The experience of an Ivy reject

Parent Cafe
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<p>Just as we shouldn’t dismiss non Ivy schools as “podunk univeristy”, we should also try to avoid calling all Ivy enthusiasts as shallow, unsophisticated in their elitism, and provincial, whatever.</p>

<p>Some who would love to see their kids at a Ivy school may indeed be living up to the vilified stereotypes - 100% of it. However, my feeling is that most of them are simply trying to increase the odds of giving the best possible platform for their children’s success. Yes, you can get wonderful education at a State U, but the odds are better if you are at an elite school. Yes, you can get to Wall Street from a State U, but the odds are much better if you are from a well networked Ivy. Yes, you can be the very best lawyer in the country with a second tier law school degree, but the odds are better if you come out of a top 10 law school… The list goes on.</p>

<p>Have you ever spent a second or two in a crowded supermarket trying to see which checkout line would move faster? Would you be so quick to pass judgment to people who carefully check to see which line is staffed by a trainee? If your answer is yes (to the first question) and no (to the second question), let’s not be so judgmental about parents and children who are simply trying to increase their odds, just as you would in a checkout line. This does NOT mean that the kids who take an alternative routes will not be successful. I am saying, these people are using their judgment and making a decision as a rational human being dealing with probabilities, just as we make a split second decision on which side of the highway we want to be on when the road divides between cars and cars & trucks (NJ turnpike: yikes!!!).</p>

<p>The only ones that truly deserve to be vilified are those parents who “force” their children to go to an Ivy school for THEIR needs when their children would be happier and better fit in other schools. Or the parents who systematically and intentionally instilled a very limited vision of the world where nothing but Ivy matters. If the kids were exposed to a variety of options, chose an Ivy school, and are happy there, more power to them. S1 has several close friends who are at Ivy schools now, and I am happy for them and their parents.</p>

<p>In our case, U Chicago was definitely worth turning down a full ride offer from other schools. Are we elitists? I would rather believe otherwise. More than anything else, I let him turn down the full ride offer in favor of U Chicago for the famed intellectual rigor they allegedly impose on its students, and so far, based on everything I heard from him, the school is living up to its reputation and MORE. As for S2, if we were to really push him, he may make it to Georgetown, but I have no intention to do that. I think he is marching to his own drum beat happily, and if he ends up at George Washington or American (he loves to be in DC), then that’s where he belongs and where he will be happy, and I will be happy. And, I also believe for what he wants to do and become, S2’s school choice is just as treasured and wise as S1’s choice was, though there may be something like 50 or more rankings difference between the two schools.</p>

<p>By the way, S1’s odds of getting an easier access to Wall Street would be much higher at Dartmouth and Duke - the schools he did not apply to and could have gotten into based on the profiles of several of his classmates who did, but I still believe Chicago is a better school for him. So, everybody weighs the data they have and come up with the best personal assessment on trade off values.</p>

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<p>No, in fact that’s not my view. I never said anything of the kind; where did that come from? Nor do I think that “‘everyone’ else loathes [you].” Whatever gave you that idea? I, too, love New York. Lived there myself for seven years and loved it, for many of the same reasons you do. (By the way, theater is great here in the Twin Cities, though of course it’s not NY; rivals Chicago for next best in this country, though). So does my D who did most of her growing up in NY and still considers herself something of a displaced New Yorker. Most of the native Minnesotans I know have never been to New York, but honestly, most of them don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it one way or another; they certainly don’t waste any energy “loathing” it. Most of those who have been there actually like it, in some cases quite a lot. </p>

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<p>Oh, please. I never said or implied any of that. I don’t countenance any of the behaviors you describe, and I’m proud to say I’ve never heard of any of those things happening here in Minnesota. Gosh, for a Kantian ethicist, you’re awfully quick to strike a low blow in an argument. </p>

<p>As for anti-New York sentiment, the only time I ever personally experienced it when I was a New Yorker was in Massachusetts, during baseball season. We were on Cape Cod with a still fairly new car, and someone apparently took offense to our NY license plates and scratched up the paint and slapped on a Red Sox bumper sticker. But that’s an intra-Northeast rivalry, not quite the same thing, I imagine.</p>

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<p>I know. I went to two myself, and taught at a third. As I thought I said, my own D is applying to one; I tried to interest her in others, but she didn’t bite. As I thought I also said, they’re all great schools. I would never question anyone’s motives for going to one, if they can get in. I do question what seems to me a collective overrating of them on the part of some segment of the college applicant population, and possibly some of their parents; overrating, that is, relative to other similarly outstanding but non-Ivy schools. I think this is unfortunate, mostly because a lot of those people won’t be admitted to Ivies, and they may be missing other outstanding opportunities. But individuals need to make their own judgments. As for the “elitist” tag; well, honestly, I’m often accused of being one myself, particularly when it comes to high-end educational opportunities in which I am a big believer. As I have tried patiently to explain, I have not accused Northeasterners of being “elitists,” only “parochial,” though I acknowledge that to some degree, so are people in other regions. (As for the “lemming” bit, I think you may be quoting someone else and misattributing it to me).</p>

