Although I have no dog in this fight (don’t know anyone currently at Yale and, like all right thinking persons, was a UT fan while living in Texas) I do have several family members who, through poor decision making or other unfortunate circumstance, ended up at A&M including among the younger generation two there currently (one an engineer) and one who will begin next year. A&M is certainly a great school, with a heck of an alumni base in Texas. I would agree that its rep is far greater than it was thirty years ago when I lived there. But Texas as a state ain’t what it was thirty years ago either. I don’t live there anymore, but I have a lot of family throughout the state and until recently did a lot of business in oil country. Will I buy that A&M (particularly engineering) is viewed at least as favorably as NYU or BU? Certainly, probably more so. But even in the Woodlands it ain’t Yale or Penn or Columbia.
Also, just a point of clarification but A&M’s endowment per student is no where near any of the Ivys. According to Wikipedia, A&M’s endowment per student is $179,000. Cornell, the “poorest” of the Ivy’s, has an endowment valued at $281,000 per student. A&M is certainly not in the same league with HYP, which have per student endowments of $1.7m, $1.9m and $2.6m respectively. Also, looking at USNWR’s ranking of undergraduate engineering programs, I see Princeton and Cornell tied at 10 with UT. A&M doesn’t appear on the list. On the graduate list it is 12th, right behind UT (as is only right and proper) and just ahead of Cornell and Columbia. But none of the Ivy’s made their rep pumping out MS engineers. That is MIT’s job.