Reply to Outcomes - Prestige and Perceptions

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[quote=Anonymous]OP: a lot of the bashing of schools 10ish to 30ish reflects a lack of perceived value/ability to pay or anger at limited seats at great public universities. The hating reflects the human defense mechanism of destroying what you want but can’t have.

For privates, the cost is equivalent to HPYSM, but the prestige is not. Thus, though the schools are excellent, there is the criticism that you’ve over paid, unless you’ve received a ton of financial aid. This leads to the negative stereotype that these schools are for rich kids who can’t get admitted to HYPSM. Though this stereotype carries some truth, it misses that the schools ARE excellent and the kids ARE TOO. Should one apologize for being the 97th, 98th, 99th, 99.5 percentile instead of the 99.9 percentile? Of course not. But, the negative stereotype allows those who get rejected or don’t qualify to destroy what they can’t have. Of course, the stereotype doesn’t apply to HPYSM because they are the standard for exceptional education.

For the publics, they are not quite HPYSM, but they are awesome instate values. Here, the anger becomes the lack of seats. Naysayers roll out the line, “I pay taxes. My kid should get a seat.”  However, these people never seem to realize that it is the school’s selectivity is part of what makes it great, and that not many of their tax dollars go to the institution. Again, they fight their frustration by degrading what they can’t have.

In some ways, it reflects society’s increasingly clamorous debate about wealth, privilege, meritocracy, social justice, etc. today’s communication channels have laid bare the lifestyles of the rich and famous and now everyone wants part of the pie. Also, it just seems easier to get a piece of the pie, so everyone is trying to grab it.  Why not. [/quote]

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