However, the importance or lack of importance of prestige is something that can vary by individual student.
Location is another aspect that attaches to all students of an in-person college, and location preferences by students are generally considered part of fit.
It is sort of illustrating the best and worst of the Internet in my view. In the best forms, we can get exposed to ideas, experiences, and so on that are outside of what we have previously encountered, and that can be extremely valuable. In the worst forms, people use the Internet to find already like-minded people who end up encouraging each other to adopt increasingly extreme views.
And I do think CC on the whole is mostly on the good side of that divide. Not entirely, not all the time, no forum is perfect. But mostly the mods and repeat participants and such have done a great job creating a community where people can be shown lots of different ways of thinking and be provided with lots of different sorts of information that collectively can really expand their understanding of what is possible in college admissions.
I think of this like the old adage: “If a tree falls in the middle of a forest but no one was there to hear it, did it make a sound?” 
My youngest graduated recently from arguably the most prestigious music conservatory in the country. It is very well known and generates quite a reaction from those who know classical music.
It is virtually unknown amongst regular folks, especially those not on the east coast. My son does not even bother to say where he went to school. He usually just says that he studied music in Philadelphia. Most people don’t know what a conservatory is. Or an oboe for that matter.
I don’t think the prestige of the name matters to him (or us) one bit. However, the school has provided an outstanding education, endless support for students and alumni and opportunities that I do not think are available at most conservatories. This is the part that matters.
The way you get a job in music (at least in classical and orchestral) is by having the audition that wins over the 50-100 other super talented candidates. Where you went to school does not really matter. However I do think the top conservatories (I suppose meaning the most prestigious) do a good job of selecting top talent and potential. And provide enough financial assistance for students to allow them to pursue their career without debt.
I agree, I think implicit in anything like prestige, fame, or so on is SOME sense of which people we are talking about.
Like, I am quite sure across the billions of people in the world, there are many who have zero informed impressions of any of this. I think implicitly, everyone thinking about the “prestige” of US institutions of higher education is already in some way already talking about some more limited set of people.
But then what makes one limitation more right than another? I don’t think there is a meaningful answer to that question, and I think you implicitly always have to be making some sort of decision about which group of people you WANT to impress with the name of your undergrad institution.
Right, the value that specific kids and parents put on different factors can vary a lot.
But to me, it is perfectly reasonable to say something like that some kids and parents value fit more than things like perceived prestige, and some kids and parents value things like perceived prestige more than fit. As I use these terms, fit and prestige are different types of factors, and which type of factor you value more is a different kind of question.
Or, better yet, you are secure enough in yourself that you don’t need to impress anyone.
I do agree about this. But it is not this thread about.
Indeed. Although to be fair, I don’t think it is inherently wrong to, say, want a resume that will help market you as a potential employee. Some people would call that an “impressive” resume, and while I think effective resume advocacy is actually a more complex topic than some people realize, I’m not usually going to make a point of objecting to that sort of terminology.
Where things get pretty bad in my view is when kids are reporting that their own sense of self-worth is tied up in where they can get admitted for college, and that feeling worthy depends on them getting admitted to a college where it is extremely hard to get admitted. I don’t think that makes those kids bad kids, but I don’t think that is a healthy attitude. And I think the sheer math of the situation means most of those kids will end up feeling bad about their college admissions.
So to extent all this prestige talk is essentially feeding that mindset, well, I don’t love that. But exactly how to separate that from the normal resume building stuff, the stuff I don’t see as inherently problematic, can be tricky.
I might suggest part of the issue when asking what prestige as applied to college admissions is “still about” is that it isn’t necessarily obvious what it has EVER been “about”. So I think some of these conversational trails are basically trying to explore that underlying question, namely what prestige in this context is really about.
If there is a world where the faculty at Curtis isn’t acknowledged to be the pinnacle of music achievement and education, I don’t want to live there!
Kudos to your son and to YOU for fostering his talent for so many years!!!
Yup. Or UIUC for computer science.
