Anonymous wrote:What schools have that preppy, upper crust privileged feel. I know people say UVA, Dartmouth, Vanderbilt, Princeton. Elaborate on it a little more if you have experience at those schools.

The old preppy, blue-blood, Boston Brahmin world has mostly run its course. Princeton and Dartmouth look very different today than they did in 1980. Same with Andover and Phillips Exeter. The most privileged students today tend to come from the NYC privates and convey a very different vibe than those from the old New England patrician class.

Kids from Upper Crust families are not going to BU, Tulane, or Miami.

God Tier

Princeton University
Harvard University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Stanford University
Yale University

S Tier


University of Pennsylvania
Duke University
Dartmouth College
Columbia University
Brown University


A Tier

University of Chicago
Cornell University
Northwestern University
Georgetown University
Vanderbilt University
Washington University in St. Louis

Anonymous wrote:What schools have that preppy, upper crust privileged feel. I know people say UVA, Dartmouth, Vanderbilt, Princeton. Elaborate on it a little more if you have experience at those schools.

Secret Society tapping time around the corner. IYKYK

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Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

No offense, but in both cases involving underprepared students, do schools end up lowering academic standards just to ensure students pass?

Dartmouth has one of the lower average GPA's of the Ivy's. Many majors have enforced medians. I call BS on op who says their kid has a 99% in every class. Are you emailing the professors to ask?

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Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Dude, it's fiction

Yeah this person is a troll. My DS is a junior there, and there are enforced medians of B/B+ in many classes. There are certainly classes that are known as being easier than others (this is true at every college), but I think it's a gross exaggeration to say that students are unprepared and that it's 'super easy'.

DD’s close friend is at Dartmouth this year. The friend, who had good stats in high school but was not at the top of the GPA distribution in high school, says that first year classes at Dartmouth are easy. She feels much smarter than she did in high school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Dude, it's fiction

Yeah this person is a troll. My DS is a junior there, and there are enforced medians of B/B+ in many classes. There are certainly classes that are known as being easier than others (this is true at every college), but I think it's a gross exaggeration to say that students are unprepared and that it's 'super easy'.

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Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Yes, they're a STEM major.
I think a lot of people would be surprised how dumbed down the Ivies are in 2026 in order to accommodate a pretty large cohort of kids who went to suboptimal high schools.

I have a STEM student at an Ivy (not Cornell or Princeton), and I’d be unable to give you any worthwhile intel on different stem majors at their university much less have an educated option on a variety of stem majors at 7 other institutions.

This would be a far superior forum if everyone had the restraint to only post about things they could possibly know.

I’m not the PP you’re responding to. But isn’t it the whole point for everyone to share their own experience?

Yes, how can you know the experience at all 8 schools? And you know for fact that Dartmouth has dumbed down classes to accommodate kids from "suboptimal" high schools?

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Anonymous wrote:USC, NYU, BU

Good catch with BU. NYU is actually a bit more socioeconomically diverse than BU.

But OP didn't ask what school just have rich kids, she asked what schools have "preppy, upper crust privileged" kids.

USC, NYU, BU, UMiami, and Tulane, while attracting rich kids, do not attract preppy, upper crust privileged kids.

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Anonymous wrote:USC in CA

Well…. It was nicknamed the University of Spoiled Children for a reason.

It’s a private in wealthy SoCal where, if you have the grades and stats, you go to UCLA for 40% of the cost of USC. The rich dumb kids end up at USC.

UCLA has a gorgeous campus in Westwood. USC is right smack in the middle of downtown LA.

The only major that’s stronger at USC is the film school, which is notoriously competitive to get into.

Um no. USC is now majority smart Asian kids from CA public schools that load up on APs. There are some different types in Film/Acting side of things. There are dumb jocks too and "new money" (mostly international) but nothing like the prep-school "old money" New England vibes.

USC 20% Asian. How is it "majority Asian"?

