<p>Could someone please list those colleges which are regarded as the " little ivies"??
I have read where Williams, Amherst and Swarthmore are really the only ones which may qualify. Also Wesleyan is debated as possibly the fourth. Is this true?</p>
<p>Originally, it was the "little three" - Williams, Amherst, and Wesleyan. And they were all approximately the same size, and all male. Their counterparts were the "Seven Sisters" that were not part of dual-school combines, being Bryn Mawr, Mount Holyoke, Wellesley, Smith, and Vassar (which went coed). The other two were Barnard and Radcliffe. All three of the men's schools went coed. At some point in the late 70s/early 80s, Wesleyan experienced (I'm told) quite a bit of financial turmoil, while Swarthmore got rich. The "little three" are still football rivals.</p>
<p>Other than the fact that they are very fine schools, very rich, with terrific faculty and facilities, and very selective, they do not necessarily have any more in common with each other than any one of them might have with Bowdoin, Pomona, Middlebury, Haverford, Reed, Bates, Colby, Vassar, Carleton, Davidson, or Grinnell, or any of a number of other fine liberal arts colleges. (The same can be said of the Ivies as well - the differences between, say, Dartmouth and Cornell - are rather immense, once one gets past wealth, faculty and facilities, and selectivity.)</p>
<p>Click on "College Discussion Archive" at the bottom of this page, then on "Message Search." Enter "Little Ivies"--and use quotation marks--and you can read the many previous discussions of this subject.</p>
<p>There's no actual term called "little ivies"...any school can claim to be a """little ivy""". </p>
<p>Sometimes schools just like to get prestige by copying the titles of awesome schools. If you notice, the """little ives""" posted above have virtually no name recognition individually, except on this board.</p>
<p>golubb_u, you are good at making jokes....</p>
<p>"golubb_u, you are good at making jokes...."</p>
<p>Thanks :) ....except that I was serious about colleges trying to leach prestige off great universities.</p>
<p>The term "Little Ivies" does indeed exist. It refers to the elite LACs eg. Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore etc. Some of these schools are more difficult to get into than the least competitive big Ivies.</p>
<p>I thought Swat cut its football team?</p>
<p>The term "Little Ivies" refers more to academic excellence at the small school level (it's nothing official).</p>
<p>Asillad, the term "Little Ivy" exists...just as does the term "Public Ivy". All this means is that some LACs and Public universities are very prestigious and highly respected...in academic and professional circles, as respected as members of the Ivy League. </p>
<p>The original "Little Ivies" include Amherst, Wesleyan and Williams. But today, I would also include Bates, Bowdoin, Bryn Mawr, Carleton, Claremont McKenna, Colby, Colgate, Davidson, Grinnell, Harvey Mudd, Haverford, Macalester, Middlebury, Mount Holyoke, Oberlin, Pomona, Smith, Swarthmore, Vassar and Wellesley.</p>
<p>Half the schools on that list have NEVER been referred to as "Little Ivies". You're being quite generous.</p>
<p>Since "Little Ivies" is not an official term...one can always pseculate. I also forget Reed! hehe Serously though, the Ivies are nothing special anyway. There are roughly 10 other Private research inuversities that are every bit as respected as the Ivies. And there are 6 or 7 State universities that are as respected as the Ivies. And there are quite a few LACs that are as respectred as the Ivies. Personally, I find the term Ivy League to be missused in this forum.</p>
<p>Yes, we have 5 or six very good public universities in this country. But to say they are comparable to the Ivies is a stretch. The best publics comes in at #18+/- in the US News poll. All of the Ivies come in earlier than that, with the majority in the top ten. Most other US Nat'l polls are in agreement.</p>
<p>True, and since you brought up the USNWR let us discuss the academic rankings. If you look at the academic ranking of those institutions, they match up with the Ivies. I am refering to the Peer Assessment score. The critrion that rates universities as academic institutions.</p>
<h1>1 Harvard University (4.9/5.0)</h1>
<h1>1 Princeton University</h1>
<h1>1 Yale University</h1>
<h1>6 University of California-Berkeley (4.8/5.0)</h1>
<h1>7 Columbia University (4.7/5.0)</h1>
<h1>9 Cornell University (4.6/5.0)</h1>
<h1>9 University of Michigan-Ann Arbor</h1>
<h1>9 University of Pennsylvania</h1>
<h1>15 Brown University (4.5/5.0)</h1>
<h1>16 Dartmouth College (4.4/5.0)</h1>
<h1>18 University of Virginia (4.3/5.0)</h1>
<h1>18 University of California-Los Angeles</h1>
<h1>21 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (4.2/5.0)</h1>
<h1>21 University of Wisconsin-Madison</h1>
<p>Like I said, in terms of academics and reputation, there are 5 or 6 state schools that compete nicely with other top universities...uncluding the Ivies. Same goes for the LACs.</p>
<p>Those are not academic rankings. They are the "peer review" component of the academic rankings. Academic rankings involve much more than a peer analysis. The reason why rankings are seldom based on peer analysis alone is because the bigger schools with more alums are favored for obvious reasons. Conversely, smaller schools are less well known and their graduates less seen.
