What are the Lifetime Advantages of Attending Top Colleges

Momwaitingfornew · May 20, 2006, 7:36am

"What is beneficial is diversity. It’s beneficial to meet all kinds of people --not especially rich ones. "

Yes. The Ivies were less diverse when I went there than they are now, and yet, along with the trust fund kids, I met people from all over the country and the world, including a former Miss Wyoming (who came from such a humble background that the competition had shocked her to the core), the son of drug dealers (yes, he admitted this), an Argentinian whose family was in exile, several Olympian hopefuls, kids who had grown up on working farms, a Native American who had never before left the reservation, the son of Christian missionaries, and, yes, the children of celebrities. And then there were the rest of us - just ordinary middle class kids who happened to get good grades.

I’m not saying variety cannot be found at second tier and below schools, but that it does exist at the top. Quite frankly, I think going away to a four year college - any residential four-year college - is a life-changing experience. Commuting students never experience the full benefit of living round-the-clock with diversity, even if it isn’t ethnic diversity. I have a few friends who never went away to college, and, now that their children are going, they don’t get it.

I taught at one university where half the students were residential and the other half commuting. I could tell which ones lived on campus because they were always the better students, not because they were smarter but because they were always immersed in a learning environment.

Momwaitingfornew · May 20, 2006, 7:42am

Gotta weigh in on the writing thing: at my particular Ivy, I never met someone who, by the end of senior year, could not write a cogent and persuasive argument. My alma mater put a lot of emphasis on writing.

dstark · May 20, 2006, 8:37am

Susan, I have been thinking about your post.

This thread could have been a place where people just give their reasons why there are “Lifetime Advantages of Attending Top Colleges”. This might have been preferable. Instead it has become a place where people’s ideas and motives are challenged about this issue.

There are many people who have been misinterpreted on this thread. That’s a weakness of a bb. It’s two dimensional. If people were sitting face to face, and said the same things, my guess is things would have been calmer, and there would have been fewer misunderstandings.

dmd77 · May 20, 2006, 9:31am

“I’ve been to homes where there are Picassos on the wall.” (said Cloverdale).

My first reaction to this was “so?” EVERYONE has Picassos on the wall. Than I realized you meant original Picassos on the wall.

Which made me wonder why, unrecalcitrant snob that I am, why anyone would want real original Picassos, when the prints have become such a cliche. I mean, seriously, who wants a cliche on the wall. And Picasso is so… history. It wouldn’t reveal anything about that person, except that they have lots of money.

This link <a href=“http://doubletake.emplive.org/press/index.asp[/url]”>http://doubletake.emplive.org/press/index.asp</a> is a list of the artworks at a current exhibit at the EMP (Experience Music Project) in Seattle–all art is taken from Paul Allen’s personal collection.

Paul Allen, BTW, went to WSU. But he knew Bill from high school—an elite, private prep school.

mini · May 20, 2006, 9:56am

“The Ivies were less diverse when I went there than they are now, and yet, along with the trust fund kids.”

Are you SURE (as regards economic diversity)? Unless you went to college in the 1950s or early 1960s (or before), that is highly unlikely.

“In the last couple of years, I’ve met a couple of rich kids that I did not care for. One who was tactless enough to unwittingly make someone much poorer feel uncomfortable about her financial status. To be fair, she was totally unconscious of what she was doing to the other person.”

If you’ve never met folks outside your social class, there is a huge educational experience in that as well. I never felt poor, nor had any reason to really think about social class until I went to college. (And to this day, I still don’t feel poor, except when I look at college list prices, which are irrelevant to me, 'cause I won’t pay 'em. ;))

simba · May 20, 2006, 9:58am

dstark:

Why is it hard for you to accept that ‘PROBABILITY’ of getting better education at top schools is higher than at a low tier state school. Now is it better? is it worth? does it make any difference? They are totally different questions. No one can answer that. No one has repeated the birth-college-achivement-death cycle. Every one forms their opinions based on few sample anecdotal incidences. And in most instances, those incidences reinforce whatever biases one has.

