How commonly is college brand/prestige/selectivity an important "fit" factor?

Parents Forum
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In another thread, this was mentioned:

How commonly is college brand/prestige/selectivity an important “fit” factor?

Around these forums, it seems to be common for that to be the case. However, these forums are not representative of all college-bound students, being skewed toward higher available money and higher student achievement, as well as a self-selection effect (students and parents are less likely to post here if their favored choices are easily affordable and assured or highly likely for admission).

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IME, this is common is some regions of the country, including where I live.

My observation is that in many other regions, brand name still carries weight, even if it isn’t the main “fit” factor. In other words, all else being equal, students prefer the better-known school. Of course, I don’t live in those areas, so I’ll defer to the experience of people who do.

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For international applicants, it seems 100%

For domestic applicants on CC or A2C and the like, it seems 82%.

For domestic applicants not on these sites, it’s low — unless we’re including their state flagship as the brand

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And I think that makes sense. Many are looking for substantial financial aid, which only the private elites are able to provide. Additionally, name recognition back in their home country is helpful.

In certain states, that’s definitely the case. Although, in the Northeast, that’s typically not the case. For example, in my home state, it’s fashionable for top students to thumb their noses at our state flagship. :slight_smile:

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I think if you are talking about specific networking opportunities that might be of relevance given the kid’s specific interests, then very common.

I think if you are talking more about generic rankings–first, I would not in fact call that a “fit” factor. It may be what a kid is looking for, but that has nothing to do with them as an individual, and loong for a college that is particularly good for them as an individual.

In terms of how common that is, I recall seeing a survey indicating it was really only a pretty small minority of college students who saw the US News rankings as important, or really even knew what the US News rankings said. But I agree that the sort of kids (and parents) who are thinking in terms of generic rankings are much more likely to appear in certain social media circles, seeking things like formulas they can follow to maximize their chances of admission to these colleges.

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I can’t answer for the second thing, but something like the US News National Universities rankings is not a very good guide to International aid availability. Among other things, it entirely misses the LACs with good aid. And then there are some very high-ranked universities with poor International aid.

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I agree, and I wasn’t referring to the U.S. News rankings at all. The schools that have generous aid for international students are all well known “elite” schools - regardless of whether they are LACs or national universities. The corollary isn’t true.

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I grew up in an area where prestige was definitely a thing. High schools published lists of how many students got into T20s. But, we moved and spent all of our D’s life in an area where it was much more common for students/families to chase big merit awards. D’s school published the individual totals for each student in the graduation program, and then the cumulative total of all the merit awards received for their graduating class was published everywhere they could. Big difference.

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This is family dependent. I will say, for international students, this might be a more significant consideration especially since many will be returning to their home country.

It was not a consideration in the Thumper family.

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Indeed. Self-selection of a different sort.

I read the original post and found it odd. I don’t get the correlation between ranking and fit. Just looking at the USNW top ten, even for a pre-Med, Yale is a very different place than MIT or Hopkins. Hell, Yale’s a different place that Harvard. I’m not sure the kid who would rock out at UMich or Duke would necessarily be doing themselves any favors by going to CalTech.

We have a very particular community here.

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That’s fair.

I think what this underscores is terms like “brand” or “prestige” are not very well-defined.

So if a person says they are looking for wealthy private institutions with relatively generous International aid, OK, I understand what that means. If someone says they want a college with a lot of “prestige”? I am not at all sure what they mean. And then if they use prestige as a proxy for generous International aid, that just seems to be making it harder, not easier, to identify colleges actually suitable for them.

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The ones that always make me pause are the lists of the top schools but the student’s intended major isn’t even offered.

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Oh, I disagree. I think it really depends. Yes, most of the international posters on CC and Reddit a2c are laser focused on brand name. For them, if they don’t get a top ranked brand name acceptance here in the US, then they will stay home to attend university. But there are plenty of international students quietly applying to and attending low ranked schools. They do it because they value studying in the United States for language or cultural reasons, I think.

As an example, a friend of ours in Spain attended UND. And, no, I don’t mean Notre Dame, I mean University of North Dakota. Four years later, she graduated with an English that is so excellent that people never imagine she is from Spain --they say she’s from the upper Midwest (she sounds a bit like an extra from the movie Fargo.)

Another example: my D25 is currently deciding between 2 lowly state directionals (yep, it’s July 30, and she’s still making up her mind…) Anyway, since she decided (a week ago!) that she did want to attend college after all, I’ve been haunting the reddits for these schools, and a lot of the postings are from internationals asking questions about “what should I bring” etc. So they for sure exist.

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To students who have been raised to think that the best or only way to be successful is - everything.

In reality and the answer may be different dependent on industry - little.

There are so many 3.9+, 1400s or if you talk to people at work - I went to such and such.

Where else did you consider - no where else.

I bet if you looked at Rutgers or Uconn or Ohio State or UTK or wherever, you’d find a sizable percentage of students who applied no where else. Or moreso the local school - the Rowan or Ramapo in NJ or MTSU by me or Central Connecticut, etc.

