I go to Cornell so I want to provide my perspective on this:

1. Do you think you’re going to learn calculus better than you would at flagship state U? - No. There might be a small difference but I would not claim to have received an education that is significantly better than any state university. I was able to take very specific grad-level classes and learn basically whatever niche subject I wanted to - which might be an issue at schools which do not have comparable funding. But overall, not significantly better than a state U.

2. Do you think you’re going to work with famous professor there? - In my experience every student who was competent and wanted to work on a research project was able to - even as soon as their second semester in freshman year (might not get the exact professor and project you want - but in my experience all professors have an incredible reputation and you will gain a lot out of whoever you get to work with)

3. They will hand off all your classes to adjuncts and grad students. - In all my classes, grad students have been responsible for grading assignments and exams, but never for teaching - only the professors teach.

4. Don’t waste your money on a fancy brand - I didn't. Coming from a low-income household, Cornell covered all my expenses and I have not paid a single cent my entire 4 years (and no loans). It is significantly more likely for an Ivy League university to provide full financial aid as they have the endowment to do so.

Additionally, the biggest advantages for me with regards to the brand name were: 1. Recruiting - recruiters from FAANG and other top companies come to you - pretty much everyone I know was going into FAANG or a top fintech company their sophomore or junior year internship. 2. Networking - Since there are so many alumni already at top firms, it is significantly easier to get referrals.

We’re talking about Ivy League schools here, not Cornell.

Cornell is ivy league.

I mean sure, technically, yeah.

Yeah, it's funny, that Cornell while being Ivy League does not get any of the blame. I guess it is because they are doing something right.

Is this not a deeply cynical reason to go to an Ivy league school? Recruiters target those schools so you get a job that will allow you to make more money, and simply because you get access to better connected people (again to make more money)? It's not about the quality of education at all, then.

It's literally the main reason to go. It's most explicit in the MBA schools, where the admissions office of various schools would tell me "we're great if you're going for this area, or live in this area, otherwise we recommend another school". The MBA teaching is almost the same everywhere, what you learn - but the whole value is who you meet.

Nearly every school will give you a quality education, but elite schools will allow you to put that education to better use. There's nothing cynical about thinking of your education as an investment you'd want to optimize, indeed many people suffer for years because they spent way more on an education than they actually valued it.

I would not say it's not about the quality of education at all - it's not hugely better than state universities but definitely not worse. I firmly believe I could not have received a better education anywhere else (except maybe even better institutions like MIT or Stanford).

As an individual, my decision then is: do I want to choose a place that sets me up for a high paying job and with connections I can rely on for life, and does not take my money for it, while also not having any downsides (that I can see) compared to a state university? Choosing a school for these reasons seems like the most rational choice anyone could make in that scenario.

Please correct me if I am misunderstanding your argument.

I think at an individual level it is logical to make the choice to go to an ivy if you have the chance.

But ivy league schools don't present themselves as just a networking opportunity. They present themselves as a way to get a much higher quality education than other universities (and this is why you should hire their alumni).

It would be more honest to present themselves as a marginally better education experience, and also a place where powerful people send their children, thus allowing better networking.

As a society, it doesn't make sense to put that much weight behind the ivy stamp on your resume, if the education is the same as a flagship state school.

I agree completely; the fact that so much weight is put behind the school reputation is a symptom of a deep societal issue.

> It's not about the quality of education at all, then.

As the saying goes, "It ain't the grades you make, but the hands you shake."

> Coming from a low-income household, Cornell covered all my expenses and I have not paid a single cent my entire 4 years (and no loans).

For students in your situation, it makes sense to go to a private college with lots of financial aid, since there's basically no downside. For middle class students, it makes much less sense since they and their families have to take on huge loans. Even for wealthy students, it's not as clear a case as for low-income students. You have to be very wealthy for your family to be able to easily afford $320k per kid.

This is an absolutely valid point.

Surrounding yourself with the smartest people possible, during the most formative years of your life, is always a good idea. Get into the best school you can

Are they the smartest people possible? Recent court cases have exposed that “smartest possible” is not what Ivies are selecting for.

I’ve yet to be surrounded by better people in any environment than when I was at MIT (not an Ivy, but is what people often mean colloquially).

When did you go there?

look, I'm a public school guy through and through, but to say people who go to Harvard don't get any benefit from going there is pretty silly.

The results of people going to Ivies is significantly better. You make better contacts and you have access to better resources.

This would be better described as Ivy+ which is the usual Ivies and colleges that are considered at that tier such as Stanford.

