<p>@sally305:</p>
<p>By “top tier”, I don’t mean “the CC-approved list of elite schools”. That’s you making assumptions and jumping to a conclusion. </p>
<p>The key is, are they trying for what they deem as the best? Maybe that’s their state flagship. Maybe they truly believe that there’s no difference between a directional and state flagship and elite private (and that’s sad, because there can be differences in opportunities).</p>
<p>However, I do see kids settling for schools with fewer opportunities even when the cost is the same (and justify to themselves not trying for a state flagship or better school). You can’t say that those kids are just as ambitious as the equally accomplished kids from the same circumstances who <em>do</em> try for better schools.</p>
<p>And yes, you can get to anywhere from a directional as well, but, ironically (and sadly), the benefits of attending an elite private are often greatest for disadvantaged/URM who are often most ignorant about the possibilities available at higher-tiered schools outside their local directional.</p>
<p>And you don’t have to give me that spiel about the real-world as the CEO where I work now went to a no-name state school and the heads of both hedge funds I’ve worked at also were state school grads (though the 2nd one was both arrogant and bad at his job; actually, they both ran their hedge funds in to the ground). Regardless, there is a difference between people who challenge themselves and those who don’t, and it’s possible that applying to a top-tier school captures that to an extent.</p>
<p>“But elite schools remain in large part the gatekeepers to our elite class - take the Supreme Court, for one example. I think it’s good for our society as a whole when there is a path, however narrow, to the the very tippy top for the smart, motivated poor kids.”</p>
<p>You know, only a handful of people are ever going to be on the Supreme Court. Saying that the elitest schools are the gatekeepers to the Supreme Court is useless to the vast, vast majority of people who don’t have a prayer of reaching that level anyway. </p>
<p>Most people want a pleasant, nice, upper middle class lifestyle. That’s easily achieved by any state flagship. </p>
<p>^^ That’s why I think it’s more important to the colleges & society as a whole than it is to the individual poor kid.</p>
<p>Society is better when the possibility of upward mobility is real, when a sufficiently bright and ambitious kid can literally start with nothing and end up as one of the most powerful people in the country. Even if that very rarely actually happens; just having that possibility is important. Without that possibility our society becomes a class-stratified one.</p>
<p>But you don’t need to attend an elite college to be a changemaker.
Ive known several people who are/were part of presidential cabinets for example and none of them attended a private university, let alone one of the " elites".</p>
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<p>You don’t need to, true, but the difference in networking opportunities, specially political networking, that opens up to one who attends an elite college versus one who attends a “no-name” college is huge. Specially now as more cronyism becomes the norm in politics and business.</p>
<p>Just for reference, list of American Presidents by Colleges attended. Harry Truman was the last one not to have a college degree, although he was a page for the Democratic Party.</p>
<p><a href=“List of presidents of the United States by education - Wikipedia”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States_by_education</a></p>
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<p>I don’t know about “literally starting with nothing,” but at least two Supreme Court justices come from very modest backgrounds, Clarence Thomas and Sonia Sotomayor. </p>
<p>Yes, PurpleTitan, a lot of CEOs are jerks and/or running companies into the ground while gaining personally. In politics, Congress has an 8% approval rating. The Supreme Court has several justices whose inconsistent opinions suggest something other than intellect is at work in their decisions.</p>
<p>There are two sides to the “ambition” coin. It’s not always a good thing. </p>
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<p>Honestly, it’s the reality today. Look at Larry Ellison. </p>
<p>Sotomayor went to Princeton then Yale, Thomas went to Yale (and I think Holy Cross). Basically supports my point.</p>
<p>Low income kids often do not have the “state flagship” option, because very few state flagships meet full financial need for their students. I think UVa, UNC, MI and the UCs are the only ones.Maybe one or two more.</p>
<p>Ohio, for example, has about 8 large state Us and not one meets full financial need for low income students. For them CC/inexpensive directional while living at home may be all that is affordable, unless they have the knowledge of and the stats and the luck to get into a top private.</p>
<p>“You don’t need to, true, but the difference in networking opportunities, specially political networking, that opens up to one who attends an elite college versus one who attends a “no-name” college is huge. Specially now as more cronyism becomes the norm in politics and business.”</p>
<p>I think when we go round and round on this whole topic, it’s because of self-selection. </p>
<p>Those of us who went into professions that “demanded” elite school educations (i-banking, mgt consulting, blah blah blah) look around and say - gosh, people don’t often get in here without elite school educations, they are critical for social mobility. They don’t often see people from East Whoville who “did well” - since they aren’t “doing well” in their circle. </p>
