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It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

chronicle.com

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Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#31

Post by thrower123 »

mlac wrote: post #21

“In 1940, the acceptance rate at Harvard was 85 percent.” I didn’t realize that was the acceptance rate, but JFK’s application to Harvard is interesting and that acceptance rate adds context: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/11/jfks-v... And maybe it’s not people pulling the ladder up behind them - it’s that the ladder has become more visible and desirable without expanding or changing. I do have so…

There's only four times as many people in the USA now as there were in the early 20th century, and still only about a thousand slots for Harvard freshmen.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#32

Post by sokoloff »

ttul wrote: post #17
sokoloff wrote: post #11

> Faculty members at prestigious universities are 50 times more likely than the average person to have a parent with a Ph.D. American meritocracy has become a complex, inefficient, and rigged system conferring its graces on ambitious children of highly educated and prosperous families. What’s the ratio in other fields of top achievement for kids to follow in their parents’ footsteps? It’s entirely unsurprising that a…

You likely don’t realize that your kids will also have an easier chance at succeeding because of other privileges they enjoy, aside from the merits of having intelligent and educated parents. Take a similarly educated family who happen to live in Gaza, for instance, and it’s obvious that the children will have a different set of opportunities available to them.

Is there any basis for your assumption that I don’t realize that?

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#33

Post by MattGaiser »

sokoloff wrote: post #11

> Faculty members at prestigious universities are 50 times more likely than the average person to have a parent with a Ph.D. American meritocracy has become a complex, inefficient, and rigged system conferring its graces on ambitious children of highly educated and prosperous families. What’s the ratio in other fields of top achievement for kids to follow in their parents’ footsteps? It’s entirely unsurprising that a…

Yeah, so many of these arguments about who comes from what category seem to assume that talent and inclination is randomly distributed among 18 year olds and that university where you find yourself.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#34

Post by eternalban »

> One of the great puzzles of American society is the position of the Ivy League. It is a bastion of privilege and power, and yet full of left-leaning professors who one might imagine would favor the redistribution of wealth.

Re-imagining social norms -- not a conservative predisposition -- has nothing to do with redistributing wealth. It is precisely the requirement for a shared mindset, or a demonstration of willingness to adhere to ideological dogma, that requires generational and selective admission. As the re-imaginings take to greater heights of fancy, the distance from the non-indoctrinated society at large (which generally feels and thinks via principles and not ideology) increases and this requires and motivates a greater degree of insularity by an establishment.

It is certainly true that some children of the ideologically and/or culturally "unwashed" masses will arrive at the 'acceptable' socio-economic conclusion (due to their superior intellect) -- whether they acknowledge this consciously is not germinal -- but the risk to an establishment (regardless of their leaning on the fabled 1 dimensional L/R spectrum) to an 'open admissions and integration' policy are simply too great.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#35

Post by jvanderbot »

sokoloff wrote: post #11

> Faculty members at prestigious universities are 50 times more likely than the average person to have a parent with a Ph.D. American meritocracy has become a complex, inefficient, and rigged system conferring its graces on ambitious children of highly educated and prosperous families. What’s the ratio in other fields of top achievement for kids to follow in their parents’ footsteps? It’s entirely unsurprising that a…

This seems obvious and unharmful.

Its funny, my co worker insisted that his children shall go to MIT so they can have all the opportunities he did. He didn't see any irony is saying this to me, his peer, a first gen engineer from University of Midwest Farm Community.

And I agree, its not surprising kids learn by example and inherit so much from their parents.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#36

Post by q-big »

thrower123 wrote: post #31
mlac wrote: post #21

“In 1940, the acceptance rate at Harvard was 85 percent.” I didn’t realize that was the acceptance rate, but JFK’s application to Harvard is interesting and that acceptance rate adds context: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/11/jfks-v... And maybe it’s not people pulling the ladder up behind them - it’s that the ladder has become more visible and desirable without expanding or changing. I do have so…

There's only four times as many people in the USA now as there were in the early 20th century, and still only about a thousand slots for Harvard freshmen.

But I bet the number of universities has increased by a lot.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#37

Post by torstenvl »

I strongly disagree. Having elite schools is far far better for upward mobility.

Being a poor kid and going to Harvard is a far more effective ticket to the upper middle class than any alternative the author proposes.

Sure, you could theoretically dilute academic signaling strength, by force, to the point of homeopathic levels - but who does that help? Whose life completely changes for the better by attending such an institution?

EDIT: If you disagree, please feel free to express why. Not complaining about the downvotes, but dialog would be preferred over drive-bys.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#38

Post by grecy »

paulpauper wrote: post #23

>The economist Raj Chetty has found that nearly 40 of the country’s elite colleges and universities, including five in the Ivy League, accept more students from families in the top 1 percent of income earners than from the bottom 60 percent. The computer scientist Allison Morgan recently released a study examining 7,218 professors in Ph.D.-granting departments in the United States across the arts and sciences. She fo…

> ... more students from families in the top 1 percent of income earners than from the bottom 60 percent

These institutions exist for the purpose of making money. Why would anyone be surprised they have rich customers to extract money from?

I'm sure if you look at the top hospitals in the USA the vast majority of their customers are insanely rich.

That's not a coincidence, it's by design. These things exist to make as much money as possible.

Ivy League Cartels are not the problem. For profit institutions that should not be are the problem.

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#39

Post by zamfi »

sokoloff wrote: post #11

> Faculty members at prestigious universities are 50 times more likely than the average person to have a parent with a Ph.D. American meritocracy has become a complex, inefficient, and rigged system conferring its graces on ambitious children of highly educated and prosperous families. What’s the ratio in other fields of top achievement for kids to follow in their parents’ footsteps? It’s entirely unsurprising that a…

Also, what is this “has become” language for? It implies that the this elite group is more self-reinforcing than it used to be, but there’s no evidence for that. Harvard’s 1940s admission rate of 85% was certainly not a more meritocratic time.

The ratio you ask for is almost certainly decreasing over time, not increasing, right?

Re: It’s time to break up the Ivy League cartel

#40

Post by AnimalMuppet »

q-big wrote: post #36
thrower123 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's only four times as many people in the USA now as there were in the early 20th century, and still only about a thousand slots for Harvard freshmen.

But I bet the number of universities has increased by a lot.

Why do you think that's relevant? The post you replied to was talking about Harvard, and the article was talking about the Ivy League. Has the number of Harvards increased? Has the Ivy League expanded very much?
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