<p>"Not sure why that young woman didn’t want to give to Dartmouth. If it was so horrible, maybe she should have transferred. Unlike public high school, people do have options when it comes to college. "</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Transfer admissions to schools of similar academic caliber are often much harder than applying from high school.</p></li>
<li><p>If most of/the worst negative experiences happened after her sophomore year, she would not be able to transfer to most elite schools of similar or even slightly lower rank as they limit transfer applications to those who apply as entering juniors at the latest. </p></li>
<li><p>Less/no financial aid possibilities for transfer students. </p></li>
<li><p>She may have loved the academics, but hated the administration and student body/alum culture. Considering how they have treated her, I don’t blame her one bit for feeling the way she does and acting upon it by refusing to donate or having anyone else donate in her name.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>^^^So she did feel there was some advantage (ranking, prestige, finace, opportunty) for her to stay at Dartmouth. What you are saying is that "I love so many things Darmouth has to to offer, but the admin did something to upset me, so I am now willing to make it less viable to make my point). Nothing is perfect in this world, one takes the good with the bad. She should have let her feet do the walking if she felt so strongly about it.</p>
<p>Which brings me back to my point about tipping… she’s paying to receive an education, or maybe she’s on a scholarship. It’s like either paying to eat at a fine restaurant or getting a coupon for a meal there.</p>
<p>Now, one should EXPECT at the very least, good food. It’s the main thing you’re paying for, and in college your meal is an education. I get my steak and in return I pay them the advertised price, or hand them the coupon. But let’s say that throughout the meal my waiter was a total boor who was rude, messed my orders up and generally just sucked at his job. It may be annoying, but if the food is really good then I won’t just leave. But I won’t give him a tip.</p>
<p>Tipping in the US is not something extra, is it? Not when the waiters are getting paid $1.25/hour. Same with cost of education. At most of those private schools, even Ivies, most of the time tuition doesn’t always cover the full cost of tuition (at least not all the nice facilities and research).</p>
<p>The other thing is that in a restaurant, you’re paying directly for service for yourself. At an Ivy League university, not only do they already have huge endowments, but spending is often focused in a few areas that some students may not ever benefit from. For example, science programs get a lot more funding from the university than some smaller liberal arts programs.</p>
<p>1) That 100% matching was absolutely ridiculous, and the school was completely in the wrong for singling out students like that.</p>
<p>2) this thread reminded me how great my private high school was so I actually just made a donation for the first time ever ($20.08 which is what my school ‘suggests’ for kids still in college, obvi I was class of '08).</p>
<p>With endowments of over $3 billion each (and some land grant funding for Cornell) is there any real worry in the short term that either institution needs donation funding? The quality of education at both is higher but many similar sized public institutions operate with endowments with 1/10 the size long term.</p>
<p>Springreen:
luck has nothing to do with my son being in private school. He worked hard for two years by starting a non-profit that helped others he had never met. That is the likely factor that gave him an edge on admissions.</p>
<p>I don’t consider myself privileged at all. I have worked full time for the last 26 years paying back my student loans and earning every single possesion I own. I am grateful for my health and my education and that I have been able to support myself and raise two great kids while setting an example to be responsible for myself and accountable for my actions.</p>
<p>Seems like you were making a few assumptions about me! :)</p>
<p>Participation is very different from the amount. You can give a dollar or two and still participate - which is very important when matching funds are based on participation NOT the dollar for dollar match. While I don’t appreciate the heavy-handedness of outing etc, I do understand why they’d want to get to 100%. What these kids may not be informed of is that even if you can’t afford a sum that would seem less embarrassing, in this case it is more about participation vs dollar amount and that ANY AMOUNT will show your support of your education. Given that perimeter, no kid should NOT donate even if it’s only a dollar! I can probably collect that amount from cleaning up a college kid’s room!</p>
<p>Oh, believe me, this young woman DID know. The class of 2010 raised $10,000, which means that the average gift was less than $10. </p>
<p>Again, please understand that it NOT was the Dartmouth administration that “outed” her. It was NOT the college newspaper. She was “outed” on Bored at Baker, which was sort of an internal Juicy Campus for Dartmouth students. She sent an email explaining why she would not give to The Dartmouth, the college paper. Then an article with her email explaining why she would not give–essentially she thinks Greeks dominate Dartmouth’s social life too much and sometimes other students left the kitchen dirty–and her photograph was published on thelittlegreenblog. This is NOT something the school itself runs.</p>
