Sometimes, I see both students and parents considering Harvard etal. as the gold ring. Some see attending an elite school as a means to getting a great job or high salary right out of college because they attended an Ivie or an elite lite. That belief was in a recent post by someone thinking attending one of the Ivies as giving an inside track to a job.
Perhaps it is still true that recent college graduates who seek employment in television news, for example, expect to start in NYC, LA, Washington, etc. rather then begin at a small-market station and work their way up to larger or more prestigious markets. I have seem newscasters whom I thought were really good, seem not quite so talented when guest reporting on a television show in NYC. Even Pat Sajak who was a weather reporter in Nashville is out of forecasting weather except for prize trips.
Harvard " rolls quickly off the tongue and people gasp, so there may be some advantage to “Harvard” in the same sentence as one’s name. That might last a minute or two. The potential downside is people wondering how you ever got admitted.
Some students and parents see an admit letter from one of the elite schools as external validation of their or their child’s intelligence and academic prowess. On one hand, these schools admit only a small percentage of applicants and “my” admission means I am the epitome of the epitome. Unfortunately, it seems to me that some lose sight of the huge percentage of students who were not admitted with comparable grades, scores, EC activities, etc.
Some seem to truly believe that Harvard provides a better education. This I find distressing because education is not something that someone else does to you. College is viewed almost like a paint job and Harvard uses gilt. I am amazed how many students do not realize that their education depends on personal effort rather than trying to nail down the content of an upcoming test. I found many students were concerned that they might learn something that wasn’t on the test. Kids are paying lots of money for tuition but may lack willingness to learn actively, honestly and enthusiastically. College is an opportunity to wring everything out of the curricula in four years and with little, if any, additional cost.
Two things I consider huge problems. The first is the belief only elite schools provide quality educations and life will be over if I don’t get admitted to on of these schools. This seems to me a combination of entitlement/reward with education viewed as paint. Realistically, there are thousands on incoming first-year students. many of whom would have been admitted if they chose to apply to an Ivy. Instead, they chose their school for all sorts of reasons, preferences and goals as well as lack of interest in an Ivy.
There was a recent post about what state had the worst public universities. I think that was just silly. Every state has a flagship and I would expect an excellent education from any one of them. Some also have special programs of note like Iowa and writing. Some schools like Maine are sea-grant rather than land-grant colleges which is likely to channel some of their majors. Every state, most probably, has a campus with really good academics but is also the party school. Some states are the former normal school so may have a larger presence in training people for education careers. Some very good schools have the added attraction of proximity to ski slopes in the Rockies or surfing on the ocean. Some graduates at Harvard scraped by==what to you call the poorest graduate from medical school? Doctor.
My second concern is cheating. In recent posts, two cheated and one plagiarized and all were caught by their teachers. The concern of these students was the likelihood that they would be denied admission to a good college; but none recognized their behavior as stealing, as unfair to other students who did not cheat, and as expecting to enroll in a good college even though some grades may have been inflated or the kids hadn’t acquired knowledge or skills that they would need in college.
After a post today about cheating, I looked it up on Amazon. Lo, over half of American students cheat. Over half!!! Of course it happens at Harvard. There was no sense of guilt, contrition, embarrassment, resolve not to cheat again. Just relief that teachers would not report the cheating or it would not appear on the transcript. At what point in life do students think cheating will no longer be necessary. Look at all the AP classes, some weighted GPAs calculated so the cumulative average exceeds the actual numerical limit of the grading scale and on and on. If students are so exemplary academically why do they need to cheat. If someone fancies his or herself as the best student in the room why do they cheat from others they perceive as lesser students? This seems to combine academic ego or pride with a lack of trust in their success as a learner.
But you are absolutely correct, IMO