<p>i just find it wrong the OP is refering to schools like University of Maryland as “bad schools”</p>
<p>this thread is hilarious.</p>
<p>Agree wholeheartedly with Flipper519. There are PLENTY of idiots who have graduated from Ivy League. And really, undergrad doesn’t matter, as long as you went to a decent school and did well there. </p>
<p>Also, most of the people I know who went to HYPS/MIT/the like lack common sense and/or morals. Which, if you ask me, is worse than lacking an Ivy League ed.</p>
<p>This is one of the most closed-minded, ignorant posts I’ve ever read. First of all, I am a top 2% student that’s looking at colleges like Duke, Stanford, Georgetown, UVa, Vanderbilt, so I’m not typing this as someone that looks for reason to pity themselves. But this is completely ridiculous. </p>
<p>Take, for instance, Teletech, a global business outsourcing corporation. Scrolling through the available resumes on the internet, the undergrad profiles of the corporate execs are listed. ALL OF THE FOLLOWING ARE MILLIONAIRES
University of Akron
Whittier College
Arizona State University
Ohio Northern University
Colorado State University</p>
<p>Obviously, it helps to flash your Harvard degree when you’re applying for a job. But what ignorant ****s like you don’t understand is that life doesn’t end at college. Does it sound right for a minute that our teenage years should dictate where we go in life? It’s mostly how we manage our life out of college that dictates our salary, stature, etc. I should end know since I’m getting angrier and angrier with every character typed. May God shame you. You are an idiot.</p>
<p>“i just find it wrong the OP is refering to schools like University of Maryland as “bad schools””</p>
<p>Exactly. With the possible exception of Texas A&M, the “bad schools” he mentioned are top 100, and UMaryland is top 50, maybe top 25 in fields like Economics.</p>
<p>Actually, it’s worth it to do two years of community college if you can’t get into a top 100 school. Ivy League schools are looked at ahead of top 50 schools, which are ahead of top 100 schools, which are looked at far ahead of the rest.</p>
<p>"graduates of bad colleges like University of Maryland have just as good a chance of being successful as Northwestern graduates "</p>
<p>You’re kidding, right? U Maryland is a pretty good college, notwithstanding whatever ‘ranking’ it might have with USNWR (I have no idea what it is). Besides, depending on the field you are in, I really do believe that ‘brains will out’ in most cases, esp if paired with a decent work ethic.</p>
<p><a href=“Loading...”>Loading...;
<p>Is that Maryland ranked 10 spots ahead of Brown and 41 spots ahead of Dartmouth in economics? I’d say it is.</p>
<p>Maryland is such a terrible school.</p>
<p>I didn’t read the entire thread because it ****es me off, so pardon me if I repeat someone’s point.</p>
<p>Let’s assume these blacks, mexicans, latinos, legacies, etc. really didn’t deserve to get in. They only got in to… Harvard because of their special qualities. If they really aren’t smart enough to attend, if they really aren’t up to your standards, theendusputrid, how do you think they graduated? </p>
<p>Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT… these top schools are not a walk in the park, I hope you understand. Most of the time, they don’t play favorites, and those who typically benefit from this type of favoritism are legacies and athletes (not URMs). They graduated because they are excellent students. If they got in because of their hook, and only because of their hook, they will most probably drop out or fail out. But to graduate from these universities, to have a diploma from these universities takes more than URM or legacy status. They truly deserve the benefits of a prestigious diploma.</p>
<p>And i don’t even want to get started on the fallacies of your “bad schools” argument. =/</p>
<p>Another opinion:</p>
<p>From The Overachievers by Alexandra Robbins, pgs. 187-188: (Robbins graduated summa cum laude from Yale in 1998. Anyone know how to underline the book title?)</p>
<pre><code> "What’s more, surveys of top business leaders do not support the idea that a degree from an elite institution is necessary for success. By 2005 the percentage of CEOs at S&P 500 companies who did not graduate from an Ivy League school had risen to 90 percent from 84 percent in 1998. Also that year, the number of S&P 500 CEOs who graduated from the University of Wisconsin matched the number from Harvard. In 2004 and 2005 the CEOs of Chiquita Brands, Continental Airlines, Intel, Kellogg’s, Kmart Holding, Sara Lee, Time Warner, and Walt Disney had received their undergraduate degrees from Southern Illinois University, University of South Carolina, University of San Francisco, DePaul University, University of Houston, Augustana College, University of Hawaii, and Ithaca College, respectively.
The truth is, while famlies spend years hyperventilating over and strategizing how to get into an impressive-sounding school, the educational and social experiences at hundreds of other colleges are just as good, if not better. Much of the name-branding has carried over from a different era, when fewer student attended college and there was a sharper divide between the elite universities and the rest. Since that time, many schools have caught up in quality to those traditionally considered top-tier. It’s only the attitudes - in many cases, of adults from that era - that haven’t. Hordes of parents each year sacrifice facets of their children’s well-being, and their own, to get them into schools that are overrated."
</code></pre>
<p>Let’s look at 20th and 21st century presidents.</p>
<p>Teddy Roosevelt - Harvard
Taft - Yale
Wilson - Princeton
Harding - Ohio Central
Coolidge - Amherst College
Hoover - Stanford
FDR - Harvard
Truman - no college
Eisenhower - Army
JFK - Harvard
Lyndon Johnson - Southwest Texas State
Nixon - Whittier College
Ford - Michigan
Carter - Navy
Reagan - Eureka College
George H. W. Bush - Yale
Clinton - Georgetown
George W. Bush - Yale
Obama - Columbia</p>
<p>9 presidents who did undergrad at an Ivy
2 presidents from high ranked non-Ivies (Michigan, Georgetown)
2 presidents from military academies
3 presidents from LACs (all Republicans!)
2 presidents from low-ranked universities
1 president who didn’t attend college</p>
<p>I think this speaks more on the ambitiousness of those who become president more than the prestige of the Ivies, but I’m sure someone will interpret it differently.</p>
<p>yep, if you’re driven enough to become president, it’s pretty likely that you’re driven enough to get into a “top college” but that doesn’t show anything about the “value added” by those ivies - who’s to say that those presidents would not have become president if they had gone to northsouthwestern Nebraska state?</p>
<p>All says to me is that the president’s of the time period had family ties helping them (our lovely Bush) or that in politics names matter. But that’s highly expected when your entire field is based on public perception and names. An idiot with a Harvard degree because their family funneled money in is still an idiot at the end of the day.</p>
<p>As far as URM’s getting unfair advantages, unfair or not I think people get the wrong idea of the advantage. A student below any school’s standard is not getting in because of their race. Maybe a fully qualified applicant who is somewhat below another non-URM student to some degree will get in while the other won’t, but it’s not like it’s a free ticket to any school of your choice.</p>
<p>Lulz at the OP.</p>
<p>As a reply to LogicWarrior, many presidents have a family history as politicians, thus they have easy hooks into almost any school they wish to attend…</p>
<p>Look how smart the last few presidents have been anyways :/</p>
<p>Which recent presidents have had family connections besides the Bushes?</p>
<p>That’s an awful argument. You’re zooming in way too far and failing to recognize things as a whole. Obviously, if you take a history of ~15 the MOST successful men in America, it’s obvious that most of them will have graduated with prestige. But look at the millions and millions of other wealthy people like people from my previous post. It doesn’t take an Ivy league education to make you successful. Your performance as an adolescent teen DOES NOT by any means dictate the path you will take in life. Burn in hell.</p>