<p>When you look at all of the factors of what the “Ivy League” means, the first thing that comes to mind is the athletic conference. The Ivy League consists a marginal division I athletics in large team sports, but often excels in other, lesser known sports like crew, track, swimming, fencing, and squash. Also, the Ivy League schools have a large, prestigious history. All of the Ivies are on the east coast. Further, the Ivies do not give out scholarships to recruited athletes. The fact that all Ivies are excellent institutions of higher learning and are all old does not bind them. They are bound by being a sports conference in most NCAA Division I athletics.</p>
<p>With all of this being said take out Duke and Georgetown due to their athletic prowess and scholarship offers to athletes.</p>
<p>Stanford is on the West Coast, so they’re a no.</p>
<p>MIT has a very limited sports program and are not Division I in the sports they do have.</p>
<p>Suitable candidates would be Holy Cross and Colgate, but these schools do not have the history nor academic reputation where the Ivy League would take them in.</p>
<p>If the Ivy League tomorrow decided they were going to add 2 schools to the Conference, they would add the U.S. Military Academy and the U.S. Naval Academy. Here’s why…</p>
<p>Both of these schools have long illustrious histories behind them. Both have produced leaders who have shaped the world.</p>
<p>We already face the Ivies in most sports as it is on a regular basis since it is not too far of a hike to any of the schools. The Academies do not offer scholarships to athletes… needless to say our sports are not that great.</p>
<p>Do we need to question the academic prowess of the Academies?</p>
<p>If you wanted to, you can look at the cumlative list of Rhodes scholarship winners:</p>
<p>Harvard 293
Yale 197
Princeton 166
U.S. Military Academy 86
Stanford 75
U.S. Naval Academy 41
U.S. Air Force Academy 34</p>
<p>Oh yeah, the Ivies did offer Army and Navy a chance to join the Ivy League back in the early 1900’s, but both turned them down to compete as independents until the Patriot League formed.</p>
<p>My guess now is that Army and Navy would still turn the offer down if asked today, but if the Ivies ever wanted to add 2 schools, it would be these.</p>
<p>Army and Navy would not want to be lumped in with a bunch of “Academic” institutions anyway because that would mean people would be applying to these institutions simply because they were “Ivy League”.</p>
<p>But, as someone already brought up, why would the Ivies want to expand?</p>
<p>8 is a nice number, especially when it comes to playoff brackets.</p>