NP. For the class of 2025: Hispanic: 17%, Black: 6%, 24% Asian/Asian American, 22% White, 21% International, and 7% Multiple Ethnicities. The 21% international contingent is mostly Asian. So add the international Asians to the Asian Americans and it definitely the majority race on campus at roughly 40%+. White is 22%.

Both you and PP like "majority" or "mostly".

What PP said is "majority smart Asian kids from CA public schools that load up on APs". That's not true. If domestic Asian is only 20%, how could CA public Asian be the majority? PP also excludes International as "new money". USC is also a welll know destination for private school kids.

School Location Median Family Income Percentage of Students from the Top 1%
Colorado College Colorado Springs, CO $277,500 24%
Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) St. Louis, MO $272,000 22%
Colgate University Hamilton, NY $270,200 23%
Washington and Lee Lexington, VA $261,00 19%
Trinity College Hartford, CT $257,100 26%
Middlebury College Middlebury, NY $244,300 23%
Colby College Waterville, ME $236,100 20%
Georgetown University Washington, D.C. $229,100 21%
Bates College Lewiston, ME $226,500 18%
Tufts University Medford, MA $224,800 19%

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Dude, it's fiction

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:USC in CA

Well…. It was nicknamed the University of Spoiled Children for a reason.

It’s a private in wealthy SoCal where, if you have the grades and stats, you go to UCLA for 40% of the cost of USC. The rich dumb kids end up at USC.

UCLA has a gorgeous campus in Westwood. USC is right smack in the middle of downtown LA.

The only major that’s stronger at USC is the film school, which is notoriously competitive to get into.

Um no. USC is now majority smart Asian kids from CA public schools that load up on APs. There are some different types in Film/Acting side of things. There are dumb jocks too and "new money" (mostly international) but nothing like the prep-school "old money" New England vibes.

USC 20% Asian. How is it "majority Asian"?

NP. For the class of 2025: Hispanic: 17%, Black: 6%, 24% Asian/Asian American, 22% White, 21% International, and 7% Multiple Ethnicities. The 21% international contingent is mostly Asian. So add the international Asians to the Asian Americans and it definitely the majority race on campus at roughly 40%+. White is 22%.

This 41% Asian at USC pales in comparison to my son’s high school (tj), which is 19% white and 81% BIPOCs, incl, Asian, multi-racial, and international.

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Yes, they're a STEM major.
I think a lot of people would be surprised how dumbed down the Ivies are in 2026 in order to accommodate a pretty large cohort of kids who went to suboptimal high schools.

I have a STEM student at an Ivy (not Cornell or Princeton), and I’d be unable to give you any worthwhile intel on different stem majors at their university much less have an educated option on a variety of stem majors at 7 other institutions.

This would be a far superior forum if everyone had the restraint to only post about things they could possibly know.

I’m not the PP you’re responding to. But isn’t it the whole point for everyone to share their own experience?

Yes, but how can you have experience at 8 schools?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That preppy & privileged feel is fading significantly at Princeton. My DS says that it only really exists with the athletes & legacies at the eating clubs. Otherwise, Princeton heavily favors and targets underprivileged kids for admission.

Same at Dartmouth. My child is a freshman. There are wealthy boarding school kids but 30% of the students pay nothing.
There are a ton of FGLI, etc kids. The downside is that the students are underprepared. My smart but not a superstar kid finds it super easy and is on the second trimester of 99% or something ridiculous in all courses (has accelerated the rigor when able but a lot of classes have been required).

Is your freshman at Dartmouth taking STEM courses? Which ones? I'm surprised academics are that easy now/

Yes, they're a STEM major.
I think a lot of people would be surprised how dumbed down the Ivies are in 2026 in order to accommodate a pretty large cohort of kids who went to suboptimal high schools.

I have a STEM student at an Ivy (not Cornell or Princeton), and I’d be unable to give you any worthwhile intel on different stem majors at their university much less have an educated option on a variety of stem majors at 7 other institutions.

This would be a far superior forum if everyone had the restraint to only post about things they could possibly know.

I’m not the PP you’re responding to. But isn’t it the whole point for everyone to share their own experience?