<p>These people are absolutely wrong. Going to Brown will give you as many opportunities as Harvard. I have five friends staying with me this weekend (Dartmouth alums). One goes to Yale Architecture, I am at Columbia Business, a friend is at Cornell med, another at Penn med, and the last one works as a consultant for a top firm. I would say we are pretty typical. </p>
<p>As for shyboy, he has not idea what he is talking about. At the undergrad level MAYBE berkeley is Ivy caliber, but its a totally different type of school. The rest aren't up there. Actually I think Cornell is the most atypical (and for me has the least value) of the Ivies due to its size, not its lower selectivity. Its classes are much bigger and the alum network isnt as strong. Great for grad school though.</p>
<p>"Actually golubb, Berkeley is stronger in more graduate programs than any Ivy except Harvard"</p>
<p>But people look at the ugrad just as much as the grad. If anyone wants to attend berkeley, all they gotta do is go to a community college for 2 years and transfer over...no biggie.</p>
<p>Sure, Berkeley is a great public school, and certainly much better than University-of-Micigan-ann-arbor, and for many people, the public school system is all they ever want to go to. I'm not saying they shouldn't do that, but if they get a full ride to the Ivies, they may change their mind since the cost factor has disappeared.</p>
<p>An Ivy League education is not necessarily more expensive. Based on personal knowledge, expected family contribution figures (EFC) for engineering at Cornell, Michigan, Illinois, Rice, Carnegie Mellon, and U of Rochester were within $5000 of each other and, yes, Cornell was highest. Michigan and Illinois were out-of-state, so there was no in-state comparison. None were early decision. (Applying ED can lower the gift aid offer.) Ivy League colleges give lots of aid. The sticker price scares people off but the real difference is not as great as you might think. </p>
<p>I am pretty familiar with the debate about Ivy League quality but I think the psychological impact is underestimated. Maybe it is a character flaw when pride is important to you, but the knowledge of being at an Ivy provides continual confirmation and reminder of your achievement. I am not saying you shouldn't be proud of acievements at other colleges. On the conrary. It is hard to put into words, but the Ivys are special. I think choosing a non-Ivy over an Ivy would more likely make you wonder whether you made the right choice but not vice versa. Maybe it shouldn't be so, but I think the Ivys build confidence and self esteem and they draw respect. The Ivys have high graduation rates, so students must be satisfied.</p>
<p>I understand the concept of "lower Ivies" but agree that HYP do not have a monopoly on Ivy quality. Cornell, for example, has several statutory colleges with SUNY tuition (a great deal, by the way, for NYS residents). The Cornell Arts and Sciences college and Engineering college are most selective (and expensive). The math SATs at Cornell engineering are probably within 30 or 40 points of MIT and Cal Tech. The same could be said of certain majors at other "lower Ivys".</p>
<p>I know you can get an excellent education at many colleges and universities and I mean no disrespect. This thread got me wondering "What is special about the Ivys?". I haven't heard too much said about the psychological impact so I thought I'd mention it.</p>
<p>You know, the more I think about it, the Ivy League is very very overrated, and the 8 schools that belong to it are seriously underrated.</p>
<p>Throughout my college search, Brown stood out as the ideal college for me. Everything from the open curriculum to the campus first aid squad seemed perfect. The quality of education is nothing to sneeze at, either. And I would have applied ED even if Brown had been a member of the Dead Tree League.</p>
<p>Prestige is all relative. As far as quality of education goes, I honestly believe that Brown = Rice = Harvard = UMich = Duke = Princeton = Chicago = UPenn = UNC = etc. Any distinctions from there completely depend on the student.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Golubb, promotions are performance based and have nothing to do with education. The powers that be do not sit down and decide to promote someone based on where she/he got their degree but rather based on who was the most steady and effective performer. </p>
<p>Secondly, evenif you believe that the qualityof one's alma matter is instrumental in getting a promossion, UC Berkeley is at least as good as 5 of the 8 Ivies and UCLA is not far behind.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Oh really? Promotions have NOTHING to do with education? That is probably the silliest comment I've read thus far on this board. Of course it matters. It's why people GET an education. It's the reason why college grads will have a much easier time getting the job of their choice over HS (only) grads and why MBAs will have an advantage over college (only) grads, etc. </p>
<p>Why do is there such fierce competitions for the "top" schools? And, further, why do these "top" schools monopolize time from recruiters of the best global corporations? Further, why does it matter to go to a "top" business school? </p>