We have seen posters who claim that IVY graduates don’t perform and his company will never recruit at those places. But what was the sample size? 3? (personally, I think the company needs to address the question why it has 25% attrition rate for 0-5 year enployees).

We had posters who claim that IVY graduates are unemployed and waiting on tables. What was the sample size? 10-15?.

We also had posters who claim that at many places there is a jealousy for the students who went to top schools, and co-workers delight in the screw ups of those graduates.

Then we had posters who claim that top schools are only for the rich (specially mini, but of course to him anyone who makes more than the median income is rich).

Then there are many parents and kids who go to top schools who articulated very well their motivation as well as their kids personalities and desires which contradicts the stereotypes of the top school attendees.

Yesterday we went shopping for some shirts at a department store. The price varied between $14-$70. Is $70 shirt better than $14 shirt? does it perform any better? You wouldn’t make any comments on the people who buy $70 shirt, would you? I bet you have bought shirts that cost more than the baseline price at Walmart. I bet you have bought cars that cost more than Ford Focus. I bet you live in a house that is bigger than you need. I bet you live in neighborhood that you think is better.

These are all personal choices, and there is no proof that one choice is better than other. We can never repeat the life cycle.

mini · May 20, 2006, 10:06am

“Then we had posters who claim that top schools are only for the rich (specially mini, but of course to him anyone who makes more than the median income is rich).”

I have no idea why you would say that, when I presented clear data on the percentage of really poor, and middle-income folks who attend, repeatedly express gratefulness that this is so, and cited my own personal experience showing precisely the contrary, and how I benefitted from the opportunity.

If you want to disagree with me, I respect that. But at least do me the courtesy of characterizing what I write accurately.

SBmom · May 20, 2006, 11:19am

montrose, good post…

I value good writing, and am consequently thrilled that my D wants to pursue an english major. I hope she has many demanding teachers like you. I remember a truly great teacher from college. She would write about the same number of words in her comments as I had written in my entire essay… cutting, rearranging, teasing out the more subtle points, explaining how to elevate my work.

She, my dad, and Strunk & White taught me 90% of what I know about writing.

cloverdale,

Don’t confuse a by-product of attending an elite school (exposure to wealthy people) with a reason to attend an elite school.

The reasons should be much more substantial and should relate to the academic experience. Rich people may be sociologically interesting but they will not redeem a poor academic/personal fit.

ecape · May 20, 2006, 11:31am

Alright, I’ll admit I didn’t bother to read every post. But I think this is an interesting topic, so I’ll add. I went to a challenging alternative high school, that I honestly do think did a good job of teaching kids critical and analytical thinking skills. (is this what people meant by meta-thinking, perhaps?) We had a really diverse group of students, in every sense of the word. We had some teachers who really worked to challenge our life view on an individual level, and we learned problem-solving skills in every class. Perhaps I’m biased, b/c the school did so much to expand my personal horizons, but I feel like education really can make a large difference in some instances.

Now, I’m at an elite college, and some of my friends from high school who were equally smart are at state U. I’m not sure in the long-run, if where we’re going to college will make all that much difference. But in the short-run, I do have to work harder for my classes and I sense that I have continued to gain more knowledge about the world from the many special opportunities I’m presented with. It’s certainly easier to remain more idealistic in a priviliged environment, for better or worse (I believe this is something mini touched upon). On the other hand, I have met priviliged people here that I feel are not very good at thinking critically about their place in the world and their views. I also know the fact that I am from a well-off family made it easier for me to come here (although I did hold jobs in hs, and have never been surrounded by privilige per se until college). I AM disillusioned with the upper-educational system, and the fact that it’s privatized and that everything revolves around money. Also that so many classes are offered that are relatively not relevant to the lives of most people. I think these prive colleges and universities offer a great deal of opportunities to the assertive (and competitive) undergraduate, but I also think they can make it too easy to stay sheltered and I wish they did more to modernize/make relevant all aspects of academia, and to challenge every student. But the fact is, these institutions, being private, rely on a certain % of rich students. If they did not retain that certain level of sheltered privilige, they’d fall apart. Then again, flagstate Us typically have a lot of reasonably well-off students too. Even when incuding state Us, we’re pretty much an oligarchy.

