is now the largest university art museum in the country, with one of the largest Renaissance/Baroque collections outside of Europe, one of the largest print/drawing collections in the US, and one of the world's top Latin American collections), and performing arts spaces (the performing arts complex at UT is among the top 2-3 of all universities in terms of quality and number of spaces.) Then there's also a presidential library on top of it. Nearly every one of UT's academic programs is ranked in the top 20 or higher - from the natural sciences, to engineering, to business, law, film, public affairs, classics, architecture, even the pharmacy school! No other school in the South, except perhaps Duke, can match UT's academic breadth and depth. It's also important to point out that although UT doesn't have a medical school on campus, it has one of the highest concentrations of NAS and NAE faculty members in the country.</p>
<p>The only thing keeping UT from getting the recognition it deserves based on these factors is the selectivity of the undergrad program. By state law, at least 90% of undergraduates must be in-state. This does nothing to diminish the actual quality of faculty, departments, and resources. And top students can choose honors programs such as the Plan II liberal arts program, where their peers will be every bit as stellar as their top private school counterparts.</p>
<p>If you look at the actual characteristics of the Ivies, they are private, with top faculty, extremely well-respected by their peers, and have an extraordinarily talented student body.</p>
<p>The only Southern school that comes close to fitting that definition is Duke. There are other good schools, but Duke is the only one that, were it in New England, might actually be an Ivy.</p>
<p>Although you asked for one, the Ivy League of the South should contain *eight *to match its northern counterpart! :) </p>
<p>And it should probably contain only schools in the colonial south, for a similar reason. Otherwise I'd add Rice Univ. </p>
<p>After all, highly-ranked graduate departments, or the size of the library, etc cannot really be factors else MIT and Stanford would be in the original Ivy League... Moreover the eight Ivy League colleges are not the top eight colleges in the country, by anyone's estimate. </p>
<p>Schools would have to be southern, though; venerable, and of very high academic standards to qualify:</p>
<p>Duke University
Emory University
Georgetown University
Johns Hopkins University<br>
St.John's College, Annapolis
University of Virginia
Washington & Lee University
College of William & Mary</p>
<p>I'd also consider Davidson College and UNC...</p>
<p>Re: Marsden's list</p>
<p>Vanderbilt?</p>
<p>I don't think you could allow public schools (no uva or w&m)</p>
<p>regarding peer assement scores, i believe hopkins scores 4.6 while duke has a 4.5...and hopkins definetly has a top faculty...however due to its location, its student body tends to be weaker... but anyhow...i believe the only school in the south that southern people truly hold most pride to and even crown it as the harvard of the south is emory =D</p>
<p>Emory does have the largest endowment of all southern schools</p>
<p>Re: Vanderbilt. I think there's a convincing argument to be made in favor of Vanderbilt, if the "Ivy League of the South" is to maintain (as it should) a distinctly southern flavor. Although I don't think Tennessee is a colonial state, I also don't think that's a terribly important qualifier. </p>
<p>In defense of W&M and UVA (and I always seem to be defending Virginia colleges on here, check out the W&L forum!) I'd point out that W&M was private until the Difficulties Between the States impoverished it and it ultimately had to be rescued by the Virginia General Assembly in the late 1800s. Were it not for that dreadful War, W&M would still be private. And UVA, FWIW, is notorious as the public school that thinks it's a private school. Okay, that was slightly lame, true maybe but lame ;)</p>
<p>Actually, I was expecting someone to take issue with JHU (no real southern character, despite its location south of the Mason-Dixon Line) or St. John's (too small and weird)... but I love St. John's...</p>
<p>maryland is not the south! the mason dixon line should be moved between virginia and north carolina imo</p>
<p>What does one consider "Southern"? Is Texas Southern? Are Virginia and DC southern? And what does one mean by "Ivies"? Are we talking about universities that match the Ivies in terms of excellence or are we just referring to excellent universities? Can we include Publics? The all-inclusive list would look somethin like this:</p>
<p>College of William & Mary (do publics qualify)
Davidson College (can a LAC truly be considered Ivy-like?)
