Stanford Admitted 5.1%

Parents Forum
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<p>You know, theGFG, you’ve made comments before about how people in your social circles would go out of their way to “tweak” you because your kids had gotten into amazing schools - that they felt compelled to say those schools weren’t all that, blah blah blah. And I kind of felt sorry for you that people acted that way around you. </p>

<p>But if you’re truly serious in distinguishing “lower Ivy” from “upper Ivy” - to the point where you actually think there are meaningful differences because the poor schlumps at Brown and Cornell might be kicked off recruiters’ lists at any point - I can see why you would attract those comments. </p>

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<p>“They are aware however that companies like Google, Facebook, Yahoo!, hedge funds, Goldman and others have a preference and do more recruiting from Stanford and Harvard than they do from Rice. They are also aware that (a) there are more companies in the world than those and (b) it is not that they exclusive recruit from those schools.”</p>

<p>If they’re truly bright, they leave the world of possibilities open to careers that they might not have even thought about. Heck, half the careers my cohort is in didn’t exist when we were in college. </p>

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<p>If you want to believe cross-admit data is a better indicator than US News for college quality (or prestige, or something else), fine. According to current Parchment side-by-side data, Harvard and Yale both win over Stanford in cross-admits (at least for the Parchment sample, at whatever time it was taken). So does Washington University in St. Louis, by the way. Princeton does not. Caltech does not. MIT does not. Chicago does not, although it loses a slightly lower percentage of cross-admits to Stanford than Princeton, MIT, or Columbia do.
(<a href=“Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.”>Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.) </p>

<p>Whether Parchment is based on an adequate sample size, I don’t know. It may be out of date by a year or more. I don’t care too much because I don’t think cross-admit in isolation is a very reliable indicator.
Cross-admit data cannot account for scenarios involving students who don’t even bother to apply to potential alternatives (for example, because they truly prefer a less selective school). Also, as others have pointed out, Stanford doesn’t face the competition in its own region that the Ivies and other Eastern universities do.</p>

<p>I’m also not a big believer in the alleged door-opening powers of school prestige (the number of hires at Qualcomm, etc.) That mojo might work in some career fields or in some countries, but to me the key indicators of college quality include:

  • an ability to attract excellent students from all over the country, regardless of financial need
  • a high level of student-faculty engagement (in small discussion classes, writing assignments and projects)
  • good academic outcomes after graduation (in the contributions of alumni to knowledge-discovery)</p>

<p>Stanford is quite good on all 3 counts. It’s not peerless. </p>

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<p>“I still don’t get why we rely on numerical hierarchies still versus tiered ranks. The world, education, and the economy is too subjective to be put in a neat and objective order.”</p>

<p>I think it has to do with the quality of one’s conceptual thinking.<br>
And the fear with which one faces the world. If you’re a fearful sort, the distinctions between #1 and #2 and #3 are of Major World-Changing Importance. If you’re confident, they aren’t.</p>

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<p>PG, </p>

<p>Folks who are seriously gunning for elite U admissions in the NE and those with similar mentalities do make such fine distinctions…and will compare them with other elite colleges they regard as peers of one or other. </p>

<p>For instance, back in the mid-'90s, in addition to the usual SMC, Duke was such a hot school it was included in the “Upper Ivy” peer category, especially considering so many HYPS admits were rejected by Duke on account of skyrocketing applications from topflight students nationwide.</p>

<p>Most of it’s elite-y points from difficulty in getting in and the exclusivity of those who were admitted. </p>

<p>It’s no different than someone nitpicking between a limited edition exclusive gold plated Rolls Royce versus a no-frills bone-stock Ferrari/Lamborghini or a standard run luxury Mercedes Benz or Cadillac. </p>

<p>However, I disagree with the above quote stating that the difference is due to perception of educational quality. Much of that is YMMV depending on student, degree of attention paid to undergrads and their education, and field. </p>

<p>Especially considering if we asked hardcore engineer/CS folks who are heading engineering tech companies and do hiring, most of the “upper Ivies” except Princeton would be at the very bottom if we’re just talking Ivies. To engineering/CS folks, the “upper Ivies” would be more like roughly top to bottom:</p>

<p>Princeton
Cornell/Columbia SEAS (Depends on field and many treat them as equivalent in practice)</p>

<p>Lower**:
UPenn SEAS
Dartmouth
Harvard
Brown
Yale </p>

<ul>
<li>Caltech…and many HS classmates tended to include CMU(Engineering/CS only) as well.<br></li>
</ul>

<p>** Keep in mind schools like UMich, UW-Seattle, UIUC would outrank all of the schools in the “Lower Ivies” list as far as the hardcore engineering/CS folks are concerned. Some may even be on par with/outrank some in the “Upper Ivies” list in the estimation of hardcore engineering/CS folks. </p>

