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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I did Ivy undergrad and state school for PhD, so it's not a one-to-one comparison because I couldn't possibly have done both for undergrad. Ivy is awesome, and not because it will improve your job prospects, but because of the exposure to many smart people for four years. I can't sugar coat it, Ivy is on another level, period. The intellectual interactions I had at my Ivy were deeper and much more numerous. State was fine, and there were some really smart people too, but Ivy has the volume. It's all about the volume of smart people. Not demeaning state, because I did it too. [/quote]

Roughly what percentage of the people there were truly brilliant, taught-themselves-calculus-and-Latin-at-10 types people, and what percentage were just normal smart people with some moxie?

I’m asking because I’ve always assumed that parents should stretch to send their kids to HYPSM+Caltech+UChicago+Columbia because those are the natural destinations for people with IQs over 165 or the culturally adjusted equivalent. So, for example, roughly at the level of the most academically smart three or four high school seniors in the Washington area in any given year.

But is that really true, or does holistic admissions mean that students with that kind of raw academic intelligence are not that more common at than at the University of Maryland?

My benchmark is an undergrad school like Emory. I think about 1 in 300 students might have been at the shockingly smart level. [/quote]

Everyone can only offer their anecdotal experience. Mine is that I graduated from a middling Ivy 25 years ago. When I first entered in freshman year, I did anticipate every day would be late night philosophical debates over pizza with your dorm mates, and all classes would have teachers like John Keating in Dead Poets Society. And I'd be surrounded by brilliance everywhere and students from interesting, unique backgrounds. I do remember saying this to an upperclassman at the same school the summer before I matriculated and how his noncommital and vague "yeah" was the first hint that, no, it wasn't going to be like that.

And it wasn't. Most kids were pleasantly intelligent, hard working, but not brilliant. The midnight pizza and philosophy happened maybe twice in all four years. The campus cliques were real, rich kids hanging out with other rich kids, athletes with athletes, minorities with minorities, and people like me with the other UMC kids, meaning my social life wasn't terribly different from my high school friends, just from different states. Had great professors and ordinary professors but none were dramatic. And then the four years were over.

I can't say I look back with a feeling of wow, what an amazing time. If there really was a special, amazing, only at an Ivy experience, it bypassed me completely. I do pretty well in life and across the last 20 years have worked with some genuinely impressive people and they came from all sorts of backgrounds. [/quote]

well, i had tons of late night pizza and pot discussions at my Ivy. [/quote]

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