<p>Okay okay I know this is not how I should be looking for a college but it must be done. My parents will not help pay for my college tuition unless it is a very prestigious college. So in order to save money (I know ironic) I must go to a top brand name college. Obviously Harvard would be my first choice because that is like apple but what other socially prestigious colleges are there that will impress my parents or their friends who will convince them to help me pay. A list would be perfect! Thanks!!</p>
<p>Note: I want go into business/economics if not offered</p>
<p>Offering to pay for the unknown and the improbable is not much of a gift. Your parents should commit to an exact amount to an acceptable number of schools. Anything else is a bit of dodge ball.</p>
<p>“social prestige”…the connotations of that phrase are not good. Let’s assume that you are a non-native English speaker and you really meant, ‘my parents will only pay for a school with a top reputation and a strong alumni network’</p>
<p>Here is your requested list to show your parents:
Harvard
Princeton
Stanford
Penn (Wharton)
Williams (may not have the universal appeal, but quite impressive in some circles)
Amherst (see above, but slightly less so)
Caltech and MIT…(impressive if you are Asian)</p>
<p>trying to think if I forgot any…nope, that’s about it.</p>
<p>The list provided is clearly east coast centric. I’m from the midwest and we would not put Amhearst or Williams on the list (althought both are outstanding schools). THe OP needs to state where they are from. IF overseaes, the list provided highlights the most prestigeous schools. If from the South or Southern Atlantic, you would add Duke and Vanderbilt. If from the Midwest, you would add University of Chicago and Northwestern. I think in the east you would also add Columbia. All parts of the country would have HYPSM as well as Cal tech.</p>
<p>This is a pretty offensive thread. If the OP wants a sense of what colleges are seen as prestigious by children who know nothing and the parents who raised them, he or she should spend a few hours reading around College Confidential.</p>
<p>As always, thank you JHS for the appropriate response. Though I would argue that this isn’t a “pretty offensive thread,” but rather a REALLY offensive thread.</p>
<p>I guess anyone who ain’t ‘tended a school on this here official “list” should jes give up, crawl in a hole, and die like an ol’ goun’hog, since such as has not ain’t never gonna ‘mount to nothing anyhows. I mean, dag nab it, only them socially ‘stigious schools can teach ye how to talk an write good enough to get a real job, or somethins, so as to make it in this here worl’. Res’ of us ain’t got no chance.</p>
<p>I’m curious to know why some people hold Williams and Amherst in such high regard. They are undoubtedly good schools, but they are significantly easier to get into than schools like Chicago, Penn and Duke, and have lower yield rates as well. In fact, the number of applicants declined at both schools this year. Is it just a “diversity” thing? People tired of hearing the names of the usual suspects (the big research universities)?</p>
<p>If we pretend that the OP isn’t a ■■■■■, I don’t see why everyone was so hard on him. Do we think it’s outside the realm of possibility that one’s parents would feel this way? Does the OP have a choice if his parents are threatening not to pay for non-Ivy U?</p>
<p>OP, I suppose the only thing to do is to pull a fast one on your parents by aiming to attend a less prestigious school and, while you’re at it, paying more money to do so. That’ll show them for not having a refined view of college admissions.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Because what people tend to regard is educational quality, not low admission rate or high yield. See also Caltech.</p></li>
<li><p>Because liberal arts colleges have a somewhat different model of undergraduate education compared to research universities, but it is equally valid and produces the same kind of sensational results, and Amherst and Williams are among the very best at it.</p></li>
<li><p>Because the students who are accepted at Amherst and Williams are essentially the same sort of students who are accepted at Harvard or Yale. The fact that fewer people apply doesn’t really make them easier to get into.</p></li>
<li><p>Also, they are quite beautiful.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>^^ did curvyteen know that Williams placed 10th in North America in the Putnam-- ahead of every Ivy and far ahead of Duke or Chicago? That its Art History program is the best --or second best depends upon what one things of Yale’s program–in the nation? Swarthmore, Amherst, Pomona are pound for pound among the greatest educational collegiate institutions in the nation. They are not research universities–and they have no desire to be (I love how the Amherst faculty voted almost unanimously to NOT affiliate with EdX re-asserting the vital importance of residential learning communities-- Williams faculty has banned recording of faculty lectures for the same reason.) </p>
<p>I have kids at both H and W and I would be hard pressed to say which is getting the better education–they are equal in their own way.</p>
<p>This is an extraordinarily offensive thread–and I wouldn’t have responded (past my first) but for the ignorant comment about these top LACs.</p>
<p>10th place on the Putnam is not “ahead of every Ivy”, especially considering that Harvard won. That and using the results of that test to determine quality of a school is, well, questionable.</p>