But if peer analysis is your thing, be careful, polls on one criteria alone can vary wildly. I have seen peer polls putting the publics much lower.</p>
<p>No, those are academic rankings. In fact, it is the component of the ranking that is geared to measuring academic quality. According to the USNWR itsel, it defines the Peer Assessment as follows:</p>
<p>"The US News Ranking formula gives greatest weight to the opinions of those in a position to judge a school's academic excellence. The peer assessment survey allows top the top academics we contact - presidents, provosts and deans of admissions - to account for intanglibles such as faculty dedication to teaching."</p>
<p>In short, what is bewing rated in the peer assessment is a school's academic excellence. You may like it..you may not like it, but you are the one who brought up the USNWR. </p>
<p>As for the UTLaw school rankings...what does that have to do with anything?</p>
<p>I haven't been a member on this site for very long, but I find it curious that for every single thread that mentions the word "Ivy", you can be sure there will be a series of posts by Alexandre that tries to accomplish three objectives:</p>
<p>1) Discredit the prestige and reputation of "Ivy League" institutions
2) Praise public universities up to the heavens as if there were being held down by some kind of evil "Ivy"-ory Tower - preventing them from taking their rightful place in the limelight of prestige and reputation that the wholly undeserving Ivies currently enjoy - what injustice!
3) Throw a bunch of extremely selective statistics together (in the guise of "objectivity", mind you) to help support the above 2 claims</p>
<p>I find it even more curious that this particular poster is supposedly a "moderator" - which I find a tad odd given that such views are seemingly very far from being "moderate". But, hey, that's just one opinion... (although an "Ivy" opinion so it will likely be discredited immediately - in fact, I'm not quite sure what the shelf life of this particular post will be)</p>
<p>As for the "Little Ivies", my understanding of this term encompasses the following institutions:</p>
<p>Andover, Exeter, St. Paul's, Choate, Hotchkiss, Deerfield, Lawrenceville, Hill, Loomis, Taft ... (otherwise known as the Ten School Admissions Organization)</p>
<p>What do you mean? He was simply defining what "little ivies" are- schools slightly below ivies academically. I don't think that Alex EVER discredited "the prestige and reputation of Ivy League" institutions. </p>
<p>Ivy_grad and alphacdcd seem so defensive. They act like the ivies are the top universities in the nation, without mentioning their equals like MIT, Amherst, Swat, Williams, Stanford, Duke, and JHU. The ivy-league is a sports division. That's it. Yes, they share some similarities, but geography is their main likeness</p>
<p>Alexandre was actually making a valid point. Alphacdcd made an unfounded assertion that ivies have a higher peer assessment than publics, when in fact that was not true, as proved by Alexandre. Not suprisingly, the defensive ivy grads freak out when disproven and sulk about it.</p>
<p>I assure you that I think that the ivies are incredible places, and they all extremely prestigious and selective(especially HYP). However, after HYP, there's plenty of institutions at the ivy standards. I consider MIT equal to HYP.</p>
<p>Hoo, Are you older than 13? Look at what you wote!</p>
<p>In your first paragraph you acknowledged "Little Ivies" being below Ivies. In the second paragraph you state they are equals?</p>
<p>
[quote]
"The Ivy League is a sports division. That's it."
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Um, yes, technically the Ivy League is a sports division. But let's get real for a second. Do you know anyone who associates the Ivy League with sports - like the ACC, Big 10, Pac-10? I think not. The fact is, the term "Ivy League" has come to mean the very definition of academic excellence. Just look the term up in any reputable dictionary or encyclopedia. Want proof? Here's the Merriam-Webster entry for Ivy League:</p>
<p>Main Entry: Ivy League
Function: adjective
1 : of, relating to, or characteristic of a group of long-established eastern U.S. colleges widely regarded as high in scholastic and social prestige
2 : of, relating to, or characteristic of the students of Ivy League colleges</p>
<p>Gee, what's missing here? Sports division? No mention of the fact that it is a sports division? How could they get this so wrong since it is ONLY a sports division? Perhaps because the term Ivy League (in theory and practice) = academic excellence. </p>
<p>Defensive? No. Just laying the facts straight. I am assuming there are a lot of impressionable kids who come to this site as a form of reference. Let's not sugar coat the reality of life - the Ivies enjoy broad prestige and reputation not only nationally but globally. My point? To try and say otherwise is not only flat out wrong, it's extremely misguided. That's not to say that there are plenty of fine academic institutions across the country - of course there are - but why does one have to go around trying to discredit the existing prestige / reputation of a set of institutions to do so?</p>