Are the ivies overrated? Perhaps too much coddling?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you guys not see that leaping to the defense of how super smart and incredibly hard working your adult children are is part of the coddling? And not just them, but all their classmates and members of their university’s athletic league?

The call is coming from inside the house, gals.

+1 As if college students at many other colleges are not super smart and incredibly hard working.

No one said they weren’t, they aren’t being targeted in discussion.

[Anonymous]

I think people need to distinguish between Harvard, Yale, Princeton and the rest of the ivies. For this generation of students, Brown, Penn, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Columbia are not meaningfully different in desirability or status from about ten other schools. And yes, everyone is noting that the students going to HYP ain't all that these days, especially compared to the other T20 schools, including the "lesser" ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think people need to distinguish between Harvard, Yale, Princeton and the rest of the ivies. For this generation of students, Brown, Penn, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Columbia are not meaningfully different in desirability or status from about ten other schools. And yes, everyone is noting that the students going to HYP ain't all that these days, especially compared to the other T20 schools, including the "lesser" ivies.

Whatever floats your boat. There is a great education to be had at any of these schools. If your kid can do better somewhere else than Princeton then turn down Princeton. Students do it every year and it's fine. Other kids choose Columbia or MIT or a top public university. There is an excellent education with excellent opportunities to be had it all of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

Witty, comedic people are very smart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

Damn! That’s a lot of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

Exactly-they, unlike some people on this thread, know that andy Bernard types are hardly rare as hen’s teeth at ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

Witty, comedic people are very smart.

Exactly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they’re all so dumb and coddled and companies don’t want to hire them, then why do we have to have daily threads on Ivies. Enjoy your other schools and be good with it. No need to knock anyone else down if you’re content.

No one thinks they’re ALL dumb and coddled, but anyone who has been at an ivy or worked with many knows some are and that it’s exactly a man bites dog story.

The Andy Bernard character on office was funny because it resonated wrt to a subset of ivy grads not because it was outlandish.

You’ll love this then:

Incidentally, most of the actors and writers of The Office went to Ivy League schools: Mindy Kaling went to Dartmouth; John Krasinski went to Brown; B.J. Novak, Michael Schur, Rashida Jones, and Charlie Grandy went to Harvard; and Ellie Kemper went to Princeton. NBC executive Kevin Reilly (who championed the show during its struggling first season) went to Cornell.

They were in on the joke.

So NBC hires mostly Ivy grads? lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one is disputing that there are super bright people at ivies, it’s more the idea that the dimwits there (and there are definitely plenty of dimwits there) are more capable than the top students at lot lots of other (less rich, less privileged) schools.

There are a much, much greater number of dimwits at non-Ivies...and more as you keep going down the rankings.

My brother was a complete idiot and on a full ride at an ~330 ranked university....between the 4 roommates they didn't have a 4.0 first quarter...didn't even pick their books up (that were paid for).

The liklihood of finding a dimwit is much greater not on an Ivy/T10/20 campus. These arguments are so stupid....everyone worked with that dumb Ivy grad...

look, I get it...we always make fun of our kid when he does something stupid...'Ivy grad' and joke about it with him.

But that misses the fact that there are so many schools in this county, many of them with crazy smart kids, though apparently not your brother.

I would pick a top 25% grad of a state flagship over a generic ivy grad any day of the week. (And that is backed up by my experience in professional school admissions.)

I would interview the person, understand their skills, temperament and goals, and then determine whether they would add and align with the company culture for long-term success. I wouldn’t have preconceived notions on their undergrad and instead see who I met that day.

This. 100%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think people need to distinguish between Harvard, Yale, Princeton and the rest of the ivies. For this generation of students, Brown, Penn, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Columbia are not meaningfully different in desirability or status from about ten other schools. And yes, everyone is noting that the students going to HYP ain't all that these days, especially compared to the other T20 schools, including the "lesser" ivies.

This is completely dumb. Why are you so insecure?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Actually, if you look at the top feeders for tech and finance, it’s mostly public schools, or private schools that have rigor similar to elite publics like Berkeley and Michigan.

For tech, many of those publics are included due to access and equity pipelines for Silicon Valley-adjacent public schools. Finance, you are just wrong.

[Anonymous]

Top companies are lazy in some ways. They recruit at the ivies because preselection has already been done for them. Most of the kids at ivies are very smart and hardworking. These companies have started to diversify and also recruit top kids from other schools. And that is a good thing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wish my kid was coddled more, not really, but that is so false. There may be some plush privates that do that but it’s not the Ivies. Most get humbled real quick and the expectations are very high. There is no hand holding.

I believe what they mean by coddled is the Ivies do not provide the full gamut of a real word education. For instance, you don’t have to be proactive to get your classes. If you’re struggling, they practically give your own personal tutor. You don’t get that in publics, at least not to that extent. You have to be responsible and get your classes early or they’ll run out of seats. If you’re struggling, they do have resources to help you but you have to seek out. And when you do, you might have to wait a couple hours for your turn (this is most common in lower division introductory courses. Upper division is much more intimate). So public school education is more relatable to the real world. No one’s gonna give you a job out there, you have to seek it out. If you’re struggling at your job, you’re pretty much on your own to figure it out. An IT person once said he could always tell what school someone went to. He said the private school people would call me to fix stuff that only took a reboot.

Really? Which Ivies actually do those things? For everyone? This sounds like TV fantasyland Ivy.

Yes, I went to one. No, I was never offered my own personal tutor. Please tell me where I need to go to have a job given to me — that I don’t have to seek out. As far as “relatable “ goes, I went to inner city public schools before college. Not sure what your IT guy would make of that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope:
One at an ivy. One at UVA. There are many more opportunities at the ivy and for the most part classes demand much more: more reading per week, more difficult problem sets, more complex midterms in calc. Peers do multiple time-intensive activities in addition to class at the ivy and more have campus jobs(though usually these are resume building jobs such as research or paid undergrad learning assistant). Classes are a lot smaller at the ivy but that is not coddling.

How in the world do you know this about your college students????

You know how many problems are in their problem sets? How many pages they're reading?

😳

LOL. I'm not PP, but I am Asian, and I have definitely looked at my kid's problem sets and asked them what they're reading when they come home. I want to know what I'm paying for!

If you actually think you can extrapolate from that to all majors at all ivies (and the same at non ivies) perhaps you yourself could have benefited from a bit more rigor as an undergrad.

How did you read any of that in my response? Did you even go to undergrad?