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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Aside from Stanford, MIT, Duke, Caltech, which schools do you consider better than the "lower ivies" (Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell)?[/quote]

In my mind, the major problem with Cornell is a lot of people apply to it only because it's an Ivy and then some of them go only because it's an Ivy and they didn't get into any other.

It's my family's legacy school and even though I chose to go to a different university, I think it's pathetic how some people talk it down.  It did great things for my family (including a first gen, low income woman in the 1930s) and everyone who went there appreciated the rigorous and thoughtful education they got there.  They were Pennsylvania and New York state residents so knew what they were getting into and actively chose the school as their first choice.

It's only a "lower Ivy" for people with crap priorities like "Ivy or bust".   It is tiresome listening to smart but narrow-minded prestige seekers bringing up all the standard whines about the rigor, the location, the weather, the partly state-related nature of the university, etc.  As well as the debunked excess suicide prevalence discussion.

It's a great school and it's a pity that the student body has become diluted by people who actually don't want to work hard and/or be there.

Whoever is reading this who can be influenced...please don't apply/have your kid apply to "lower Ivies" if you have no interest in going there.  Only apply to schools that you are interested in.  You won't miss being a student at the "lower Ivies" and they won't miss you.[/quote]

Well said. It reminds me of an old post where someone said they hated their experience at Duke, and then explained that the only reason they went there was because it was the highest-ranked school they got into.  :roll:

Call me crazy, but colleges are not commodities. They're not all the same, just distinguished by a ranking or their sports conference.

Colleges are many things, including communities, each with a ton of diversity within it, but also with it's own overall personality (which I think of as the story the college likes to tell itself and others about what it is.)

Plus at many schools, whatever they are ranked, your experience will differ depending on your major.  There are schools where Humanities majors will more lilely feel like they're with "their people". There are other schools (of equal ranking, if that's your thing) where those same Humanities majors would feel like fish out of water compared to the majority of their classmates.

When you look at it that way, many the top 20 schools are VERY different, even though they're ranked quite similarly. Same for the rest of the colleges out there.  If you value the experience at all, they're not interchangeable commodities. (And even if you only value the prestige, that too can differ depending on the major.)

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