The Official Preppy Handbook, 1980 (Archival Information)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"The College of Your Choice"

The Top Ten

Princeton
Hamilton
U of Virginia
St. Lawrence
Babson
Hampden-Sydney
Lake Forest
Sweet Briar
Hollins
Pine Manor (SATs N.A.)

The Runners Up

Amherst
Reed
Williams
Georgetown
Colorado College
Trinity (CT)
Colby
Vassar
Connecticut College
Wheaton (MA)

Note: While these schools appeared alphabetically in the original, they’re listed above in order of the included SAT profiles for an indication of how these colleges may have changed across time.

lol Babson. making a comeback like fashion? And Sweet Briar was a runner up?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I surprised that Reed was ever on the list. I do know preppies who went there but they were the serious druggies who dropped out to follow the Dead and are now carpenters in Oregon.

And sooo....?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP:

The author of the Handbook went to Brown.

Yes. Lisa Birnbach graduated from Brown University. She wrote a satirical guide to Prepdom that took off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP:

The author of the Handbook went to Brown.

Yes. Lisa Birnbach graduated from Brown University. She wrote a satirical guide to Prepdom that took off.

She is also not a born and bred WASP so she didn’t get everything right. Still, a lot of it is pretty close.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP:

The author of the Handbook went to Brown.

Yes. Lisa Birnbach graduated from Brown University. She wrote a satirical guide to Prepdom that took off.

She is also not a born and bred WASP so she didn’t get everything right. Still, a lot of it is pretty close.

Do some of you out there just not get humor at all?

[Anonymous]

I still have my original copy. This thread inspires me to re-read it, now that my kids are nearing college age.

The book was published before the Internet took off and before college rankings became so important. It was a time when people went to the schools their grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles attended and not where USN&WR said was “best”. Legacy status was huge.
Being preppy is also about working smart, not hard. No Prep wants to be considered a grind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still have my original copy. This thread inspires me to re-read it, now that my kids are nearing college age.

The book was published before the Internet took off and before college rankings became so important. It was a time when people went to the schools their grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles attended and not where USN&WR said was “best”. Legacy status was huge.
Being preppy is also about working smart, not hard. No Prep wants to be considered a grind.

The book was satire, you realize?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Um, this book was humor.

Those rankings were supposedly of the “preppiest” schools, not the best schools. It was meant to be funny! I was in college at the time and we all thought it was a very funny book- almost as funny as the movie “Animal House,” which is also comedy.

Me, too. Memories!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The College of Your Choice"

The Top Ten

Princeton
Hamilton
U of Virginia
St. Lawrence
Babson
Hampden-Sydney
Lake Forest
Sweet Briar
Hollins
Pine Manor (SATs N.A.)

The Runners Up

Amherst
Reed
Williams
Georgetown
Colorado College
Trinity (CT)
Colby
Vassar
Connecticut College
Wheaton (MA)

Note: While these schools appeared alphabetically in the original, they’re listed above in order of the included SAT profiles for an indication of how these colleges may have changed across time.

Good job missing the whole point of the book, I guess

The book was satire, not comedy, of course. Plenty of viewers here will understand the importance of this distinction. For those who don't, the schools listed were "real" choices which comported with the true-to-life, but often humoursly-conveyed and exaggerated, ethos of the book.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP:

The author of the Handbook went to Brown.

The books editor, who also was one of its writers, graduated from Brown. Three other writers were credited, of whom one was credited with the concept as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Love this! Super dated, but love to see how things have evolved.

What would this list look like in 2025?

The first comment in a topic such as this is often an energy killer. This represents a nice exception. (The few energy-killer comments came later.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Love this! Super dated, but love to see how things have evolved.

What would this list look like in 2025?

The brief era perhaps cannot be replayed. Those who paid attention may have seen its beginnings in the film Jaws (1975), in which, not incidentally, a character attends Trinity. The Preppy Handbook (1980) may have captured both the peak and the end of the era.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Love this! Super dated, but love to see how things have evolved.

What would this list look like in 2025?

Colorado College & Middlebury at the top of the list. Basically schools with easy access to skiing - Colby, Dartmouth, etc. Southern prep seems very alive at many schools, but I always viewed this book as more northeastern.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I had an original copy and it was my bible

But it was never meant to have anything to do with academics for crying out loud.

It was tennis and finishing and boarding schools and Speery topsides, monograms, LL Bean duck boots, duck phones, etc

Sweet Briar almost shut down completely from lack of funds and enrollment lags. Hopkins is all female too.

Let me guess : you are the same poster that turned to Vogue magazine for a historical article on “prestige” colleges (a fashion magazine) and now are going to a preppy parody book.

I suggest you look for academic literature.

Who said the book was about academics? The heading for the schools, "The College of Your Choice," was retained from the original source without comment. I listed the schools by the SAT statistics in the book (rather than alphabetically) simply as added information for anyone curious about this characteristic of the college landscape circa 1980.

Vogue? What on earth are you talking about?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I had an original copy and it was my bible

But it was never meant to have anything to do with academics for crying out loud.

It was tennis and finishing and boarding schools and Speery topsides, monograms, LL Bean duck boots, duck phones, etc

Sweet Briar almost shut down completely from lack of funds and enrollment lags. Hopkins is all female too.

Let me guess : you are the same poster that turned to Vogue magazine for a historical article on “prestige” colleges (a fashion magazine) and now are going to a preppy parody book.

I suggest you look for academic literature.

I still have my original copy. I loved it because I figured out my life was somewhat preppy-adjacent.

I learned about the University of Virginia from reading the book. I was in 7th grade and had just moved from the Bay Area to MontCo.

I enjoyed the preppy trend and have stuck with quite a few elements of it.