Putting it another way, if you are going to college and you had an Ivy+ college as an option, why would you not choose that?

>The results of people going to Ivies is significantly better.

The studies I’ve seen contradict this. Students who are accepted to elite colleges but instead go to “lesser” schools do just as well as their Ivy counterparts. The exception is extremely poor students who do better by going to elite schools; researchers speculate that is due to networking effects. But that effect doesn’t generalize well like your comment implies.

Note: I can't find the article on this, so no data unfortunately.

The reason for this (at least from what I've heard) is that when you've got the credentials to get into an Ivy, the limiting factor for your success is "being able to complete your degree."

If you choose an "easier" school, your odds of completing a degree go up by a lot. You also stand a chance of being one of the best students there, further bolstering your transcript and opportunities for doing research while at the university.

There's quite a number of variables that go into college selection, and just because you qualify for a bunch doesn't mean that the "most elite" would be the best. Sometimes it is better to be the big fish in the small pond; other times you're better off being smaller in a bigger pond.

Part of the problem is trying to work all this out at an age where you're not even allowed to vote, let alone buy a beer or a gun.

One of the surest things to aim for, in my opinion, is minimizing external debt carried afterwards, which for low income but high achieving students, may mean aiming at the very top, where full scholarships are available.

The argument that I’ve heard is that we confuse causality. I.e., elite schools select for successful people, not that they add anything to make people successful.

> Why would you go to an Ivy?

It’s not got much to do with the quality of teaching as you point out; it’s largely for signalling purposes.

Apparently there are now would-be students getting into Ivy League colleges with no intention of ever matriculating and paying the vast fees. They simply attach their offer as proof of their intellectual potential/elite group membership to their CV and get a job where they’ll learn far more than they would in four years at an old academic institution (and get paid to do it!).

If you ever wanted proof that the certification is worth more than the experience itself, that must be it.

Wow, the snake eating its own tail!

Good thing Harvard has a $50bn endowment to carry them into the future. /s

This is very divorced from reality. Past a certain point your classes and professors don't matter much.

You go there to be surrounded by smarter people, with better connections, better extracurricular programs, and the name brand recognition to get a headstart on adult life.

It’s true. There are brainless hiring managers who will greenlight anyone with a fancy school on their resume just like there are consumers who will fork over a month’s salary for a handbag with right logo. If you want to work for people like that, by all means, knock yourself out jumping through Ivy school hoops.

If you care about results, focus on results and the rest will follow.

I mean, the Ivies have a pretty darn good track record of 'results' too.

Where do you think are places with better 'results'?

Not trolling here, I am genuinely curious as to your metric and the places/things that fit it.

Kids that just graduated don't have any results to look at, besides the schooling they've managed to complete. With no other knowledge, if you had to choose between a kid with a stanford degree and a kid with a south harmon institute of technology degree, which would you imagine is more capable?

I am probably quite wrong on this, but I have always believed that the people smart enough to get into MIT, Harvard, Yale, etc. were probably smart enough that they didn't even truly need to go there. It's more for connections and a formality than for pure educational attainment.

For example, Bill Gates left Harvard after two years. He did quite fine without graduating by most metrics. I imagine he would have been quite successful, perhaps in a different way, had he not attended at all.

They may not have needed to go, but they almost certainly received advantages for having gone.

Even Billy G would have had two years of knowledge of people whom he could tap - and if you go back and research early Microsoft, I bet you'd see evidence of that.

Billy G had mommy :) Look her up on wikipedia.

Harvard works more for people like steve ballmer than it does for bill gates.

financial aid

Youve completely missed the point of ivies. It's not to get a better education. Its not to do research or have better professors. The point of ivies is to be around the other students who got in. The alumni network at these institutions is unbelievably valuable, and theyre full of rich legacies who can boost the careers of the whole network.

It’s not to get a better education. It’s not to do better research. Yes, you are proving my point.

There's a massive advantage for likely-to-succeed students to be embedded in an environment where they will primarily interact with other likely-to-succeed students. Somewhat perversely, it doesn't really matter WHY they're likely to succeed, which creates the situation that rich parents buying their kid's spot actually creates a net benefit to the students who got in on merit.

THAT's why you go to an Ivy. It's where the successful go.

> THAT's why you go to an Ivy. It's where the successful go.

I'd rephrase that as 'going to an Ivy (or equal non Ivy notable school like Stanford) - gives you - all things equal - a better chance of success' (by various points made by others who have replied to the parent comment).