<p>Those of us who went into professions where there are mixes of elite and non-elite school educations look around and say - yeah, I’ve done well for myself, but so did Joe Schmoe who went to East Whoville State, it’s not where you go, it’s what you do with it. They see plenty of people from East Whoville who do well and plenty of people from Fancy U who are just muddling along. Either way, we just see what we see around us.</p>
<p>@OHMomof2:</p>
<p>I believe that NYS has something for low-income as well. The GA Hope program is merit-based, but if you can get in to the 2 flagships, getting that is likely.</p>
<p>The maximum NY grant is $5000. SUNY colleges (tuition, fees, room, board) cost at least $20k+.</p>
<p>From the perspective of someone who applied to elite colleges just last year, they really do not seem to be reaching out to low-income kids. I am a Pell Grant recipient from a poor southern county that hasn’t sent a kid to an Ivy for undergraduate in twenty years from what I hear. I had qualifications unparalleled by anyone in my senior class of 400 (35 ACT, 2330 SAT II, president of 3 clubs, 4 other offices, big state awards in writing and chemistry, internships at our radio station, excellent service), but H & Y rejected me. Neither even reached out for an interview. The kid who was co-valedictorian with me and had a 34 on his ACT got rejected from Cornell.</p>
<p>Ironically, the schools that seemed to do the best job are the ones that statistically did the worse. Half of UPenn students are full-pay, yet they interviewed me over a video chat, had recruiters call me, even sent me a scarf! At Princeton, the closest interviewer drove thirty minutes to meet me halfway. Yet only 12% of its students are Pell Grant recipients, compared to 20% at H & Y, which didn’t seem to do anything to catch me. My conclusion is that Penn and Princetoo-valedictorian with me and had a 34 on his ACT got rejected from Cornell.</p>
<p>@OldNassau I wonder if part of the reason that H & Y have a higher percentage of pell grant recipients may be that many lower income students may only have heard of Harvard and Yale, and may not even recognize Princeton or Penn. It will be hard to get outstanding low-income students to apply if they never heard of it and neither have their parents. </p>
<p>Do you think that is plausible? If you asked regular people on the street, in the town where you grew up, if they have heard of Princeton University or the University of Pennsylvania, do you think very many would say they recognized them?</p>
<p>Interesting theory @Much2learn. Lack of recognition could plausibly be a contributor to Penn’s problem. When I told a few friends that I’d gotten a likely letter from them and wore the Penn scarf on college day, everyone–I mean EVERYONE, teachers included–thought I was going to Penn State. That rumor persisted even after I had committed to Princeton.</p>
<p>But I’d say Princeton is equally well-known as Yale. Time’s World Reputation Rankings agrees:
<a href=“World Reputation Rankings 2014 | Times Higher Education (THE)”>http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2014/reputation-ranking</a></p>
<p>One problem with your theory is that, in my estimation, acceptance rate is a good indicator of how many applicants a college has drawn in with its prestige. Even Penn’s acceptance rate is below 10%. A university that attracts 10x as many students as it can admit has no problem with branding and PLENTY of low-income kids to choose from.</p>
<p>The struggle to attract low income students is likely due to other factors. For instance, Princeton is definitely preppier than Harvard and Yale, so self-selection may come into play. Further, we may be losing cross-admits because of our grade deflation policy–not really sure. What’s certain is that our matriculation rate, at 67%, is lower than Harvard’s at 83% and Yale at 72%, so we lose about a third of cross-admits for one reason or another. Maybe one reason is that low-income kids feel more accepted at a school with more low-income kids. Regardless, there’s probably no single answer. It’s a pretty thorny problem, or Princeton would have solved it already.</p>
<p>Let me point out that while Princeton is doing significantly worse than H & Y, those two aren’t doing well either. When only one-fifth of your kids come from the bottom one-half of family incomes, your socioeconomic diversity isn’t exactly something you should be proud of.</p>
<p>@sally305 “Many people have no idea [kids from Iowa with 34 ACTs and a fear of leaving their bubble] exist.”</p>
<p>This anecdote is so few and far. A 33+ ACT score is 99 percentile. There are only 18,000 students each year in that category, let alone with all of the ECs he’s cultivated. I’m not sure why you’d celebrate a student like this who avoids seeking out a highly concentrated academic setting.</p>
<p>“So now it’s a character flaw to not even apply to top-tier schools?”</p>
<p>Yes, a fear of leaving your comfort zone is a character flaw. Someone so promising will likely end up fine wherever s/he ends up. But you must not discount the heights they could reach surrounded by a student body of 98 percentile peers.</p>
<p>You have absolutely no idea why people choose or don’t choose to apply to top schools, but way to judge. </p>
<p>I didn’t want to leave the state because both of my parents are in poor health and I didn’t want to be far from them. It wasn’t a comfort thing. It was choosing family over everything else. (Btw, I was one of those “18,000” students, and I did splendidly at my instate public and I’m not going to a “top” grad school.) </p>
<p>@romanigypsyeyes It’s impossible to predict what your outcome would have been at an intellectually thicker school. As @Pizzagirl stated, and I echo, determined students can “do well” anywhere. But the real draw of elite schools, ditto for elite coastal cities, is that talented people thrive in settings with the highest concentration of peers.</p>