I guess, I feel that for those who want to go into academia or top professional schools, there are obvious advantages to going to elite undergraduate schools (assuming they make good enough grades at their institution, a fact that is unfortunately lost on some students who think benefits come from a name alone). Other than that, the advantages other students garner are probably on the level of what you get from any unusual life experiences, it adds perspective to your life-view, teaches you to look at the world in a slightly different way, possibly expands your horizons. And then of course, many students probably make great, lifelong friends with similar interests and similar drive, something which is harder though not impossible at a state U.

And for the record, I know Harvard bashing is like the most-popular thing ever, but H is a lot harder than a lot of other places. The Boalt lawschool put them on an 86 (higher number means harder to make grades), when elite schools were generally 80-89.5 and state schools with a couple of exceptions were 78 and below. I believe professors around the country recognize one of Harvard’s freshman math courses as being the hardest anywhere, or something like that… So if you’re a nerd who believes in following intellectual holy grails, to learn as much as you can in classes, I guess ivies make a difference there.

viewpoint · May 20, 2006, 11:34am

I’m not sure the Ivies are as diverse as some here believe. In some ways, they are much less diverse than American society as a whole: most students are Jewish, Asian, URM, or wealthy WASP’s with few exceptions. Plus, in some Ivies at least, there’s not a great deal of interaction among students of diverse racial/ethinic backgrounds.

In my college days, students from various racial/ethnic backgrounds seemed to stick to themselves with little interaction with those from other groups, thus they might not have benefitted much from the extolled diversity. I won’t blame the students themselves because there seemed to be subtle pressure from day one to find your own appropriate ethinic niche; the promotion of ethnic-based residential programs made the situation even worse. I wonder if things have changed for the better.

rorosen · May 20, 2006, 11:35am

mini, many of your ideas are too complex and playfull to misrepresent fairly,…this is a good thing.

Northstarmom · May 20, 2006, 11:46am

“In some ways, they are much less diverse than American society as a whole: most students are Jewish, Asian, URM, or wealthy WASP’s with few exceptions. Plus, in some Ivies at least, there’s not a great deal of interaction among students of diverse racial/ethinic backgrounds.”

I’m very curious to know who here is normally part of an organization or school with more diversity than what is described above.

"In my college days, students from various racial/ethnic backgrounds seemed to stick to themselves with little interaction with those from other groups, thus they might not have benefitted much from the extolled diversity. "

That’s because many of the URMs who were at Ivies back in our day came from backgrounds in which they were in the overwhelming minority. As a result, for many URMs at top colleges, college was the first time that they had ever been around relatively large #s of peers of their own race. The URMs typically at Ivies back then had had plenty of time to be around whites. Many such URMs had been class officers in overwhelmingly white high schools. College provided a rare opportunity to have peers of their own race. The Ivy URMs who went to college with me tend to live in very integrated worlds now, though, unfortunately, due to whites tending to not in general live in diverse worlds, my URM Ivy peers often are in situations at work or socially in which they are the only nonwhites present.

In addition, back in the late 60s-70s, the Ivies and similar schools were greatly boosting their #s of URms, often over the protests or racist alums who had gone to the colleges when, for instance, there either were no URMS allows (Princeton didn’t accept black students until 1945) or there were only one or two per class. While probably most of the URMs were used to being around whites, probably most whites at Ivies had never before had close interactions with URMs who were peers.

It’s not a lot of fun to spend most of one’s time representing one’s race or answering naive questions from uninformed white people, so as a result, URMs did get a lot of comfort from sitting together in the dining hall and doing things like that.

At the same time, however, most URMs probably were involved in some mainstream campus organizations. It’s just that when they did things like that, it wasn’t as noticeable as when they sat together at a table. It’s easy for people to notice, for instance, 10 black students sitting together in the dining hall, but not to notice the 3 black students out of 100 white students who participate in a campus EC.

