<p>Literal conversation stoppers:
Harvard, Yale, Princeton </p>
<p>Interest sparkers:
MIT, Stanford, Columbia, Brown</p>
<p>Gutrade, I enjoyed your analysis. You caught the popular image of Yale particularly well.</p>
<p>There are two types of people:</p>
<p>Type 1, makes up about 95% of the people out there, don't know much about universities. They are not that well educated and their exposure is lacking. Those guys would not know many universities. Schools like Chicago, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Brown, CalTech and Johns Hopkins are unheard of. They obviously know Harvard, maybe MIT, Princeton and Yale, and perhaps Berkeley and Stanford. That's about it. They may also know schools like Duke, USC, Notre Dame and Michigan because of their sports programs.</p>
<p>Type 2 are a far more exclusive group. Those people are usually quite well educated and have a lot of exposure. Any top university would impress them, but I hardly think any school would have them standing silent in awe.</p>
<p>Alexandre, what you say about #2 for sure is true for adults. But for the kids I know, even from IVY families, they act like #1 group even though their parents tell them not to.</p>
<p>alexandre's point is accurate - many people have never heard of Dartmouth, let alone Northwestern. The people who know the calibre of those schools will probably be impressed by "HYPS" - but it wouldn't leave their mouths hanging open (unless they'd never expect you to get in :p).</p>
<p>Mensa - your op didn't limit the list to U.S. universities - what about Oxford and Cambridge?</p>
<p>Down here if you said you went to Harvard they'd say, "oh, I guess he didn't get into UF"!.LOL (but true)</p>
<p>That's a good point Mensa. I was refering to adults (people over the age of 20). High School students are indeed more likely to be impressed by name. I know I was. My parents and family members had to beat it out of me when I was a senior in High School. </p>
<p>I also forgot to add that type 1 are also likely to know regional colleges. So people in Ohio probably know Ohio State, Ball State, Bowling Green, Miami of Ohio and Kent State more than say CalTech or Dartmouth.</p>
<p>i think oxford and cambridge have the wow factor, similar to yale, princeton, or stanford.</p>
<p>Why don't highly ranked LAC's like Williams, Amherst, and Swarthmore have much of a "wow" factor? I mean, they're all nearly as selective and high calibre as the Ivies and are the premier recruiting spots for Merill Lynch, JP Morgan, and other investment banking firms. It's sad that the genaerl public ignores these fine schools.</p>
<ol>
<li>Oxford/Harvard (Tie)</li>
<li>Yale/Cambridge (tie)</li>
<li>MIT</li>
</ol>
<p>I think these are realy the only ones that mean a lot to the average Joe.</p>
<p>This is coming from the Dartmouth/ Columbia perspective.</p>
<p>Group 1, about 50% of people: They have heard of the school. I often get "thats a good school, right?" or "is that Ivy League?". But more often than not they know its a good school and are impressed.</p>
<p>Group 2: 25%. They know it, and know it well. They are immediately impressed. Likely college educated themselves. Most impressed are people who go to other relatively good schools (like Bucknell, etc) or have kids at these types of places.</p>
<p>Group 3: 25%. They havent heard of it at all. </p>
<p>These experiences are from interacting with generally educated people while out on the town or talking with family friends, etc. I havent had much experience talking about my Dartmouth education with the guy flipping burgers.</p>
<p>Coming originally from back east I often tell folks that stare at me blankly when I say my son is at Pomona, that it is a school like Amherst. They still look at me blankly and ask what Amherst is.</p>
<p>You'd be surprised: a majority of people, asked to name well known colleges, would not be able to summon Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, or MIT to their lips.</p>
<p>You mean majority of residents of trailer parks in backwoods Mississippi? You have to be kidding me if you know educated people who haven't heard of Yale or Oxford!</p>
<p>IIT. I'd be impressed...</p>
<p>"What about "Middlebury, Swarthmore, Bowdoin, Haverford ... wow, you actually care about education instead of big names and grade inflation!""</p>
<p>Right...because LACs with little name recognition hold the monopoly on education...get off your high horse.</p>
<p>I'd never heard of Harvey Mudd, CalTech, UChicago, or most top-ranked LACs until I found these boards. I also didn't know that MIT, Northwestern, UMich, or UVA were as selective as they are.</p>
<p>I don't think I even knew Brown was an Ivy until I was a sophomore.</p>
<p>for your average american, the names of schools that garner the most respect are generally: harvard (by far the most impressive to them), yale (sounds vaguely familiar), princeton (wasn't that schizo guy from there?), stanford (ends in the sound 'ord', must be prestigious), and thats about it. theyll bat their eyes at MIT and UChicago won't sound impressive to them (even though it is). most people only know a handful of names, most of which are just the most talked about schools. and some may know others bc of sports.</p>
<p>I'm interested in how you all define the "average american".</p>