<p>I don’t know that it is only the students who have “prestige” on the brain. I’ve seen lots of parents as well. I remember a particular thread where a girl was bemoaning the way her father was trying to force her to apply to HYP when she thought she would be happier elsewhere.</p>
<p>I wonder – do any of the prestige-seeking students have parents for whom this isn’t important? This isn’t rhetorical, I don’t really know. </p>
<p>It is hard to deal with sometimes. My daughter has a friend who applied to every Ivy plus a goodly number of top name schools. Her mother had a hierarchy of preference worked up and it seemed all to do with prestige, not any inherent difference among the schools, what her daughter wanted to study, etc. It seemed like much of this girl’s life was programmed to give her a good college application. They both seemed to be disappointed when “only” Cornell admitted her. I could tell she was so jealous that my daughter got into Brown, which in her (the parent’s) mind was higher in the prestige ladder. </p>
<p>So now, every time I see her she wants to know HOW my daughter got into Brown. Because, you see, she has two younger daughters who don’t have the same stats as the eldest and she is so worried they won’t get into a “good school,” by which she means on the level of an Ivy. I don’t get anywhere telling her that there are lots of good schools out there or giving her the specific reasons that Brown was the best match for my daughter (and thus why they probably admitted her). I’m sure she just can’t conceive that prestige had nothing to do with my daughter’s preference for that school. I try not to talk to her about colleges …</p>
<p>It DOES feel good to finally let all this out in a safe place!</p>