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<p>Yes, I quite agree. But I also think it’s plain bad manners and dare I say ignorant to accuse someone of saying those things who in fact never said them or anything even remotely similar.</p>

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<p>Winning an award doesn’t mean that a person has accomplished more than someone who didn’t win the same award, or didn’t apply for it. It’s just that one person happens to have been granted recognition. </p>

<p>That’s not to take away the value of the award – of course NMD should be proud – but what stood out to me the most about his post is that he didn’t say what his daughter had DONE to merit any of the awards. I’m sure she is very accomplished – but I don’t have a clue from his post as to what she might be accomplished in.</p>

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<p>NMD’s D is a science major; the award (one of only two) is for writing. That is even more of an achievement than if she had received a science award. As for the Rhodes scholarship, it speaks for itself.</p>

<p>I know Californians who got terribly upset at having to “settle” for a UC that was not Cal, but, in my opinion, still very good. It’s no different than New Englanders being upset at not being admitted at HYPM. In fact, it is arguably worse, since the difference between HYPM and the state schools in New England is much larger than between Cal and other UCs.</p>

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<p>thank you so much for this thread. i am currently applying to ivies and its nice to know that i can still achieve success after rejections.
=)</p>

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<p>A “science” major? Wow… that narrows things down.</p>

<p>I don’t mean to put down NMD’s daughter. Again, I am sure that she is very accomplished. But if I go out to dinner with friends and one parent starts listing the awards their kid has won, and another parent starts telling me the details of some project their kid is working on … I’m more interested in hearing the latter. </p>

<p>My point is that for purposes of encouraging students who may be disappointed if they aren’t accepted to an Ivy… a focus on accomplishments at other colleges rather than awards might be far more valuable.</p>

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<p>collegealum, there is alot of smart thought in your post. If you couple your post with the posts that discuss the “parent” insecurity of believing that HPY are the pinacle of self reinforcement as a good parent, then mix in with a tiny bit of regional parochialism…you’ve got it. How did we ever get to a point where kids don’t know that the University of Chicago (or a handful of other places) is every bit as “good” as HYP? Or is it parents that don’t know? I wonder sometimes.</p>

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<p>I’m always reminded by Mini that in WA, people confuse Wellesley with Whitman. It would be the other way around in MA. There is indeed parochialism everywhere. What continues to puzzle me is the prestige that certain schools have achieved. These include HYPSM. There are other schools every bit as good as these, but for some reason they have not acquired the same national recognition.</p>

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<p>Sigh. NO ONE is saying that HYPSM aren’t great universities! Of course they are!
We are saying that a peer culture of parents / fellow students who think that those schools and those schools alone are the be-all and end-all, and who make other students feel undue pressure to go there or that they have “settled” if they wind up at Rice, Wellesley, U Chicago, whatever, is a wacked out culture! </p>

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<p>I agree. I love NYC. There’s nothing like it and I’d love to live there if I had unlimited funds.</p>

<p>Nothing in Newmassdad’s post really has anything to do with the fact that he happens to live in the Northeast (I’m gathering in Brookline or thereabouts), though. The objection wasn’t that he / his daughter felt HYP were excellent schools. The objection was to the mentality in his area that HYP were the ONLY good schools. That would be just as objectionable of a mentality if it were taking place at a top-tier public hs or elite private school in the midwest, the south or the west.</p>

<p>This isn’t a war between the Northeast and other areas of the country.</p>

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<p>Hey hyeonjlee, we are doing the Gtown/GWU/AU visit in a few months. Maybe our sons will wind up at one of them together!</p>

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<p>To me, a Boston-area resident, it is entirely understandable that high-achievers in both private and good public schools obsess about HYPM and are far less knowledgeable about schools in different areas or less willing to attend those schools (S1 wanted to be within a two hour drive of home and S2 ended up within a half hour’s walk). One of the reasons is the extreme concentration of extremely good schools in the general Boston area and the greater reluctance of people in this part of the country to travel long distances–unlike people in the Midwest or CA for instance.
Why people from other areas put so much emphasis on getting into HYPM, as I said, is a mystery to me.</p>

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<p>I am always surprised to hear about kids who want to be so close to home. Both my kids had/have a requirement that the school has to be at least two states away. Hmmm, and I thought they liked me.</p>