Duke University
Emory University
Georgetown University
Rice University (one can argue that Texas isn't Southern)
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (public)
University of Virginia (public)
Vanderbilt University</p>
<p>I have trouble including DC in this list, but no way does Maryland qualify as Southern.</p>
<p>what is marland considered as then?</p>
<p>Although this is kind of a ridiculous thread, this may be the first time ever that I would agree with Alex, although would probably put W&L on that list before UNC. </p>
<p>MD is mid-Atlantic, just like NY, NJ, PA, DE. Sometimes, VA is considered mid-Atlantic and sometimes southeast from what I've seen.</p>
<p>The Baltimore and DC metropolitan areas are not the South.</p>
<p>The rest of Maryland has a southern flavor to it, as does all of Virginia except for Northern Virginia/the DC suburbs.</p>
<p>Johns Hopkins could benefit from a bit of southernness, I think. The place is kind of intense.</p>
<p>It GREATLY depends on how you define this. If you just want to ask the question of "What are the best schools in the South?", then that's a different question from "What schools are Ivy League in nature?"</p>
<p>If the issue is about IVY LEAGUE, then there are two ways to go: (1) a school that has most of the same characteristics such as being private, having extraordinary students and extraordinary faculty, etc., or (2) a school that is of similar QUALITY, however one defines "quality."</p>
<p>If we're talkig about similar characteristics, then I stand by my earlier statement that only Duke qualifies. It is private, it has a reputation score of 4.5 and a SAT midpoint of 1450. This compares favorably to the Ivy League averages of a 4.65 reputation score and 1448 SAT. Basically, if Duke were in the Ivy League, its student body would be about average based on SAT scores and it's reputation score a bit on the low side, but higher than Dartmouth and Brown, and tied with Penn.</p>
<p>No other Southern private school (if we define "South" as the old Confederate states) even comes close. Rice's student body would be about in the middle, but its reputation score is 4.1. Emory's student body would be about the same as Cornell's, at the bottom of the Ivy League, but its reputation score is 4.0. Vandy's 1370 SAT score would put it in sole possession of last place in the Ivy League and with a rep score of 4.1. After that, there's a sharp drop off to Wake and Georgia Tech.</p>
<p>If you want to call Missouri a Confederate state because of of its state legislatures voted to secede, then you have Washington University in St. Louis. Its student body SATs are about in the middle of the Ivy League at 1440, but its rep score is 4.1. In other words, it ranks about with Rice.</p>
<p>If one includes schools of similary QUALITY, it becomes more difficult. I'm going to use SAT scores and reputation scores as my definition of "quality" because those data are available. There are many ranking systems that include more data. You're welcome to use those.</p>
<p>I've already gone over the private schools, so the only place left to look is the publics. Only UVA's rep score approaches that of the Ivies. Its 4.3 would be the lowest in the group, and its mid-point SAT score is 1325, which would be 50 points lower than the lowest Ivy, Cornell. UNC has a 4.2 rep score and a 1300 midpoint SAT. W&M has slightly higher SATs at 1350, but a rep score of 3.8.</p>
<p>Someone suggested Texas, but it hardly looks like an Ivy. It has a rep score of 4.1, and an average SAT score of 1235, 150 points lower than the lowest Ivy and 213 points below the Ivy average.</p>
<p>I think that Duke is the only school that qualifies.</p>
<p>^ I would agree with this. I was just going more by what are the eight best schools in the South.</p>
<p>Just for giggles, I'll make a list. I excluded publics, even though William and Mary and UVA definitely deserve to be considered, and I left out lacs, although Wash and Lee and Davidson deserve to count too. I also considered any state that once owned slaves to be southern.</p>
<p>Duke - Harvard
Rice - Princeton
Georgetown - Yale
Washington U St. Louis (I know people here seem to hate it) - Columbia
JHU - Cornell (just cuz the science base, and for no other reason)
Vanderbilt - UPenn
Emory - Brown
Wake Forest - Dartmouth</p>
<p>Almost all Southern schools are disqualified because they actually have good athletics. Sorry!</p>
<p>I don't think the Ivies would last very long in the ACC.</p>
<p>Johns Hopkins
Georgetown
Washington & Lee
William & Mary
Duke
Davidson
Wake Forest
Vanderbilt
Emory
Rice</p>
<p>Based on History/prestige/reputation.</p>
<p>UVirginia & UNorth Carolina if you added public research schools. ( I know W&M is public but as noted before only due to a fluke of history. More private in flavor than other public schools.)</p>