<p>It would seem that way, rev, but Caltech also boasts on of the highest CR SAT Averages in the country.</p>
<p>It is pretty amazing though that they're the only school in the country that boasts a CR+M average score over 1500, when we here at CC see hundreds of kids with 2350+'s get rejected from all the top schools every day (well, during admissions season)....it's sad. There's no way close to 50% of the students in the Ivy League should have under a 1400.</p>
<p>The only reason Caltech has such a high SAT score median is because they focus on scores and cull their top 300 applicants. Like I said before, if the Ivies selected the top 300 scores out of 20,000 applicants, they will have ~1550 as their bottom 25th percentile.</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT
Columbia
Brown
UC Berkeley
Cornell
Caltech</p>
<p>totally depends on where you live- in the northeast, the average person has no clue about the quality of schools such as cal tech, rice, berkeley, etc. local schools such as tufts sound much more impressive</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT/Columbia
Wharton
Cornell
Brown/Dartmouth</p>
<p>huskem has a point. In the west:</p>
<p>Harvard
Stanford
Yale
MIT
Princeton
Berkeley</p>
<p>i live about an hour and half from notre dame and 2.5 hours from chicago, and i would say that chicago has more "prestige" from noble prizes and their econ dept while nd is better known for football and being a catholic school. it is a good school, but i think chicago is more of a pure academic school</p>
<p>In the south:</p>
<p>Harvard/Yale
Princeton
Duke/Stanford
MIT
Columbia
U-Penn
Dartmouth
Cornell/Brown</p>
<p>(A baker's dozen in no particular order)
University of Chicago
MIT
Cal Tech
Harvey Mudd
Reed
Swarthmore
Carleton
Yale
Princeton
Harvard
Amherst
Oberlin
Byrn Mawr</p>
<p>Harvard
(big gap) </p>
<p>Princeton
Yale</p>
<p>(gap)</p>
<p>Stanford </p>
<p>(gap)</p>
<p>Duke</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Wharton (upenn)
Stanford
MIT
Johns Hopkins
Columbia
Brown
Cornell</p>
<p>Harvard
Princeton
Yale
MIT
Brown
Dartmouth
Stanford
MIT
Columbia
Penn
Cornell
UChicago</p>
<p>^ MIT is so good, it makes it twice...interesting.</p>
<p>Prestige:</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT
University of Pennsylvania
Columbia University</p>
<p>(and then comes the uni's most ppl have no idea exist:)</p>
<p>UC Berkeley
Duke
Brown University
Dartmouth University
Cornell University
University of Chicago
CalTech</p>
<p>Top 10:</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Berkeley
Columbia
Stanford
MIT
Johns Hopkins
Georgetown
Chicago</p>
<p>This is silly, but I will play with the other children</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
Brown
Dartmouth
Columbia
MIT
Penn
Hopkins</p>
<p>Top 10 most prestigious schools, IMO:</p>
<p>Harvard</p>
<p>Duke</p>
<p>Yale
Princeton</p>
<p>Notre Dame
Michigan
Georgetown</p>
<p>Berkeley</p>
<p>William and Mary
UVA</p>
<p>If I were to go up to somebody on the street, this is the list I think they would give me. Those of you who don't attend some of these schools may have not cringed upon hearing "Dart-MOUTH" or don't know that most people think the University of Pennsylvania is a public school, Columbia is a country, Brown is a color, etc.</p>
<p>Agreed with Hunt that West Point, Naval Academy, etc. are very, very, very prestigious, and are bound to turn more heads across the board than an ivy or other elite.</p>
<p>If you're really talking about national prestige with most people (i.e., not just academics or top employers), I think the list is:</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT
maybe Columbia</p>
<p>Most people couldn't tell you what the other Ivies are, or their ideas of quality would be regional. My criteria is this: would almost anybody in the U.S. be impressed if they heard you attend this school? Actually, by that criterion, I need to add a few more:</p>
<p>West Point
Annapolis
Air Force Academy</p>
<p>Prestige is very much influenced by regional preferences. IMO only a handful of schools have true national prestige (HYPSM) and also true national recruiting appeal. After that, it is a battle region-by-region and the local region colleges will be significantly more prominent and prestigious than is commonly recognized here on CC. Furthermore, the importance of college prestige waxes and wanes depending on where you are. </p>
<p>There are definitely barriers and prejudices in all areas of the country about where one comes from and where they went to college. For example, consider a student coming from SMU who wants to get a job in Dallas or Houston and how they might be viewed compared to a student coming from a non-HYP Ivy. It might surprise some, but in Texas, the prestige and the hiring decision might favor the SMU grad despite that school's lower national prestige vs the Ivies. But I pity the poor fool from a school like SMU who ends up interviewing in a New York or a Boston against a student coming from one of the NE elites. There will always be exceptions, but the historic perspectives and recruiting experiences and the in-bred regional biases drive a lot of the perceptions about prestige. </p>
<p>So, for national prestige, there is HYPSM and then by region it might go like this for national universities:</p>
<p>MIDWEST
U Chicago
Northwestern
Wash U
Notre Dame
Carnegie Mellon
U Michigan
U Wisconsin
U Illinois</p>
<p>SOUTH/SOUTHWEST
Duke
Rice
Emory
Vanderbilt
U Virginia
U North Carolina
Wake Forest
W&M
Georgia Tech</p>
<p>WEST
Caltech
UC Berkeley
UCLA
USC
UCSD
U Washington</p>
<p>NORTHEAST/Mid-Atlantic
All other Ivies
J Hopkins
Georgetown
Tufts
Boston College
Brandeis
NYU</p>
<p>For kyledavid80 (post #18)--with all due respect, your comment that "residents of Chicago think that 'University of Chicago' means 'University of Illinois at Chicago'" is completely preposterous. I've lived in Chicago all of my life, save for my four years at the University of Michigan (I'll be 53 in two weeks), and I've never met anyone--repeat anyone--from Chicago who would confuse the two. Nor would anyone on a national level confuse the two. The University of Chicago is an incredibly pestigious school, particularly in the area of economics. I am not a U of C grad, nor has anyone in my family or circle of friends attended U of C's undergraduate school, so I have no bias here, but you're way, way off base.</p>