Now what's interesting is the parent comment 'why would anyone ... a joke' clearly shows that they don't understand at all the value or branding. As if it's some type of mass delusion of stupid people.

The value of branding. An interesting concept. What value does branding provide? Does it make you smarter? More competent? Or does it just convince people to give you more money for no reason?

Interesting that you place such a high value on branding compared to actually being able to do your job.

You seem to be now arguing that prestigious universities provide a WORSE education than lower-tier institution. That's very different from what you said in your original comment, which is that they're no better. The latter is probably true, or at the very least not dramatically better. They certainly don't offer a worse education, though.

So the additional competency from direct instruction is negligible. That doesn't mean that the value of attending a top-tier university is negligible, because the direct instructional education is only a small part of what someone gains access to at a university.

There's the social network aspect: There is a lot of value in having personal connections with other successful people. People need business partners, investors, advisors, etc. in order to be successful, and top tier universities intermingle you with others who are likely to be helpful in those regards. At top tier universities, the majority of people you interact with will either talented, wealthy, or both. At a lower tier university, the pool is far more diluted, reducing the utility of your social network in pursuing success.

There's the branding advantage: if you're choosing between two people, and one has someone you trust vouching for them that they're competent, and the other doesn't, you're going to go with the first person every single time. A top-tier university is basically that third party, vouching for its graduates: they're more likely to be successful, and people want to surround themselves with successful people.

And then there's the educational advantage: If you're surrounded by other smart, motivated people, you're going to gain real educational advantages by cooperating with them. You learn from each other, bounce ideas off each other, etc. If you're by far the smartest person in the room, you don't get nearly the same added value out of your education. At a top-tier university, you're going to be surrounded by substantially more high-quality students than at a lower-tier school.

And yeah, convincing people to give you money is BY DEFINITION valuable. As measured by the value of the money they're giving you.

This is essentially the premise of good k-12 public schools. The good schools are the schools with the good students. In some states, the worst schools are the most funded, and they continue to be the worst schools.

You don't go to an Ivy League to learn calculus. You go to an Ivy League for the prestige and to build a network of connections with people who are likely to be successful.

And would you say it’s a good thing that this is the reason as compared to actually learning calculus?

Ultimately, you’re going to have to drive across a bridge someday designed by John or Jane Q. Ivyleageue. Would you prefer they got the bridge designing contract because they were good at calculus or because their college roommate’s uncle was in charge of awarding the contract?

The people at Ivy Leagues still do learn calculus. You're not sacrificing anything academically to go to a better school, the perks are on top of a first rate education.

Sure,ok. Look at the state of things run by Ivy League graduates in the US and carefully reconsider that. The financial system. The cost disease in infrastructure projects. Government. Healthcare. Are you sure about that?

Show me a country where institutions are run by people who went to mediocre institutions that is dramatically outperforming the US. Indeed show me any evidence of elite education attainers underperforming.

I can see the argument that the perks of elite education do not justify the increased cost, but I've never seen anyone argue that elite education is actually of substantially lower quality.

Believe it or not a larger percentage of students at an IVY (or otherwise notable university say Stanford) have busted their ass to get into that school and not coasted 'oh I don't want to work that hard'. Absolutely there are people who have been admitted that have not (family, money, legacy whatever). Just the same there are the same type of students who have gone to a non notable school that may have been Ivy material and not gotten admitted for various reasons (didn't care, couldn't afford, family, whatever).

The thing is about the student body at a top school (IVY or notable again) is the percentage and general feel of the student body that fits the 'busted their ass to get to that school' instead of not caring that much. And really living working and dreaming about going to the top school including but not limited to sacrifices that they might have made.

> Do you think you’re going to learn calculus better than you would at flagship state U?

Yes. Compare this Harvard Calc I final [0] to that of UNC Charlotte [1]. The test format of the Harvard exam works in the student's favor, but the questions are more difficult, more conceptual, and encompass optional topics that are not in a typical Calc I course (PDFs, Midi function). The Harvard class also requires students to demonstrate competency in various proofs that would not be required in a purely computational Calc I class.

[0] https://people.math.harvard.edu/~knill/teaching/math1a2020/f...

[1] https://math.charlotte.edu/sites/math.charlotte.edu/files/me...

Don't think "Midi function" is an actual thing. It looks like $f(x) = 440e^{(x-69)/12}$ literally maps the number of a note in the MIDI standard to the actual frequency. I guess this question is a bonus to people who paid attention in a particular lecture in class (or who know music and can recognize the significance of 440 and of 12 in the exponent).