This happened a lot in our circle as only a handful of kids from our HS had ever been accepted to D’s college. It was startling how many families, who had never really spoken to us before, were suddenly our best buddies. They all wanted to know the secret to admittance. It got old fast and D avoided telling people where she was going to college.
I just came back from visiting Oxford. Ever been to the Bodleian Library, or the Eagle and Child, or the Radcliffe Camera, or the Ashmolean Museum? No wonder they are embarrassed to say they go to Harvard! Lol.
Guess who’s saying “I went to school in the UK” in order to avoid the “and how did YOU get in? Money or connections?” unpleasantness…
I don’t think most here have trouble believing Harvard grads experience “embarrassing “ moments. But sympathy? I think the benefits of the degree outweigh any embarrassing moments. Talk about searching for a dark cloud.
My error. I thought Harvard phased out need-based aid at around $150K family income but looks like it is at around $220K. I would still think that families that make that amount, with two parents working, and live in certain high cost areas may still take some kind of loan. Clearly, Harvard (and certain other schools) are much more generous with need-based aid than many other schools.
Yes, it’s much better when it is absolutely clear that neither money nor connections (and not even being an Olympic athlete, at least as an undergrad) can get you into Oxbridge, only intelligence. I certainly feel more impressed when I meet someone from Caltech compared to someone from Harvard.
Tony Blair’s son was rejected by Oxford (his alma mater) when he was Prime Minister and Malala tweeted about how she was nervous whether she’d achieve the A level grades needed for her conditional offer.
1 Like
Wouldn’t it be more correct to say “academic achievement” (measured by A-level grades) rather than “intelligence”. The latter is obviously an input to the former, but is not the only input.
I probably wouldn’t bring it up, but if asked a direct question I would answer honestly.
Not entirely, because the interview is really designed to determine how enjoyable you would be to teach, which for almost all Oxbridge dons means “how intelligent/insightful are you in discussing their subject”. So I think “academic intelligence” would be closer than “academic achievement” (for example I’m aware of someone from the US who got in having never attended school after 8th grade and never having done any formal high school academic courses, he just taught himself lots of math and then took the STEP papers).
The specific numbers from Harvard’s NPC are below, assuming typical assets. The cost to parents has a sharp increase between $150k and $180k, but this group still gets substantial FA. For $150k income, Harvard is likely to be less expensive that in state public alternatives (ignoring merit scholarships). However, once you reach $180k, Harvard is likely to be more expensive than many in-state publics, especially if the student lives at home while attending the in-state public.
Harvard NPC: Cost to Parents
$65k income (~median US income) – $0k cost to parents
$100k income (top 30%) – $5k cost to parents
$150k income (top 16%) – $15k cost to parents
$180k income (top 11%) – $30k cost to parents
It’s also interesting that the region in which this sharp increase in price occurs is the income region that starts to get especially overrepresented among applicants. This may relate to how Harvard can afford such a generous FA program. They have a much lower concentration of applicants in the <$150k income grouping, so they can be especially generous for them.
IPEDS and other federal databases report 6% of students receive loans, 2% of which are federal loans. The distribution of federal loans suggests that the 2% of students with federal loans is spread out across a wide variety of incomes, rather than being concentrated at $150k+.
No student should feel embarrassed at the school they attend. Whether you attend Harvard or Faber University you should feel proud of your accomplishments. So, I guess we should have a little sympathy for the students/families that feel singled out and a little disdain for the individuals that single them out.
1 Like
I believe that many of the listed examples can theoretically happen, but the more meaningful question is how common they are. Maybe there is one person somewhere who once said that say they want to touch a Harvard grad, but I expect that is an extraordinarily rare occurrence, and the far more typical reaction is more along the lines of “that’s nice” or “that’s a good school”, then continuing with the conversation.
For example, I have 3 degrees from Stanford. I don’t hide the fact that I attended. An acquaintance could easily figure out I attended by the driver’s license plate on my car, LinkedIn, or a bio on my website. Yet I am not inundated with comments about Stanford. Outside of this forum or interviews for the school, I get maybe 1-2 comments per year about those school, unless their football team is having a very good year.
These comments are never negative, and rarely suggest any kind of assumptions. A comment might be a colleague at work mentioning that they stopped by the campus while on a vacation to the Bay Area and asking if I attended? Which leads to talking about the campus for a couple minutes. I can’t recall ever having a negative conversation related to finding out I attended Stanford, with in real life persons not connected the school (outside of this forum or interviews).
Similarly, it’s quite rare to have any major changes in behavior after learning I attended the school. At work, people are concerned with my areas of expertise and past experiences, rather than where I attended college years ago (I work in engineering. I realize law, investment banking, and other more prestige oriented fields can differ.). Friends or persons I am dating also rarely appear to act differently after learning where I attended college.
