<p>I do wonder why there is so much hostility to the Ivy threads? There will always be a desire to enter the campuses of the oldest, most highly ranked schools. History, amazing resources, great financial aid, what’s not to like?</p>
<p>And despite the common response that they are all so different, really they are not. The experiences vary slightly in geography and city/town size but the academic offerings are similar. Each one has their jocks, preppies, artsy/bohos, finance/econ future tycoons, and pure academic/pre-Ph.D.s.</p>
<p>The eight schools have to admit a thousand or two every year so some of the “Chance me?” posters will indeed get in to one or several. </p>
<p>On the CAN YOU AFFORD THAT replies. I agree there’s a place for them, but I really heave a sigh when the first 4-5 replies are ALL like that and the thread gets so distracted that OP’s question never really gets addressed. Sometimes it seems there is a handful of self-designated “tuition police” who race each other to make the same post first.</p>
<p>@Nrdsb4, crepes are smooth, we are not into waffling ;)</p>
<p>About hostility to Ivy threads–I’m not hostile to them in principle and certainly not when the posters have done some research on them, have a realistic shot and are interested not just in prestige but because of their offerings. I spent a great summer at Harvard for a post-grad seminar 20+ years ago. DH just did a weeklong seminar at Yale and we agreed that in terms of stellar faculty and impressive research collections and facilities, they deserve their reputation. But I’m sure we can agree that many of the “Chance me for IVY’S” threads by uninformed posters are annoying.</p>
<p>Which school has the best premed program? I have to go to a top school. I am going to be a XXXX (super specialist) and I want to go to any ivy med school.</p>
<p>I was the person who said they hated any thread with “Ivy” in the title. (Well, actually, lookinf back a number of us cross-posted.)</p>
<p>As a person with a number of Ivy grads in the family and a kid with degrees from two of them, I have no hostility to the Ivies at all. What I hate about those threads is the amount of completely unwarranted hostility against the Ivies that they unleash. The lack of perspective of those who seem to think that the Ivies–or worse yet, the “upper Ivies” <shudder>–are the only great schools is also annoying, but minor in comparison. To me.</shudder></p>
<p>My new least favorite thread is one that is titled: I’m a current student at XXU, ask me anything. Then after about a dozen posts with passive aggressive negative comments about the place, slips a comment in the middle of a paragraph about trying to transfer out. If you hate the place and you’re leaving, let’s lead with that info! </p>
<p><<<
I do wonder why there is so much hostility to the Ivy threads? </p>
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<p>I think the hostility is when kids post that they are applying to all of them, and they really don’t know that each is different. They think the ivies are really just identical sextuplets. If one ivy rejects them, then another one will do just fine. Plug and play.</p>
<p>^^^Like, like, like a thousand times! If I’d tried to major in a STEM field I’d probably be dead or in jail right now. And I hate the “girls in STEM” threads. Does it not occur to anyone that some girls don’t go into STEM because they simply aren’t interested?</p>
<p>You mean the ones like, “I earned a B- in AP Biology because my teacher is an incompetent jerk . . .”? Because good schools want students who won’t take responsibility for their choices.</p>
<p>Rarely do I find posts as sensible as this one. Most posters who attack the “elite schools” become worse than the objects of their attack. Those people create the very provincialism and elitism that they claim to detest, which manifests in themselves and in their adversaries, the elite school partisans.</p>
<p>Gandhi argues in Swaraj that to stop being a slave, one must stop acting like a slave. Pulling down “elite schools” is acting like a slave. Constantly comparing one’s school to one with a more widely-known name is acting like a slave. (One might even say, “An advantage of attending an elite school is not needing to contend with this formidable and absurd ‘inferiority-superiority complex.’” However, you would need to contend with an inferiority-superiority complex for different reasons…)</p>
<h2>Anything to make a point, even if it turns you into a devil! (cf. Nietzche and Fanon) </h2>
<p>Most annoying threads:</p>
<p>“The Ivy League veneer”
“The truth about the elite schools”
“The miseducation of the (American?) elite…”
“Why I’m glad I/my child didn’t attend an Ivy/didn’t get into Ivy…”</p>
<p>Truly, most of those threads should not exist.</p>
<p>I think the chance me thread builds some amount of dillusional HS in my opinion, and when its all said and done, they become very disappointed because they felt entitled to a school that they were chanced on CC.</p>
<p>The other is the Pubic VS Private; we vs them attitude. I see so many post on CC how private school students are spoilt brats and do nothing than spend their parents money especially the IVY’s - I usually see this as a sign of someone that got rejected from privates or IVY’s and decided the best way to get over it is to be bashful.</p>
<p>You just gave me another type of thread to add to the “most annoying” list–those in which posters assume that because someone disagrees with them, it’s “sour grapes” because they didn’t get into the type of school one “side” says is better. </p>
<p>The threads titled “is it worth it to go to an expensive, selective college” and written as if they are the first to think to ask the question – when it is asked at least once a day on CC and there are already many lengthy threads debating the topic.</p>