<p>Because IT MATTERS. There is an inherent selection process already done when one has been able to get through the tough selection process and then graduate from one of the top schools. Similar concept for graduate programs.</p>
<p>Of course, I'm not saying that its the ONLY thing, but (and if you'd read my initial post carefully) you'd note that I wrote "then rising slightly again when coming time for executive / management level screening process / selection." </p>
<p>In other words, if a company's board of directors are looking at two equally qualified candidates, and one has an Ivy undergad and Ivy MBA and the other has an undergrad degree (only) from a public U. The Ivy grad is (at the margin) going to have a slight edge. Again, noting that these candidates are equally qualified. Because boards can take confidence in the fact that there are more CEOs of Fortune 500 companies that have either a Wharton or Harvard MBA than any other two graduate programs out there. There is a reason for this.</p>
<p>No guarantee by any means (again read my initial post), but it certainly won't hurt you.</p>
<p>Ivy Grad, let us not overdo it shall we? Obviously, if two employees of equal caliber apply for a job, and one of them is a Wharton MBA while the other only has an undergraduate degree from the University of Wyoming, the Wharton MBA is going to be favored. But how often does that happen? And if it does, what does it say about the level of Wharton's MBA program?! LOL What I was saying is that if an employee with an MBA from Wharton were competing for a job against an employee with an MBA from UVA, the one with the better performance record will get the job. If they both have excellent performance records, then it will be a question of personality fit. </p>
<p>An Ivy League degree is certainly worth every penny. But so would a degree from a university like Chicago, Northwestern, Duke, MIT, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Rice, UVA, UC Berkeley etc... Funkyspoon is right when he says that all of those schools are equal...and that the rest is up to the individual.</p>
<p>Ivyleaguer, I do not believe in the concept of "Lower Ivies". That is not my term. Others have used it, and in answering their posts, I may have quoted them, but it is not a concept I believe in. And I am the first to say that selectivity and academic quality are not the same. Obviously, selectivity plays a role, but it is only one of a dozen or so important factors that go into determing the overall quality of a university. I do believe that there are differences between universities, but those differences are insignificant. All Ivy Leagues schools are top 15 universities and the difference between #1 and #15 is not that big anyway. I also believe that there are 5 universities that, when you look at all the components of education, are slightly better than the rest. Those are Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford and Yale. But they are not clearly better than the schools that immediately follow and it certainly does not mean they are better places to study.</p>
<p>I think it is worth it for personal satisfaction and prestige. But I don't think you make more money by going there and that's not a good reason. But prestige is.</p>
<p>Mensa, if you were from California, or Virginia or Michigan, would you really chose to pay an additional $60,000 - $150,000 to go to a school that you perceive as having more "prestige" over the flagship State school? You would pay $140,000-$200,000 for a Penn or Brown education when you could go to UVA, Cal or Michigan for $50,000 - $80,000? Obviously, if you come from a very poor family, you may get a substantial amount of help from the private schools...and if you are very wealthy, it doesn't matter. But to most mid-income family ($90,000-$150,000 household income) who won't get that much from the elite private schools, I think that's too much to pay for "pereceived" prestige. You know, in the real world, when you are surrounded by educated people, the difference between Cal and Brown or UVA and Duke is non existant.</p>
<p>Well, what you say about Michigan and UVa is true; but they have near-Ivy prestige. So they are super bargains. But like if it were a choice between Penn and SUNY Buffalo I think it does make quite a difference to people.</p>
<p>That is not a fair comparison. SUNYs are decent but not great by state school standards. Ivies are the cream of the private school crop. There are 8 Ivies, so let us look at 8 elite state schools:</p>
<p>University of California-Berkeley
University of California-Los Angeles
University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
University of Texas-Austin
University of Virgnia
University of Wisconsin-Madison</p>
<p>Half of those schools are worth chosing over some Ivies, provided they are a better fit.The other half are a cut below, but they are still worth going to if the price difference is signficiant.</p>
<p>fair enough. I would say that of those schools, berkely, michigan nc uva and wisconsin impress people in a good way. ucla, illinois don't impress many people. UT i don't know how that is. if money becomes a factor, i would go to michigan, uva, berkely and unc in that order. i think they are prestigious and i would be happy to go there, esp sving money to use in grad school.</p>