Well I’m from central california and will be attending Rice. The usual conversation goes, “Where are you going to school?” “I’m going to Rice.” blank stare “It’s in Houston.” “oh that’s cool, Houston is nice.” except for like teachers and those who went to top school. Stanford is very much the holy grail for students here and we had one kid who chose Stanford over Harvard and Princeton. I’d bet the majority of people know HYPS and almost everyone knows ND because it’s a very Christian and conservative area. People know UCLA and USC and a slightly smaller number know Berkeley. My friend got into Duke and everyone seemed to know that was a big thing. Another kid is going to Pomona and no one has any idea what it is besides maybe the top 5% or so. Cal Poly is known by a lot of people and is well-respected. Besides those football schools lol. At my school itself about 25% of kids could probably name more than 4 Ivies and and 10% could name all of them. I have a lot of friends in the Bay Area though and they seem to know a lot more schools for academic quality.