by honors programs, I mean programs hosted by many state flagships for the most talented/scholarship students*, not the special programming options I was talking about certain elites having. Quality teaching methods (problem is many elite privates are stuck on lecture and traditional active learning like clickers, which make for “not overwhelming but more rigorous than HS and far more impersonal” settings), good rigor, still surrounded by great students. I think it just depends on one’s learning style. I just hold out hope that good students would like to learn at a level that reflects their capabilities in the classroom, while also engaging whatever oppurtunities outside of it. I do not think elite privates and publics are the only places (nor necessarily the best) places to do that, but that opinion doesn’t come from a concern that dealing with the competition may be scary/uncomfortable, but that the methods of education are often efficient but not optimal for learning.