I attended a public HS that was not in a especially wealthy area and not located in CA. Like the overwhelming majority of US HSs that meet this description, few students applied to Stanford. I don’t recall personally knowing anyone else who applied to Stanford, so there was little risk of issues with someone else being upset because they were not accepted. Even among more popular schools within my HS, such as Cornell, this type of behavior seemed quite rare. Students I knew from honors classes generally acted like they were happy to hear that their friends got in to Cornell, even if they were not accepted.
Have to agree with @Data10. And, maybe its different in New York City where I attended a large urban public high school with separate vocational and academic tracks typical of its time. The handful of people who wound up at a competitive private college (maybe a dozen out of a graduating class of 1500) were the bright, earnest kids who did well on their exams and perhaps stood out in some other way - leads in the school play, class officers. The editor-in-chief of the school newspaper was nearly always a stepping stone to an ivy. I don’t remember being jealous of them. I don’t remember them being shy about telling people where they were going.
When I told people I was going to Wesleyan the first question was almost always, “Does it have a campus?” This was a very important perk to First Gens who’d spent almost their entire lives hopping on board trains and buses to get to school. When I answered with a resounding “Yes.” all I can recall ever receiving back was the functional equivalent of whatever was a thumbs up sign at the time, probably something like “Nice going.”
“I don’t recall personally knowing anyone else who applied to Stanford, so there was little risk of issues with someone else being upset because they were not accepted. Even among more popular schools within my HS, such as Cornell,”
Pretty much describes my hs in upstate NY. Only like 1-2 kids applied out of 550 to HYP, we had a couple to Stanford as well, as this was the first year of the US news rankings, so that maybe driven interest. We actually had more to MIT and other ivies, but really only the best students applied, like the val and the sal and a few others. And students know who the best students are, being public hs we didn’t have many with hooks.
DD graduated from Harvard. When people asked us where she went to school we would say boston. That usually ended the conversation. We didn’t want to drop the H bomb. She is Caucasian and is very social. If people followed up and we told them she was in tech and Stem the responses were very interesting to say the least
I sensing a little bit of an inconsistency here. On the one hand, there’s a desire to be spared the gauche reactions that apparently graduates of Stanford, MIT, Rice, Texas, Columbia, Dartmouth, Brown and most of NESCAC are spared. At the same time, I’m also detecting a quiet satisfaction with the mystique that gives way to the responses in the first place. I mean, so far, no one has said, “Gee, I wish people didn’t have all these misconceptions about Harvard.”
Count me as a “No.”
And why is it “the H bomb”? Like, audible gasps can be heard? People grip each other in what - shock, disbelief, sheer awe? It’s a school folks. So what is the acceptable reaction to the embarrassing confession “ I went to Harvard?”
That would depend on why it was asked. “Did you like it?” works fine for me. “What was your major/concentration?” is also fine. “Did you know _?” works if you are the same age. “Did you take any classes with _?” is fine too.
@circuitrider wrote: “I mean, so far, no one has said, <Gee, I wish people didn’t have all these misconceptions about Harvard.”
Okay here goes: I wish people didn’t have all these misconceptions about Harvard.I mean, so far, no one has said, “Gee, I wish people didn’t have all these misconceptions about Harvard.”
It’s not a tragedy folks, but at work and socially it does pose some very real problems. We, like most, have REAL problems so I am not a snowflake 
1 Like
Not really a problem,-- but with degrees from Harvard and another Ivy only Harvard takes it on the chin. The other gets nods. It’s the Harvard name. I think if someone goes to Brown, Cornell, Stanford, RIce etc the reaction might be different. H is the H bomb. Say the name and there is a loaded pause. Do graduates deserve sympathy, of course not. But the reaction is strange.
MIT also gets a pregnant pause from techies on the East Coast but doesn’t elicit the same response maybe due to the fact that STEM is more “measurable?” Also, Harvard College is the one that elicits the stunned look. Harvard Law, business school etc are considered differently. They aren’t even counted as alumni when applying to Harvard College ( though I think they should be). I’ve often thought the overreaction and negative comments have their basis in someone going back in time to being 18 and being rejected from their dream school. Most made it happen in college and got to whatever grad school they wanted but the Harvard name sticks in their craw.
The conception that every person who walks in Harvard Yard is loaded is just not factual. Richer than average ( quite likely). But not walking in on C grades as in years past.
The world is changing. Many uber wealthy prefer other colleges to Harvard. I know my kids would prefer other schools. I’d bet if you took out the billionaires, many at Ivy league schools are about the same in terms of income.