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<p>You guys are just arguing about which chocolate in a box of chocolates is the best chocolate–and what your choice of chocolate says about you.
“Chocolate truffles are really inferior, they’re just for people who don’t know what’s good.”
“Wow, you still like milk chocolate? How can you call yourself worthy of chocolate at all?”
“All the polls I’ve ever read insist that the kind with the coffee bean on top are the absolute best. How can you argue with that?”
“Ah, but those are flawed polls. You have to ask the people who really know–the people, for example, who know that milk chocolate is Over.”
“But how can chocolate have any meaning if we can’t decide which, in this box of chocolate, is the best? After all, most of the enjoyment of eating chocolate comes from knowing how much everyone else wants your chocolate.”</p>

<p>Meanwhile, the people around you are rolling their eyes. </p>

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<p>“What is the best X?” is as significant, or as trivial, as the value of X.
Aristotle and other ancient philosophers put a lot of thought into the question, for example with respect to X=the form of government, but also to the general form of the question, directed at how we know the things we think we know, and how we make principled choices among alternatives.</p>

<p>The question, “What is the best college?” (or variations on it) is a central concern of this entire website. If you think that is a trivial or uninteresting question, why spend time on on this site? </p>

<p>Otherwise (if you do think it is a non-trivial, interesting question), how would you frame it?
If we are asking, “What is the best college for the best students?”, then it is reasonable to ask whether admit rates or yields or Qualcomm hires or class sizes or SAT scores etc etc have probative value in deciding what is “best”. If you just want to wing it and go with whichever option feels right, that’s your privilege. In that case, it’s true, there isn’t much point to these discussions.</p>

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<p>I did not invent the term “lower Ivy.” I learned it on here; it is a CC label of differentiation that one would never use or hear outside of this forum. My S went to a great school–that lower Ivy, had great opportunities there, and has a good job now. But I would be lying if I said that his school commands the same respect as H or S. Most people (outside of the really competitive students and their parents) actually don’t know where it is or how good it is. Whether or not you care about that respect quotient is dependent on your goals in life and career plans. </p>

<p>Caring is not an indication of moral deficiency, fear, insecurity, or lack of sophistication. It is an assessment of what motivates the people who are in control of some opportunities you might want some day. You don’t have to agree with their views, but you do have to take them into account. I love my sweatpants. They fit me so comfortably, and don’t squeeze my waistline too tightly. They are kind to my bulges. They don’t need any special care or ironing. I can say, “Who cares what the world thinks of my gray sweatpants, I know they’re best for me. And since I am a confident, fearless and sophisticated individual I will choose to wear them.” For many of my daily activities, these sweat pants will be fine, but they will not be “just fine” for others. Speaking of that, job placement data at top companies means nothing without information about what sort of job that person from USD got as compared to the person from Cal. </p>

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<p>"The question, “What is the best college?” (or variations on it) is a central concern of this entire website. If you think that is a trivial or uninteresting question, why spend time on on this site?</p>

<p>Otherwise (if you do think it is a non-trivial, interesting question), how would you frame it?"</p>

<p>I would frame it as follows – what is the set of excellent colleges that offer a strong student body, excellent professors and lots of opportunities for the motivated student to take the ball and run with it … and then within there, what are the nuances of the experience at the college that may be of particular interest to a given person? (ex: city vs suburb vs rural, a thriving arts scene, a certain type of architecture, high placement in a certain field, size, presence / absence of athletics, Greek scene, etc.)…</p>

<p>" It is an assessment of what motivates the people who are in control of some opportunities you might want some day. You don’t have to agree with their views, but you do have to take them into account."</p>

<p>What motivates SOME of the people who are in control of SOME of the opportunities. Not ALL of the people or ALL of the opportunities. </p>

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<p>“My S went to a great school–that lower Ivy, had great opportunities there, and has a good job now. But I would be lying if I said that his school commands the same respect as H or S. Most people (outside of the really competitive students and their parents) actually don’t know where it is or how good it is. Whether or not you care about that respect quotient is dependent on your goals in life and career plans.”</p>

<p>But the kinds of people who are indeed obsessed with these fine distinctions just aren’t people whose opinions are worth caring out, TheGFG. They’re trivial, non-conceptual thinkers. For 99% of the use cases, there just isn’t a meaningful differentiation in quality between Harvard and Dartmouth, or whatever. </p>

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<p>“It’s conversations like this that work to convince 17-year-old high school students that they are failures if they don’t get into Harvard or Stanford.”</p>

<p>I don’t think I’m a failure for not having what it takes to get into a school with a 4-5% acceptance rate. But I do recognize that those students are vastly more impressive than me and as a result of their dedication, are more likely to be more successful than me. There’s no need to dance around this. It is what it is.</p>

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<p>"PG,</p>

<p>Folks who are seriously gunning for elite U admissions in the NE and those with similar mentalities do make such fine distinctions…and will compare them with other elite colleges they regard as peers of one or other."</p>

