<p>urbanslaughter:</p>
<p>I never attended Berkeley. I applied there back in my time but I wasn’t accepted. In that year, Berkeley accepted only about 6.8% of all the international applicants. It was one of the only 2 US schools (the other is MIT) that turned me down. I got into 4 Ivies, however, and a number of elite LACs, including Hurvey Mudd and Bowdoin. </p>
<p>I went to a university in England. And the only US school I’ve had the experience of attending was Stanford. I spent time there as an exchange student, and lived in campus almost the whole time. That said, that doesn’t make me ignorant about prestigious US schools. </p>
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<p>prestige = respectability + popularity </p>
<p>The schools in your examples are somewhat popular. But none of them is widely respected as an academic powerhouse.</p>