<p>Poll: what three colleges do you think are the most overrated? and which three are the most underrated?</p>
<p>Overrated: The Big Three-- HYP. </p>
<p>Underrated: The Little Three (the LAC Version of "The Big Three")-- Amherst, Williams, and Wesleyan.</p>
<p>Overrated: HYP</p>
<p>Underrated: Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan</p>
<p>I've always heard the 'little three' as Amherst, Williams, and Swarthmore.</p>
<p>gomestar, I think that Swarthmore is a great school, and if I could, I would create a whole list of "Little Ivies," but... <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ivies%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ivies</a></p>
<p>Overrated: University of Miami</p>
<p>Is it as hard to get into the "Little Ivies" as the big ones? Which "little ivy" is best for English and foreign language? If I were to get into Amherst and Middlebury, should I choose Midd based on their reputation with writing and language?</p>
<p>Sorry to hijack this thread. Here are my additions to the list:</p>
<p>Overrated:
Harvard</p>
<p>Underrated:
Pomona</p>
<p>Overrated: most private institutions (including mine, Duke)</p>
<p>Underrated: many public institutions</p>
<p>Overrated: NYU, Notre Dame, Dartmouth</p>
<p>Underrated: Rice, USC, William and Mary</p>
<p>vincanity1, care to explain how the University of Miami is overrated?</p>
<p>Overrated: George Washington University, NYU
Underrated: Davidson, Rice</p>
<p>Overrated: Notre Dame, George Washington, Washington-- Seattle, Wisconsin
Underrated: WashU, Rice</p>
<p>Beantown64, I've lived in Miami all my life and have become pretty familiar with the education that UM has to offer. The university is comprised of 50% OOS, which would make it seem as if it would be a quite desirable university in terms of their academic standing. While the university is good, it can't even claim to be the best university in the state. It doesn't help that the tuition difference between the two schools for an instate student is about $30,000. Many of the students that choose to go there in state are either those who qualify for a certain scholarship that I am not too familiar with but I know one needs to be in the top 1% of their high school class, as well as some specific GPA and SAT reqs, or they attend simply because they can afford it. </p>
<p>I don't quite understand why students are coming from states thousands of miles away and accumulating a substantial amount of debt to receive the education that the University of Miami has to offer. I do not mean to bash the university, but almost no matter what state you are from, there is a comparable public university that will offer about the same standard of education for a very small fraction of the price. </p>
<p>Again, I in no way mean to bash UM despite how it probably seems that way. I just believe that the education offered at UM is about the same as one in almost any top public institution, and in some cases including that of UF, UVA, UC's, the caliber of education offered is even better than that of UM. </p>
<p>I apologize for not following the trend of conciseness in this thread</p>
<p>I also don't appreciate the tone beantown. There is a reason that the individual who created this thread didn't also ask for explanations of each one</p>
<p>This has been done many times.</p>
<p>HYP = overrated.
Top publics = underrated.</p>
<p>And I'm not against privates, nor am I a huge public-supporter. But I do think that the tippy top privates (including Stanford) are quite a bit overrated, while the top publics are often ignored and/or disdained.</p>
<p>how exactly is notre dame overrated? this is about academics, not sports--if anything, i think ND is underrated (see peer assessment)</p>
<p>Any non-Northeast school with strong academics is underrated.</p>
<p>The Little Ivies are widely recognized to be the members of NESCAC:
Amherst, Bates, Bowdoin, Colby, Connecticut, Hamilton, Haverford, Middlebury, Swarthmore, Trinity, Tufts, Wesleyan, Williams</p>
<p>The Little Three, however, refers to what was originally the Triangular League, a sports conference between Amherst, Williams, and Wesleyan formed in 1899. For much of the 19th century, these three were also considered to be the top three small colleges that offered an education comparable to that of Harvard/Yale/Brown/etc. By the time of the inception of the USNews rankings, Swarthmore - about 30 years older than AWW - had secured its place as one of the very best LACs while Wesleyan had gone from being one of the wealthiest colleges in the nation to somewhat poorer than Amherst and Williams due to financial mismanagement, particularly in the area of investment. As such, Amherst and Williams have remained at the top, Swat's small size and intense atmosphere has made it an academic powerhouse for those pursuing education in particular, and Wesleyan has remained a top school (ranked as high as 6 and as low as 14) that evidently has fallen short in some aspect that is important to the rankings - I would assume it is money.</p>
<p>Overrated: Nortre Dame, WUSTL, Emory, NYU</p>
<p>Underrated: U of Washington, W&M, UCSD, U of Wisconsin</p>
<p>I've just never heard of the 'little ivies' as being those 3 listed ... I guess I confuse it when people say Williams, Amherst, and Swarthmore are the HYP of the LAC's. </p>
<p>In any case:</p>
<p>Over:
Notre Dame, UPenn (not Wharton), WUSL</p>
<p>Under:
most publics</p>