<p>So? That doesn’t mean I have to take them seriously, just because you might. I don’t have to take other people’s opinions as gospel when I think they’re stupid. </p>

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<p>So . . . I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I’m pretty sure Superman beats Batman.</p>

<p>Superman is NOT all that great, though. Kind of a drone, very competitive (not content with being merely Verygoodman), obsessed with name recognition on the planet Krypton, not very intellectual . . . </p>

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<p>I seriously doubt anyone who doesn’t vet info received via CC- especially when it comes from hs kids or involves building some world view based on how high school kids think and make decisions. I’ll throw in inexperienced parents, too.</p>

<p>And I really don’t care what someone thought or how something worked in the 80’s or 90’s- not when the discussion is today. </p>

<p>You cannot look at the tip of the iceberg (USNWR, some perception of selectivity or cross-admit decisions or which companies prioritize which colleges, etc, etc,) and expect to find the whole picture from that. It’s not critical thinking and shirks the deeper view needed. Harrumph.</p>

<p>And since when is some lemmings philosophy seriously valid? With very few exceptions, this thread hasn’t even talked about strengths in one’s major, special opportunities or programs that further a kid’s interests.</p>

<p>Just superficials. C’mon. Plus we have seasoned CC posters whose kids got plum jobs from more than some 10 top schools. When you have time, look at something like the vast range of schools whose grads got Fulbrights or are in top flight grad programs. Don’t waste brain cells on the small stuff. </p>

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<p>How does a “lesser Ivy” compare to a “better directional”? (The latter is perhaps my all-time favorite CC phrase.) </p>

<p>Just asking for a friend. </p>

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<p>“You cannot look at the tip of the iceberg (USNWR, some perception of selectivity or cross-admit decisions or which companies prioritize which colleges, etc, etc,) and expect to find the whole picture from that. It’s not critical thinking and shirks the deeper view needed. Harrumph.”</p>

<p>And of course, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t differences between #2 and #200 on USNWR. </p>

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<p>This whole notion of lower Ivy’s is offensive, imo. </p>

<p>PG, you remember the poster who was all about how super Truman State is. At one point, I looked it up and it looks like a place that, yes, would empower plenty of kids who fit there. Then happened to meet a Fulbrighter from there. This idea only some pinnacle of colleges will magically transform a kid is nuts. And the idea a Harvard or Stanford or their sisters is the only way to find self-validation is suspect. </p>

<p>If a college really is the right fit for your kid- and your kid is the right fit for them, fine. But don’t go picking based on superficials. And then trying to justify that a narrow view is sufficient. </p>

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<p>Is there any possible way that we could ever have a thread on this issue without devolving into hyperbole? Of course there are any number of schools that offer excellent educational experiences, and a smaller-but much larger than Ivy + Stanford and MIT group of schools that are a cut above the rest. And yes, anyone who really thinks that getting into Brown and not Yale will significantly restrict their opportunities is pathetically narrow.</p>

<p>But I don’t think it devalues the above point to acknowledge that some employers may be ever so slightly more impressed by hearing “Princeton” than hearing “Penn” without being unsophisticated idiots not worth knowing or working for. It must be very empowering for an established professional to glibly thumb her nose at anyone who doesn’t share her precise view of the relative merits of various elite and non-elite schools. The rest of us have to live in the real world, where you might have some bright, decent, successful people who nonetheless don’t have a great pulse on elite school admissions, have never heard of Williams, think that Penn is a state school, but are very impressed by the name Harvard - and the inflated GPAs of so many of its students.</p>

<p>That being said, I think that the advantage in terms of opportunity is so slight as to be almost negligible. In grad, law and med school admissions, it doesn’t matter a whit, from what I’ve seen, how elite your elite school is. If 99 out of 100 recruiters visit your campus, the one that skipped the visit isn’t likely to be all that important. And if a few super snooty firms really only want students from three or five schools, is it really worth hand-wringing that IF you indeed wind up going into the financial sector at all, there is an outside shot that you will wind up in a job making lots of money rather than one making slightly more money? And that’s assuming you would have gotten the better job even if you had gone to Harvard, which you can’t possibly know, and that you don’t find another that is just as good.</p>

<p>I just don’t think that point needs to be punctuated with so much sneering at anyone who suggests the mere possibility that someone worth knowing might see the issue a bit differently. </p>

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<p>That last sentence x 100</p>

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<p>“This whole notion of lower Ivy’s is offensive, imo.”</p>

<p>It’s also reality in the world where people care about such things.</p>

<p>So, I don’t think “offensive” is the word that you are looking for.</p>

<p>Also, Stanford is HYP, regardless of how much people want it to be.</p>

<p>Granted, it’s better than Brown/Dartmouth/Penn.</p>