Didn’t even given much thought as to where to go to college.

I think it’s a very small percentage of kids overall - higher in wealthy areas but not high - that prestige is something truly cared about.

From the board here though - it also seems a higher thing amongst immigrants…first gen…

But here on the CC we don’t see society…we see a tiny snippet.

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I agree with @NiceUnparticularMan that I don’t think of brand/prestige/selectivity as a “fit” factor. For some students and families, it ranks very high on their list of things that they want. I find that similar to families who might have a geographic radius that they want to stay within for reasons of preference (not out of necessity to stay within a certain distance to medical facilities, or insurance coverage, etc.).

I was reading an article the other day about luxury goods manufacturers and how some items had very high resale prices (i.e. above the list price) because of manufactured scarcity while others had lower resale values and lower demand because the company maintained a steady supply of very expensive items that were able to be purchased by anyone (rather than needing to build a “relationship” with a vendor to get an opportunity to buy). Essentially, there was higher demand for an item even if it was priced similarly and (I assume) made with similar levels of quality because of its exclusivity. And the buyers (of the luxury goods) don’t just want an expensive item, they want an exclusive item.

I think it’s similar in the college sphere. I’ve often heard students say that they don’t want to attend a school that peers who didn’t work as hard in high school could also end up attending. And even if the quality of education is comparable between a highly rejective school and a not-so-rejective school, there are a number of students (on CC) who associate exclusivity as their reward for hard work.

That said, I don’t think that CC is the norm. I think there’s a reason why we get a lot of families from NY/NJ, the D.C. metro area, and the Bay Area. Although those areas are very populous, I suspect they’re overrepresented on CC, and I suspect that those areas tend to have a higher percentage of folks for whom exclusivity & prestige is a desired factor in a college selection. And I don’t think it’s the entirety of the D.C./NY/Bay Area population, but those who are in the top 10% of incomes or whose children attend schools that have a significant population of students from families in the top 10% of incomes.

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Yes, and yes :slight_smile:

But…

therefore, at least for these folks, prestige and name brand is a fit factor, no?

(I didn’t include exclusivity because I don’t think that’s sought after by people I know)

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This all seems right to me.

In a related concept, I sometimes think of this in terms of peer competitions–among kids and their peers, but sometimes also parents and their peers.

By its nature, a competition needs a way of keeping score, so you can know who does better or worse. So, some sort of published rankings, the official list of colleges in the Ivy League, published admissions rates–these can essentially be chosen as the way you will keep score in your competition.

And I think the observable fact of some kids and/or parents treating college admissions as a peer competition is not necessarily strictly bound to any area, any HS, or any other definable subpopulation. But it is perhaps observably more frequent in some than others.

And again to me, none of this really counts as “fit” logic. Indeed, to me it is basically the opposite.

With fit logic, conceivably every applicant could “win” in the sense of ultimately being able to choose among comfortably affordable offers from colleges that were all carefully chosen to be particularly good fits for that individul applicant.

But if everyone has won in that sense, then there is no possibility of meaningful peer competition.

Which I would see as a good thing, but it will not be satisfying to those who want there to be a peer competition, so that they can win it.

But to end on a hopeful note, I do think there are sometimes kids or parents who start off thinking in peer competition terms, but they don’t like it, they just are taking their cues from those around them. And then sometimes when those kids or parents encounter very different views about college admissions, say in an online forum, to them it is a huge relief to know they do not have to think that way.

So I think those of us who feel that fit logic is typically a healthier and more productive attitude toward college admissions can at least demonstrate the possibility of thinking that way, and hope some people will respond positively to that.

But then to me it is counterproductive to start claiming that a kid or parent who thinks of college admissions as another opportunity to win a peer competition game is just another form of fit thinking. It is not, those are actually significantly different ways of thinking about college admissions generally, and I think we should be clear about that distinction.

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There are certain students/parents for whom acceptance to (attendance at) a very selective school is important as validation to others. If your MIL (just an example) has been making your life miserable by criticizing your parenting decisions and what they mean for your child’s future, “prestige” options can feel like sweet revenge.

Likewise, if you have constantly been at odds with your school district regarding your child’s potential, getting external validation in the form of a ",prestige " acceptance may be important.

And I think there are certain social circles where elite college attendance is a bit the norm. (A friend once whispered to me at a reunion “Am I the only one here with average kids?”)

None of these are great reasons for the focus on these schools, but it can feel pretty real to folks in these situations. And it’s not really “fit”.

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Veblen effect (demand goes up with price because of status/prestige)

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Oh yes, I know a parent (immigrant - I feel I have to add, not Asian as that’s the stereotype) who unloaded her unhappiness about the fact that her son “only” ended up at ASU and how envious she felt seeing all her friends post on social media about the “good” schools their kids are at. Nothing in that rant had anything to do with her son’s happiness or fit at the school etc. I was kind of flabbergasted… not least because her husband, who is very successful in the consulting industry, is an ASU alum.

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