# What do you think is an elite school? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 12, 2019, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035 "2019-03-12T23:58:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/81 "2019-03-15T00:46:12Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Because I specifically asked for a knee jerk snap judgement on what pops up in your head when you think “elite school.” Did I think that some would want to show off their specific knowledge and give an analysis of what schools are really elite? Of course I did. It seems weird that you’d ask a man-in-the-street question in a place that you don’t really consider the street, and then pooh-pooh the responses for their lack of street cred. It’s also weird to ask a common-knowledge question, because everybody knows Harvard is the universal metonym for elite education if you’re American. With the question being obvious and answered, there’s nothing left to discuss except whether the reputation is deserved or not. ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/82 "2019-03-15T00:49:54Z")
> [@peccavi](#): > > Of the universities I pay attention to globally, McGill isn’t on my radar. I’d put University of Toronto and even UBC ahead of McGill. McGill is a politician factory and where the establishment sent the scions back when it mattered. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/83 "2019-03-15T00:58:46Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > It doesn’t have to be but it is. In terms of history, lore, social cachet, and just plain famousness, Harvard- Yale is a one-two punch that exists as a duo on its own. The people who run this country are known generally as a group for their associations with Harvard and Yale as the twin poles of the elite. It’s not Harvard-Yale-Princeton. It just isn’t. > [@TriPolar](#): > > I’d say that Princeton has it’s own reputation of elitism and scholarship just without the image of Yale and Harvard as producing national leaders, almost as if it cares more about education than that, maybe intellectual snobbiness of some kind. It’s just an image though, as it is for the other schools. I’ve met plenty of idiots from all the schools that have been mentioned. Go up to Cambridge any day of the week and you can’t swing a cat without hitting one. > [@Colibri](#): > > I agree. Harvard and Yale, in terms of social cachet, are well above Princeton. And while MIT gives you credentials in the scientific and tech world, it won’t give you the social standing of having gone to Harvard or Yale. I will bow to the consensus. I always lump the three together in my head as “the good Ivys”. I can see that Harvard and Yale have produced a lot more movers and shakers, but I think of Princeton as more academically accomplished–packed with nobel laureates and such. From an admissions standpoint, I consider it harder to get into Princeton than Harvard or Yale. They are less flexible about what they are looking for. > [@Loach](#): > > Because I specifically asked for a knee jerk snap judgement on what pops up in your head when you think “elite school.” Did I think that some would want to show off their specific knowledge and give an analysis of what schools are really elite? Of course I did. If people didn’t ignore the OP and fight against the question I would have to double check to see if I was on the right website. Well, again, it’s like you asked for an opinion, but didn’t want anyone who actually knew anything to actually answer. Going back to my analogy–just because no one would recognize a Maybach at Wal-Mart doesn’t mean it’s not a status symbol. And if you asked “What kind of car do you think of as a status symbol?”, would you really say people that said “Maybach” were just being difficult? > [@Omar\_Little](#): > > If you’re talking engineering, the only school that I would put anywhere near the proximity of MIT, is the School of Mines, in Golden CO. If you think Mines is as impressive as MIT, I don’t see how you can leave out Harvey Mudd and CalTech. Does aerospace engineering not count? Mines is a very good school, but it’s not more like MIT than those other two. > [@Loach](#): > > Yeah I’m going to say the academies are a completely different animal and hard to be even put into this conversation. They are elite in that you have to be appointed, enrollment is small, and competition is fierce. There are multiple degree programs and they are not military based. Of course they also received extensive military training. I think it’s less that the schools are elite and more than people that graduate from the academies are seen as deserving a lot of respect. It’s a weird, subtle difference. ---
**Author:** ![peccavi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peccavi/32/388_2.png) [@peccavi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peccavi)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/84 "2019-03-15T00:59:33Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > If you’re talking engineering, the only school that I would put anywhere near the proximity of MIT, is the School of Mines, in Golden CO. I take it you’ve never been to Purdue? Or Case Western? For that matter, the number one Civil Engineering program in the United States is Berkeley (overall Berkeley Engineering is ranked in the top 3 consistently) ---
**Author:** ![peccavi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peccavi/32/388_2.png) [@peccavi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peccavi)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/85 "2019-03-15T01:01:50Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > McGill is a politician factory and where the establishment sent the scions back when it mattered. Ah, that’s why it isn’t on my radar. It’s sort of the Harvard of Canada, then. (except Harvard also has an elite science program) ---
**Author:** ![peccavi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peccavi/32/388_2.png) [@peccavi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peccavi)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/86 "2019-03-15T01:04:49Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I always say that I went to the good school in Cambridge. I’ve tried “I went to a state school just north of Oakland”, but it’s too obscure as a reference. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/87 "2019-03-15T01:05:00Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > It seems weird that you’d ask a man-in-the-street question in a place that you don’t really consider the street, and then pooh-pooh the responses for their lack of street cred. > > It’s also weird to ask a common-knowledge question, because everybody knows Harvard is the universal metonym for elite education if you’re American. With the question being obvious and answered, there’s nothing left to discuss except whether the reputation is deserved or not. Well I’m not on the street I’m here. Regardless of your background you can have a knee-jerk reaction to something. There have been plenty of “what’s the first thing that comes to your mind” questions on this board. A knee jerk reaction or the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word elite does not require detailed analysis any more than if the question was “What’s the first thing you think of when you hear the word blue?” It’s not surprising at all that some want to expound on the subject but it’s not what was asked. In the thread that spawned this There was plenty of incredulity about the media dubbing the schools involved as a “elite.” As has been obvious by every reply except for yours the answer isn’t just Harvard. I guess a different way to ask the question would be “If there is a media story about ‘elite’ schools which ones would you expect the story to be about?” ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/88 "2019-03-15T01:16:25Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > McGill is a politician factory and where the establishment sent the scions back when it mattered. I have a couple of friends that went there and it’s the only Canadian school I’m familiar with so it’s elite to me. > [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > When I was in high school, we heard that our math teacher had gone to Yale, so someone asked him. He only said that he went to a “small liberal arts school in New Haven”. I had an officer tell people he went to a small school in upstate New York. He meant West Point of course. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/89 "2019-03-15T03:13:27Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I always say that I went to the good school in Cambridge. I’ve heard MIT referred to as a vocational school near Boston, both self-deprecating and sarcastically. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/90 "2019-03-15T03:20:04Z")
McGill thinks of itself as the “Harvard of the North”. Uh, no. They don’t even have a decent gym. There are many schools and public facilities in Montreal which easily surpass the quality of its facilities. It is an academically rigorous school with great political influence. But so is Toronto. I see little difference between these and Western, UBC or Queens. And many Canadian schools have some excellent programs — Waterloo engineering, York business… even some College programs are highly regarded. The Canadians I know who went to Harvard, Oxford or Yale don’t brag about it, exactly. But they seem to have an enormous supply of varsity sweatshirts which they wear frequently. They become very animated if someone else brings up the topic. I have no complaints and received some full scholarships and an excellent education. But I never even considered non-Canadian universities. My friends were exceedingly smart and mostly successful - no one thought about that back then. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/91 "2019-03-15T03:45:49Z")
Hogwarts. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/92 "2019-03-15T12:26:03Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > McGill thinks of itself as the “Harvard of the North”. Lawrence University in Appleton, WI has been called “the Harvard of the Midwest”. This prompted the production of a t-shirt bearing the statement "Harvard: the Lawrence of the East. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/93 "2019-03-15T13:43:26Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > Lawrence University in Appleton, WI has been called “the Harvard of the Midwest”. This prompted the production of a t-shirt bearing the statement "Harvard: the Lawrence of the East. My alma mater, which you’ve never heard of–tiny little Wabash College in Crawfordsville, IN–also occasionally calls itself “The Harvard of the Midwest.” It’s not. ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/94 "2019-03-15T14:55:19Z")
> [@Isamu](#): > > Hogwarts. They let just about anybody teach classes there ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/95 "2019-03-15T15:11:33Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > I guess a different way to ask the question would be “If there is a media story about ‘elite’ schools which ones would you expect the story to be about?” Let me turn that around. If there was a media story about Swarthmore, Middlebury, and Bowdoin and it called them “elite”, I can imagine that a lot of people would be surprised. They would say “I’ve never even heard of those schools”. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t elite. What else would they be? They are extremely exclusive and expensive and the student bodies are largely comprised of the children of the super-affluent, both foreign and domestic. Things don’t have to be famous with the masses to be elite. The most elite things often are not. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/96 "2019-03-15T16:42:31Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > They let just about anybody teach classes there For one year. ---
**Author:** ![dorvann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df705f/32.png) [@dorvann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorvann)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/97 "2019-03-15T17:02:34Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > They let just about anybody teach classes there It’s still more respectable than DeVry University. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/98 "2019-03-15T17:22:58Z")
> [@MandaJo](#): > > Let me turn that around. If there was a media story about Swarthmore, Middlebury, and Bowdoin and it called them “elite”, I can imagine that a lot of people would be surprised. They would say “I’ve never even heard of those schools”. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t elite. What else would they be? They are extremely exclusive and expensive and the student bodies are largely comprised of the children of the super-affluent, both foreign and domestic. > > Things don’t have to be famous with the masses to be elite. The most elite things often are not. I think that’s an interesting related sub-question: What schools do the elite attend that the general public isn’t necessarily aware of as being elite? ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/99 "2019-03-15T18:59:23Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > If you’re talking engineering, the only school that I would put anywhere near the proximity of MIT, is the School of Mines, in Golden CO. Are you a school of mines alumnus? Not that US News is unassailable in its rankings, but they have the School of Mines as the #58 engineering school. I work with two grads. One is quite good, the other is a good project manager but not much of an engineer. ---
**Author:** ![fjs1fs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/9e8a1a/32.png) [@fjs1fs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fjs1fs)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2019, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035/100 "2019-03-15T19:08:28Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > It’s a well-known shibboleth that Harvard graduates never say the word ”Harvard” in situations like this. Instead they work in phrases like “I went to school _in Boston_.” It’s been my experience that the shibboleth (a word I just had to google, not being a Harvard grad myself) seems to be the exact opposite, i.e., that most Harvard grads figure out a way to work the H-word in as early as they can in any discussion. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-an-elite-school/831035.md?page=6)