We see a few kids getting accepted to superb schools and feel bad that they didn’t get into somewhere more famous. In some cases the more famous schools are not even as good for what the student wants to study.
I think that this web site does give us a chance to try to reassure students in cases such as this.
Thank you for your kind words.
Well, here on the west coast, if he says he went to Curtis most (non music) people ask him “Did you not get in to Juilliard?”
Well, at least nobody is going to ask him what his SAT score is…
And most non-music people on West Coast won’t know where Julliard is either.
You’re lucky they aren’t asking “Wasn’t he good enough to make marching band” when they find out he studied orchestral music!
Friend of mine had a kid at a conservatory in Boston and their acquaintances were genuinely worried that the parents were “enabling” their kid– who clearly lacked musical talent– since he wasn’t going to Football Powerhouse college and playing at games!
Again, I never said it wasn’t prestigious, I said it doesn’t have widespread prestige. By definition, prestige is bestowing respect or admiration for someone/something based on reputation. Personally, I am much more interested in the opinions of those who “know” so widespread prestige isn’t something important to me. But I don’t find it accurate to disregard it exists, particularly when discussing higher education.
But at least they have heard of Juilliard. 
So my point is, prestige can be very much environment/audience dependent. You music aficionados are impressed while many people see him in his Curtis sweatshirt and think it is his name.
And prestige does not matter as much as what you do with your opportunity. Which is why kid downplays it and lets his music speak for him.
I’m saying I don’t worship at the altar of Prestige that many people do. I’m big on accomplishment and, as my friend Senator @Blossom has been saying in different ways, accomplishment and prestige are not the same thing.
My point was that my accomplished buddies managed to get accepted to and thrive at one of the top business school in the world without the benefit of a “prestigious” undergrad. And no, they weren’t consulting or banking analysts (of course not, they didn’t go to “prestigious” undergrads), and no, their focus areas weren’t the Strategy or Finance tracks that the cool kids came early to get a seat for; they both were operations guys (one of them worked in a plant (shudder) the two years previous. They both worked for “Solid -to-Mid” consulting firms after graduation (while everyone was jostling for MBB “prestige”) before both leaving to work for Enormous CPG Company X on the one hand and a company that rented out temp office space on the other. Now, they’re the ones hosting the parties at reunion. Prestige didn’t pay those bills.
I’m saying in my opinion, I don’t co-sign for prestige’s overweighted status. Paraphrasing Yoda: “Do. Or do not. There is no prestige.” It’s the middle-aged Suburbanite equivalent of “peaked in High School.” I’ve worked at too many firms where my peers, bosses and clients were smarter and better than me and I’d either never heard of or didn’t think especially much of their academic pedigree. Although they were and are (unduly) impressed with mine.
So no, I’m not about “Prestige.” I’m about quality work-product which, unless Princeton can somehow guarantee me Analysts, Associates, Managers and Directors who can deliver better than most because they got a Tiger degree (they can’t and don’t), I’ll remain unimpressed.
But I’m old and crotchety. You can continue the inevitable feeders, targets and hiring efficiency discussion that always follows these rants.
If something feels too narrow, it may still have prestige, but it is “specialized prestige.” When it comes to colleges, however, broad-based prestige holds greater meaning.
Babson has been exceptional in entrepreneurship and business for many years, but it has been somewhat “specialized.” The recent ROI rankings by WSJ, Linkedin… have given it more broad-based prestige IMO.
I agree with this. I think part of the issue is I don’t think of prestige and quality as the same circles. Someplace can be high quality without being prestigious. And something can have more prestige than its actual quality.
Certain non-prestigious law schools for example of producing hard working and competent lawyers who I would want to work with. While some prestigious ones have a rep for producing smart people who don’t want to put in the grind required to be a practicing attorney.
To me no. I don’t feel that way about large universities. I would value what some got from being at an intentional LAC with strong academics, excellent faculty, small class sizes, and great academics. Being a graduate of UGA or Wisconsin or UNC or Harvard for that matter is not specifically going to pique my interest.