<p>“It’s unfair how international students who worked really hard studying English in high school, got near perfect SAT, TOEFL scores, had stellar ECs, and attended elusive unis. like D or B, ended up going back to their countries being “viewed” as less “scholarly” than, say, UMich or UWisc grads.”</p>
<p>Awwww, too bad. My advise to you, since you are so bent on attending the best engineering schools, is to do just that. Brown and Dartmouth are not known for engineering. Michigan and it’s peers in engineering are. If you are that stellar academically , and since schools like Michigan are “extremely easy” to get into, you should have no problem being accepted to MIT, Stanford, or Caltech. Then again, if you’re not real smart, perhaps you might end up going to D and B. That would look real good back home wouldn’t it?</p>
<p>“Michigan is not even necessarily prestigious to Michiganders themselves.”</p>
<p>That is a load of bunk. Most “Michiganians” consider U-M a top school. I suppose you could always find a few that think otherwise, but they are in the minority.</p>
<p>“It’s unfair how international students who worked really hard studying English in high school, got near perfect SAT, TOEFL scores, had stellar ECs, and attended elusive unis. like D or B, ended up going back to their countries being “viewed” as less “scholarly” than, say, UMich or UWisc grads.”</p>
<p>Kind of reminds you of all those people who are lawyers, doctors and PhDs who drive your taxi, huh?</p>
<p>As a Michigander, I would say Michigan isn’t considered super prestigious. All the smart kids go there, but all the really smart kids try to go a place better. Most people I know consider it a safety (because it accepts like 40 students a year from our school), but a very good one at that, and maybe 25-30 of those kids end up going there anyways (because its relatively cheap for its quality).</p>
<p>“I suppose you could always find a few that think otherwise, but they are in the minority.”</p>
<p>See above.</p>
<p>I never said that Michigan is considered “super prestigious” even in it’s home state. It is however, considered prestigious, even in it’s home state.</p>
<p>hahalolk, I think “anybody” may be a stretch. But I agree that with the exception of Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Yale and Princeton, no university really has a “wow” factor associated with its name. Some programs do, such as Johns Hopkins among physicians, Caltech and Cal among Engineers, Wharton among MBAs and Chicago among Economits.</p>
<p>You call me a profane name (within which you strategically place an asterisk) and MY posts are “nasty drivel.” <em>roflmao</em> </p>
<p>If you’re going to ignore every single CC poster who may not hold Michigan in as high esteem as you do, you won’t be left with much else to read in these forums.</p>
<p>I would argue that school prestige must be measured by popularity (well-known) and respectability (well-respected). Take one out of the equation and you won’t attain prestige. </p>
<p>Prestigious schools are popular/well-known and very well-respected.</p>
<p>Amherst and Williams, for example, are very prestigious schools in America. But the moment you leave America, their prestige dwindles significantly.</p>
<p>It is also important that prestige is a subjective thing. For example, Dartmouth is prestigious for you. You’d argue till death that Dartmouth is extremely prestigious. But for many people, it is not. Prestige is a subjective matter.</p>
<p>Oh yeah when I reread my post I saw “anybody” and was like d’oh! I meant to say “among people who are from my school” or something similar to that. However, for grad school, its considered very impressive, because that what it excels at.</p>
<p>That is absolutely patently false. Try re-reading my prestige vs. familiarity post again.</p>
<p>For example, Caltech is without a doubt one of America’s most prestigious academic institutions (in fact, one of the world’s leading academic institutions).</p>
<p>But I doubt 1 in 10 (if even 1 in 100 or 1,000) Americans (let along an average non-US person) would be able to acknowledge as such. They’d just as easily confuse it as a no-name technical college. BUT, and here is the point, does that make Caltech any LESS prestigious? </p>
<p>Absolutely not. The same can be said, perhaps to a lesser extent, for the University of Pennsylvania (e.g. many confuse it with Penn State).</p>
<p>Now, some institutions enjoy both familiarity AND prestige (e.g. HYP) but just because you don’t have familiarity does not mean, necessarily, that you lack prestige.</p>
<p>Point of fact, many of the world’s MOST exclusive, ultra luxury brands have scant “street” recognition. </p>
<p>People have heard of Ferrari, but what about Bugatti Veyron?
People easily recognize the name Rolex, but what about Vacheron Constantin?
Dom Perignon, but what about Ch</p>
<p>beauty is in the eye of the beholder. and so is prestige.
what seems to be beautiful for you might not be for others.
you think miss Venezuela should have won the miss universe. for you miss Venezuela is the most beautiful… but the people in Africa think that Miss Angola should have won the crown.</p>
<p>Caltech is definitely prestigious for both of us. but that’s because we both are very familiar with Caltech. but how is it prestigious to those people who even haven’t heard of it? You have to know it to acknowledge it that it is prestigious. That is a prerequisite to prestige.</p>
then you have to inform the people that Bugatti is a prestigious car. do some marketign stuff. make your products known. advertise if need be. otherwise, no body would even buy that car. now you see?</p>
<p>that’s okay. that’s what I usually being told every time someone tries to make a point but could no longer support his argument. pretty understandable…</p>