GIFT LINK.
I think it’s possible there will be a noticeable shift from old school prestige to “stealth prestige” in the next couple of years. The emphasis for cost-conscious parents is likely to be more on great value and job outcomes. Maybe the Binghamton s and U Pitts of the nation. As those schools deliver the goods, they will become prestigious in a new way. As in, good value will be cool.
Curious to hear others’ thoughts.
Includes this sentence:
In the 1980s, New York City was considered synonymous with crime (remember the movie Escape from New York?). So no surprise that NYU likely had trouble marketing itself back then. But after the crime wave (that peaked in 1991) receded, and New York City crime fell faster than overall crime in the US, the location became an advantage for NYU.
USC in the 1980s had a strong “University of Spoiled Children” reputation, but (beginning in the 1990s?) aggressively tried to raise its academic profile (with what were then automatic full tuition scholarships for National Merit Finalists, among other scholarships). Obviously, it has been successful at that. It also benefited from the receding of the crime wave, since it is in a relatively higher crime part of Los Angeles.
I think that return of urban centers to places young people actually wanted to be has affected other schools as well. Like obviously not quite as dramatic an example as NYU/NYC, but I think part of Pitt’s increasing value perception out of state is also related to more kids wanting to be in cities, and then visiting and seeing Pittsburgh is now a quite fun city.
Of course as the article points out, we’re deep enough into this trend that now cities can be very expensive for young families (particularly once they are past the me and five roomates in a shoebox stage, they start looking for “good schools”, and so on). Again, obviously a lot less true of Pittsburgh than NYC, but nice family neighborhoods in cities like Pittsburgh are not as affordable as they once were.
And I can believe this is contributing to families being more cautious about cost. In fact, it definitely colors my own advice. If you and your family would need a lot more debt to go to a “higher-ranked” college, that could be money you wish you had back someday when your professional peers who chose otherwise are putting downpayments on houses.
On the third hand, as the article ALSO discusses, a large part of what has happened is simply that the “old” “elite” colleges did not expand to keep up with the increasing pool of competitive, well-prepared students. And so more and more such students had to go to other colleges. But at a fundamental level, those students themselves define a lot of what makes for an “elite” college–professors want to teach them, employers want to hire them, and they want to be around each other.
So I tend to think individual stories like Columbia aside, mostly this is not about the “old” “elite” losing status, so much as “new” “elites” moving up. In theory the leveling off of the US domestic HS student population could stabilize things, but at least until recently rising demand from competitive, well-prepared Internationals was compensating.
So we’ll see, but I think this will likely continue to be mostly about an increasing list of other colleges leveling up. Which is great for kids looking for colleges.
Agree, I don’t see the old guard elite schools – who are also the wealthiest schools – losing prestige anytime soon. And also think that some other schools will rise (Northeastern, Tulane).
In fact speaking of wealth, there is a similar point you can make about things like endowments. Of course the Harvards of the world just keep getting wealthier too, but over the last 30+ years or so, many other institutions have grown their endowments far faster than inflation. But most have not expanded much if at all. So, they have a lot more real money to spend per student.
And I think you can literally see it. So many campuses are just nicer than they used to be, these days many have really amazing new STEM facilities, and so on.
Of course a fair criticism is–why then were tuitions also increasing faster than inflation? And I think the blunt answer is basically that for a long while, they basically could keep increasing tuition above inflation, and yet more and more desirable applicants kept showing up anyway. So why not?
But starting around 2016-17, things seem to have changed. Full pay tuition seems to have stopped increasing more rapidly than inflation, and actually dropped in inflation-adjusted terms during the inflation spike, although it looks like there is some catch up going on now. And then average costs of attendance have actually gone down further in inflation-adjusted terms. And it seems like every week, another college announces a “free tuition for families below $X in income (assuming typical assets)” policy.
So I personally think this massive explosion in endowment wealth and such is finally translating into a bit more cost competition.
But returning to your point–it is not like the Harvards of the world are in any danger of LOSING that competition. It may cost them a bit more to maintain their reputation of having the best available need aid for most families, but they can absorb that cost.
And again, that’s great for college-bound kids. More colleges leveling up. Also (finally) more cost competition. Not so bad.
I think Honors Colleges have gained in prominence. I also think given costs, schools that buy people in have gained in prominence, regardless of ranking.
It mainly has to do with the fact that the US population had grown in the past few decades, so there are more “top colleges” now. A lot of large state schools like Purdue and UIUC have sub 10% acceptance rates in STEM