<p>Hey guys, what do you think of Ivy Plus dating/networking? Non-Ivy Plus students can certainly attend these events as well, but they tend to attract only Ivy Plus members who are officially on the “invite” list.</p>
<p>Some of this is a little arbitrary…e.g. UMichigan undergrads are excluded whereas business, law and medical students are invited. From NYU, only law and business students are invited. I believe I read somewhere that all MD candidates (from any US medical school) are invited but I can’t find that statement anywhere now.</p>
<p>PS: If your college is not officially on the list but you believe you share TIPS (The Ivy Plus Society) values as mentioned on the site, you are asked to “email <a href="mailto:events@ivyplussociety.org”>events@ivyplussociety.org</a> to make an admission request."</p>
<p>Let’s arbitrarily select only these schools because intelligent people can only come from these specific schools! </p>
<p>There are plenty of colleges not on that list which should be. In fact, I see absolutely no relationship between some of these that allowed them to be selected over others. Overall it comes off as pretentious and pompous:</p>
<p>“Alumni from the schools listed below are invited to attend TIPS events. The schools below include members of the Ivy League as well as similarly select U.S. and international universities. We have found that alumni of these schools generally share some of the same values, including: appreciation of academic and professional excellence; intellectual curiosity; leadership; and civic and philanthropic engagement.” </p>
<p>“Membership and participation in The Ivy Plus Society and its events are limited to those who meet the qualifications set forth below* However TIPS members and qualified alumni attending events are welcome to bring guests from non-TIPS schools.” </p>
<p>So… Only those schools which are listed are allowed to go, and everyone else from other universities does not have an appreciation of academic and professional excellence, etc. We have to be invited by those people are ARE alumni of those specific schools.</p>
<p>The list is of course arbitrary - if you include those schools, why not include a whole bunch more? Amherst and Smith are there, but not Swarthmore or Williams?</p>
<p>In the end this is a pointless endeavor, akin to trying to name the “public Ivies” or the “international Ivies” or the “LAC Ivies.” The Ivy League has 8 arbitrarily-chosen colleges, but they are the only official ones. Without that official membership, the arbitrariness runs amok.</p>
<p>Why is it pretentious? Why do you care which colleges are members? I think secretly you hold these colleges in high regard. The way I look at it, this dating society is no different from that for Big 10, Pac 12, etc., just more national in scope. Unless of course, you secretly believe these are the “it” schools and are excluding non-“it” members. Obviously, it goes without saying that talent exists in many schools. This society is simply for a particular set of schools which, as you say, is arbitrarily determined. Let’s stop finding ways to be offended and the world will be a better place :)</p>
<p>Why is it pretentious? Are you REALLY that full of yourself?</p>
<p>They claim “We have found that alumni of these schools generally share some of the same values, including: appreciation of academic and professional excellence; intellectual curiosity; leadership; and civic and philanthropic engagement” </p>
<p>(1) That’s very pompous to claim that ONLY these schools have these things, because that’s clearly not true</p>
<p>(2) Why are schools that clearly have these things not included? Who’s arbitrarily decided what schools do and do not have this type of person? Did they interview all of the people, conduct research and find that ONLY these schools attract that type of person? If they did, I’d love to see their sources. </p>
<p>Someone, arbitrarily decided that “these XYZ schools are better than these other XYZ schools”, even though that statement is clearly false. </p>
<p>Where are the following schools?:</p>
<p>Swarthmore
Tufts
Brandies
NYU
UNC-CH
U Michigan
UCLA
UVa
Williams
Pomona
Middlebury
Bowdoin
Rice
Vanderbilt
Notre Dame
Emory
Carnegie Mellon
USC
Wake Forest
BC
GaTech</p>
<p>Why have these schools, to name a few, been excluded? Do they produce less alumni who have an appreciation of academic and professional excellence; intellectual curiosity; leadership; and civic and philanthropic engagement? I don’t think so. Some of these schools have produced world-leading thinkers, as well as having world-leading faculty.</p>
<p>It wasn’t of much interest to people then either and mostly got responses due to novelty.</p>