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<p>pizzagirl,</p>

<p>That would be lovely!!! I understand you live in Chicago: we should trade places now!</p>

<p>Marite:</p>

<p>having worked extensively with companies in overseas, I can tell you one reason why HYP currency is real, not just imagined. Business leaders overseas, especially in Asia, are even more diploma obsessed than we are here. When you say you went to HYPSM, the doors will open automatically. Now, THAT is real convertible currency. One top consulting agency I worked with only sent their top Ivy associates to work with their global fortune 100 clients with HQs in Asia. With more globalization and more weight shifting to power economies in Asia, there is a real benefit of having an HYP diploma. Even U Chicago, which is internationally better known than the lower Ivies and other Ivy Plus schools don’t carry the same weight. (By the way, U Chicago’s international prestige is much greater than its domestic version).</p>

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<p>Now I understand the name: pizzagirl.</p>

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<p>idad:</p>

<p>Our GC said that the kids start wanting to go far from home then when the time comes to decide, they select schools closer to home. Of the 11 kids who got into H in my S’s year (and probably got into quite a few other schools), only one declined (and went to Stanford). A few more from that cohort went to MIT, Tufts. Mt Holyoke, Brown (only one hour away), etc…</p>

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<p>marite: Let me help you out here: the USNews rankings maybe? I hear USNews isn’t doing too well financially…does this mean we might be rid of those damnable rankings (please heaven?)!</p>

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<p>marite: Fascinating. Kids here go everywhere. Not a single kid of family friends or acquaintances attends a school within 1000 miles. Southern CA is a popular destination of course, but distance or ultimately prestige doesn’t seem to be too much of a consideration. Many kids turn down Ivies. Close friend’s D chose Rice over Dartmouth for example.</p>

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<p>Ahhhhhhh I miss the deep dish Chicago pizza. I did my graduate work at UIUC. Every semester, after we finish the exams, etc, we used to all pile up in one of my office mate’s truck and go to Chicago for civilization.</p>

<p>I love Chicago. It is my favorite city, after London!</p>

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<p>Mummom:</p>

<p>Yeah. And so the people who should be castigated are not the OP’s D who lived in an area where HYPM are the schools kids are most familiar with (and the state universities lag far behind), but the folks from different parts of the country who don’t value what is closer to home. And yet, all too many posters criticized people from the Northeast for being elitist.</p>

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<p>Amen to that. After being here on and off for a year, it’s apparent that the most active threads are generally a variation of the same theme - are HYPM et al. the ‘best’ ? Are they worth it? What does it mean if you don’t get in? Should someone who has less than perfect stats even bother to apply or are they just kidding themselves? Can a person have a successful career, life, college education etc. without going to an Ivy? Shouldn’t a person who goes to an Ivy have a six-figure job waiting for them when they graduate? Is going to the State U always inferior to the Ivies? If my child doesn’t go to an Ivy, will they be shut out of a career field forever?</p>

<p>Has anyone on CC ever been swayed to change their opinion?</p>

<p>I have to say I appreciate NMD’s sharing his daughter experience. I will be printing it out and sharing it with DS if and when he gets his first rejection. Unfortunately, he has also been drinking the kool-aid and thinks unless he gets into a top 10 his life is ruined. This thinking has been strongly influenced by his friends at a very competitive private HS and some of them will most certainly get into a top 10.</p>

<p>For the record, I think the Ivies are slightly overrated and the State Us are slightly underrated (in general). In real life, I know people who attended Ivies who are total duds in life and people who attended a lowly rated state U who are very successful. IMHO, the correlation between where you attend and how successful you are (career-wise) is not linear. Yes, there is a higher probability if you are admitted to HYPM that you will be more successful but mostly because the bar to get in is set so high that these schools tend to attract highly competitive, driven students to begin with.</p>

<p>These same students could probably go to the local community college and still have very successful careers. Like NMD’s daughter, a highly qualified applicant who didn’t get in to HYPM etc., is still very likely to go on to be very successful at a different school. I think that is the point he was trying to make and it is a very valid one, indeed.</p>

<p>On the other hand when HYPM picks the ‘wrong’ kid (and they do because being a good student doesn’t always correlate with having a successful career - school is mostly about regurgitating facts, whereas, work is much more about independent thinking) those kids aren’t probably any more likely than the average State U attendee to be successful.</p>

<p>That is not to say that there is no value in attending HYPM, etc. but I wonder if there isn’t a little bit of the ‘tail wagging the dog’ thinking going on here. As in… my child will only be successful (or get the best education, whatever) if he/she attends HYPMs vs. my child is a top performer and will do well and take full advantage of his/her education no matter where they end up attending…like NMD’s daughter.</p>