And of course, people tend not to notice the hundreds of white students who sit together in the dining hall or who happily participate in organizations without noticing the lack of diversity.

viewpoint · May 20, 2006, 11:58am

“(assuming they make good enough grades at their institution, a fact that is unfortunately lost on some students who think benefits come from a name alone).” -ecape

Some Ivy students don’t realize that gaining admission to top law schools is difficult even for Ivy grads. For example, the median LSAT of the actual LSAT takers from various top colleges is like this: Harvard 165, Yale 164, MIT 163, Penn 161, Cornell 160, etc. Realize that these are median scores of those who actually took the LSAT’s. Many others gave up on their law school aspirations because they didn’t expect high LSAT scores.

Yet, respectable as the above-mentioned LSAT scores are, they are generally not high enough for top law school admission: the top 14 law schools ask for LSAT score above 167 and GPA above 3.7 or so. Thus, most Ivy grads don’t have the numbers to attend top law schools.

Of course they could attend lower-ranked schools, say a “first-tier” SMU with median LSAT around 163. The problem is that attending a law school outside of the top 14 may lead to unemployment upon graduation. Even at a T1 law school, only the top 1/3 or so have reasonable chance obtaining decent legal positions. Some in the bottom 2/3 end up never obtaining any legal, or even non-legal employment.

simba has questioned my anecdotal evidence for the large number of unemployed Ivy grads, but if you consider that most liberal arts grads, even from the Ivies, won’t find jobs and can’t get into the top law schools, that academic positions are increasingly harder to come by, you can see why many Ivy grads are poor and struggling after many years at the ivory towers.

Momwaitingfornew · May 20, 2006, 12:02pm

“Are you SURE (as regards economic diversity)? Unless you went to college in the 1950s or early 1960s (or before), that is highly unlikely.”

Yes, I’m sure of what I wrote. I could not possibly have gone to an Ivy that early because I am a woman. :-)

Northstarmom · May 20, 2006, 12:02pm

“consider that most liberal arts grads, even from the Ivies, won’t find jobs and can’t get into the top law schools, that academic positions are increasingly harder to come by, you can see why many Ivy grads are poor and struggling after many years at the ivory towers.”

I haven’t seen that with the exception of the Ivy graduates who had severe mental health problems or who chose to go into professions that are low paying. For instance, a Harvard classmate chooses to live a simple lifestyle in a rural Mexican village where she has started a nonprofit that serves that community. This is a choice, not something that she was forced into. She had an outstanding career in her field, journalism, and probably could be working a variety of jobs now in that field or academia, but has chosen a different path.

I also know some people who bascially took a couple of years off after college, and worked some low paying jobs before going on to doctoral or professional programs. One of my close friends, for example, worked in a camera shop after graduation, then dabbled in a couple of other fields before going to medical school and becoming a surgeon.

mathmom · May 20, 2006, 12:26pm

“There is a reason why MIT (not an Ivy!) asks teachers and GC to evaluate whether the student received the grade by dint of memorization, being hard-working, being grade-conscious or being brilliant. No prize for guessing which answer will get the student into MIT.”

LOL. Maybe my kid has a chance at MIT!

simba · May 20, 2006, 12:36pm

"“consider that most liberal arts grads, even from the Ivies, won’t find jobs and can’t get into the top law schools, that academic positions are increasingly harder to come by, you can see why many Ivy grads are poor and struggling after many years at the ivory towers.”

mini is a perfect example of the choices one makes. Actually, I am humbled by his choices. He has done more for my home country than I have or ever will.

DRJ4 · May 20, 2006, 1:15pm

Everyone who attended a large public university.

Northstarmom · May 20, 2006, 1:19pm

“Everyone who attended a large public university”

Not true at all. For instance, University of Minnesota and University of Wisconsin aren’t that racially diverse. I also know that many southern universities aren’t very diverse when it comes to religion (such as not having many Jews and people who aren’t relatively conservative Christian).

barrons · May 20, 2006, 1:26pm

No but at least UW is very economically, socially and politically diverse and has a large international student population.

What are the Lifetime Advantages of Attending Top Colleges

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