<p>
The term is relatively uncommon, but some of the Ivies have used it, usually in reference to a coalition for events (e.g. job recruiting, sustainability initiatives) or for data/IR comparison purposes. The composition of the group seems to fluctuate, with Chicago, MIT, and Stanford being the schools that nearly always show up. A few examples:</p>
This is probably the most commonly misspelled college on this forum (but only because RPI goes by its initials!) and is one of the more grievous/amusing ones. </p>
<p>warblersrule, that’s interesting. So it seems MIT and Stanford are universally in the “plus” group, Chicago near-universally, and a few others show up as well, such as Duke. Perhaps the only reason that SM are often the “cutoff” is that 10 is a nice even number (even though there are many other universities that could hold their own against certain members of the Ivy League).</p>
<p>Like I said, the list is arbitrary. I can create my own society and include the schools below. So what? THE ORIGINAL LIST IS NOT CLAIMING TO BE AN ALL-INCLUSIVE GROUP OF SCHOOLS NOR IS IT CLAIMING TO BE A MEMBERSHIP OF THE BEST SCHOOLS. I’VE SAID THIS SO MANY TIMES-- DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND? <em>YOU</em> yourself came up with that interpretation. Ivy Plus Society is NOT pretentious because it’s NOT claiming to be the “best.” YOU yourself gave it that meaning. You are projecting your thoughts here. You are getting offended over nothing.</p>
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<p>ON THE OTHER HAND, if you’re trying to come up with a list of TOP 10 schools, then don’t include Dartmouth, Brown, and Cornell and maybe replace Duke and Chicago with Williams and Amherst.</p>
<p>No, I don’t think you’re reading here too well:</p>
<p>“Membership and participation in The Ivy Plus Society and its events are limited to those who meet the qualifications set forth below*. However TIPS members and qualified alumni attending events are welcome to bring guests from non-TIPS schools.”</p>
<p>This means that ONLY TIPS members can go unless us non-TIPS schools have the pleasure of “being invited as a guest”. Thanks… I feel so undiscriminated against? </p>
<p>“We have found that alumni of these schools generally share some of the same values, including: appreciation of academic and professional excellence; intellectual curiosity; leadership; and civic and philanthropic engagement.” </p>
<p>So… the TIPS universities are supposedly different in the fact that they produce this specific kind of alumni, while other schools don’t? Um… No? People just like that come from plenty of universities with plenty of different backgrounds. I hate to inform you, but any given HYPSM is in no way better than I am; so why is it that they’ve been selected for this group whereas I have not? </p>
<p>If the society based membership on academic interests, etc. Fine. But, this society bases membership on social elitism based on where you go to school; and that’s clear in the fact that many schools which should be there, but are not as well-known, are not.</p>
<p>Zawel, Marc (September 1, 2005). “Defining the Ivy League”. Untangling the Ivy League. College *******. p. 9. ISBN 1596585005.
“In his book Untangling the Ivy League, Zawel writes, 'The inclusion of non-Ivy League schools under this term is commonplace for some schools and extremely rare for others. Among these other schools, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University are almost always included. The University of Chicago and Duke University are often included as well.”'</p>
<p>I’m surprised Caltech doesn’t get more mentions; it would be my 3rd nomination after MIT and Stanford.</p>
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<p>Um, a couple of those schools are on there. I spot with my little eyes UVA and Williams. The inclusion of U of Washington and the exclusion of Middlebury, Swat and Notre Dame is nonsensical though.</p>
<p>^ Interesting source. Was the blocked word above “Pr.owler”? It does appear that SM are considered the definite “plus,” with Chicago a close second and Duke/Caltech a distant third. I’m also surprised that Caltech doesn’t get more mentions.</p>
<p>NYU2013: As a graduate of a member of the so-called Ivy Plus schools, I totally agree with you. It’s social elitism at its worst, and it’s disgusting to say the least. Needless to say, any truly accomplished person would do well to stay away from such poisonous clubs. The members are likely alumni of the given schools who haven’t accomplished anything in their lives and are just searching for a reason to feel superior to everyone else.</p>