<p>baseballmom said: "luck has nothing to do with my son being in private school . . . I don’t consider myself privileged at all . . . "</p>
<p>Then " I am grateful for my health and my education" . . . nice irony!</p>
<p>Serendipity plays a role in all our lives, interweaving itself with our decisions and our personal drive.</p>
<p>Not trying to take anything away from BBM’s accomplishments, but it’s an exercise in both humility and paying attention to reality for all of us to remember that we are not solely the product of our wills.</p>
<p>The students may as well get used to it. Every year the univesities that I have graduated from as well my work send out lists of donors for various items to all in the organizations, essentially “outing” all who have not donated and are omitted from the list of recognitions.</p>
<p>The information given about cornell is at best, barely accurate and it is totally sensationalized.</p>
<p>First things first, I worked firsthand for the Cornell Senior class campaign last year. What happens is that that the class campaign is given a list of everyone graduating in the senior class that includes phone numbers and emails and such. An army of volunteers is recruited to solicit donations from the graduating seniors by phone. Once someone is contacted and responds either positively (by donating) or negatively (by not donating) they are taken off the list. Usually you end up calling your friends and or people involved in the same organizations as you so there is a lot of joking around and fake “pressure”. There was no list of 42 people who didn’t donate, in fact less than 50% of the senior class donates, and no one really cares. The reason the university pushes it so hard is twofold, </p>
<p>1) there are two anonymous donors that pledge 25 dollars each for each senior who donates five dollars, so in essence, if you donate 5 dollars, you really are donating 55 dollars</p>
<p>2) many studies show that students who give upon graduation are more likely to give later once they are successful. </p>
<p>There is no real bad stuff going on here. Everything is incredibly sensationalized. I know what happened here an it is boring news, its a total non issue. No one on campus is talking about it, there wasn’t even any kind of article in the Cornell daily sun (even in the opinion section) about this because the writer of the original article clearly had the wrong story/impression of what goes on here.</p>
<p>"2) many studies show that students who give upon graduation are more likely to give later once they are successful. "</p>
<p>I wonder how many of those studies accounted for the possibilities that students who do give upon graduation tend to come from well-off backgrounds and/or were otherwise already highly favorably disposed to their college beyond the institution’s minimum of providing the opportunity for an excellent education. </p>
<p>Most classmates who donated upon graduating from my college tended to have well-off parents and were enthused by their collegiate experiences beyond receiving a great education. </p>
<p>Vast majority of the scholarship classmates such as myself started donating only after we had established ourselves at our first jobs and had spare cash after rent, bare essentials, and any student loans were paid off. </p>
<p>Moreover, if a student chooses not to donate because he/she had a negative experience, the proper response from the college community and fundraisers from classmates and alums is at the very least…to accept his/her response respectfully. </p>
<p>That wasn’t what happened here and in addition to showing themselves to be unprofessional and petty, the college community lost a chance and most likely ended up burning their bridge with that alum…and possibly others who do not appreciate such high pressure “donate or else we publicly out ya” tactics. </p>
<p>After all, colleges and their students/alumni associations are not entitled to demand fellow classmates/alums donate anything. Donations after all, should be made out of the complete free will of the donating individual free of anything beyond asking in a gentle civilized manner.</p>
<p>I posted earlier about my disapproval of the fundraising practice described here and called it a GAME. Stop being childish.
If the girl who refused to donate (for whatever reasons, they are HERS and nobody including the institution or fellow students/alums has the right to press her for an explanation) needs a reference, I am here, as she obviously is an intelligent person.
Another thing I can’t stand is prompt, repeat requests once one HAS made a donation! We haven’t experienced this (yet) from a school, but have with other nonprofits/charities on occasion. Now I keep a careful list so I don’t donate twice in a 12 month period by mistake.
I believe a lot of this is ramped up Development/fundraising is based on one’s zip code (I come from an area of prosperity).
What I don’t like is the thought that my recent donation is now being used to press me for more $! And that involves staff time, research, mailings, whatever.</p>
<p>Don’t they all charge $40,000 nowaday, ± few thousand? Even 3rd tier schools charge the same amount. At least schools like Cornell give generous FA. Berkeley charges $35K for non-resident.</p>