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Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

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Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#181

Post by MisterBastahrd »

coldtea wrote: post #169
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A more basic problem with "athletic scholarships" is that being an athlete has absolutely nothing to do with being an academic/scholar/student of something else. Welcome to 1910. > It might be a good way to bring some publicity to the school, and to make it have a strong team. But it has absolutely nothing to do with a school's intended purpose (except the "make money" purpose). It engages people who care about spo…

> Welcome to 1910. Is that an argument? The "newer is better" kind? Perhaps 1910 had that part figured out better than 2023. > Well, it turns out that universities are full of educated people and they've run the numbers. The numbers say that athletics are an attraction to universities for students and alumni alike. I never argued it doesn't make them money or that the bean counters there can't see that. Just that it'…

> Is that an argument? The "newer is better" kind? Perhaps 1910 had that part figured out better than 2023.

The NCAA has been around and has regulated athletic scholarships in its current form since 1910. They're the ones who stepped in and said that athletes needed to be students at the universities they represented. That's good for the universities AND good for the athletes.

> I never argued it doesn't make them money or that the bean counters there can't see that.

> Just that it's (or oughta be) unrelated with the goals of an academic institution, whether it's lucrative or not.

Then you don't have any more universities aside from a few flagships and deeply endowed private institutions, because they have fundamentally different objectives than they did at the beginning of last century.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#182

Post by tophi »

itsacomment wrote: post #154
tophi wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A university is not just a place to go to learn anymore. It’s a big club that happens to be a place where you study. You bond and make lifelong friends. Also a great place to find a partner for life. Athletic departments are vital to the university system in American schools and their local economies.

The US college sports system is mainly a feeding ground for professional sports teams, and none of that is necessary for either education or social destratification. It is only vital in the sense that people have vested interests in it, but it's not to the benefit of the students.

For many students, the sport team culture and the activities surrounding these events is a big draw and motivator to attend university.

Most college athletes will not play at the professional level. Their young adult connections and the values they develop as being part of a team to overcome great challenges in preparation and on game day are important to our society. The stress one feels for a final exam does not compare to the emotions one feels on a big game-day! Valuable mental models are developed from athletics. Lessons learned are applied to every industry. it’s important simulation.

To deduce it all to irrelevance is a mistake that many intelligent people with no team or sporting experience often make to no fault of their own.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#183

Post by whimsicalism »

camel_Snake wrote: post #111
ryukoposting wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one has always been truly baffling to me. By all means, make sure that need-based scholarships are plentiful, but isn't great academics the entire point of the Ivy league? I was never going to make it into an Ivy anyway, but I remember learning about that system as a middle-class high school kid and thinking "huh, sucks for me I guess." Too rich for need-based scholarships, too poor to pay full price.

> but isn't great academics the entire point of the Ivy league? No, that is just branding. If these institutions were truly based on merit the legacy system wouldn't exist.

Arguably. The legacy system exists to provide funding that can be directed to students of merit.

It is also unclear the extent to which legacy programs influence admissions. Legacy applicants have higher acceptance rates, but we would likely also expect this in a situation where there was no preference for legacy admission.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#184

Post by whimsicalism »

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #163
sandkoan wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm criticizing their decision to only offer need-based scholarships when they could just as well provide both—if they really cared about academic strength, then they could put their money where their mouth is, and provide meaningful merit-based scholarships. Princeton, for instance, is capable of letting in every student for free, and still not dipping into their endowment [0]. Why don't they do so? Because it w…

As usual, Malcolm Gladwell looks insightful but it’s all surface gloss. Do some basic reading about the structure of university endowments: it’s not one big pot of money, it’s thousands upon thousands of individual gifts that often have specific purposes (like: a particular professorial chair, or a particular library) that are limitations on use. I don’t even really understand the point about merit scholarships. Sure…

> the purpose of a merit scholarship is to help someone who can’t afford to go to a school but who is academically outstanding

No, that’s not the purpose of a merit scholarship. A merit scholarship is to encourage someone of merit to go to your school in particular by providing them money

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#185

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

whimsicalism wrote: post #184
NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As usual, Malcolm Gladwell looks insightful but it’s all surface gloss. Do some basic reading about the structure of university endowments: it’s not one big pot of money, it’s thousands upon thousands of individual gifts that often have specific purposes (like: a particular professorial chair, or a particular library) that are limitations on use. I don’t even really understand the point about merit scholarships. Sure…

> the purpose of a merit scholarship is to help someone who can’t afford to go to a school but who is academically outstanding No, that’s not the purpose of a merit scholarship. A merit scholarship is to encourage someone of merit to go to your school in particular by providing them money

That doesn't seem consistent with e.g. the National Merit Scholarship program, where the scholarship funding can be used towards an undergraduate course at any accredited school.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#186

Post by stale2002 »

nobodyandproud wrote: post #140
stale2002 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are missing the point. It is not a problem of an individual school refusing to give academic scholarships. Instead the problem is the schools all agreeing together to do this. By all means, let each university individually choose if they want to allow scholarships or not, with zero agreement between the schools.

Then why the long rambling on the moral outcome? It can be both true that the collusion is legally shaky—I’m not disputing that—and the author has an axe to grind. I believe the writer wants a particular outcome for reasons beyond just forbidding collusion. Finally it’s also true that the DoE’s national accreditation can forbid athletic scholarships. I personally believe it should, if we want higher education to be a…

> Then why the long rambling on the moral outcome?

Because monopolistic collision is bad, that's why.

Not just illegal. Also bad.

> if we want higher education to be about cultivating knowledge and intellect again.

If an individual college wants to get rid of all it's sports programs, or scholarships, or whatever, and decides to do that individually, then they should go ahead.

What they shouldn't do, though, is try and force all the other colleges to do the same thing, with monopolistic agreements.

To repeat, if a individual college wants to not have athletic scholarships, fine.

But no agreement that forces all the other colleges to do the same thing.

Let each college, individually decide how much they want to focus on this, instead of having monopolistic agreements.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#187

Post by nobodyandproud »

stale2002 wrote: post #186
nobodyandproud wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then why the long rambling on the moral outcome? It can be both true that the collusion is legally shaky—I’m not disputing that—and the author has an axe to grind. I believe the writer wants a particular outcome for reasons beyond just forbidding collusion. Finally it’s also true that the DoE’s national accreditation can forbid athletic scholarships. I personally believe it should, if we want higher education to be a…

> Then why the long rambling on the moral outcome? Because monopolistic collision is bad, that's why. Not just illegal. Also bad. > if we want higher education to be about cultivating knowledge and intellect again. If an individual college wants to get rid of all it's sports programs, or scholarships, or whatever, and decides to do that individually, then they should go ahead. What they shouldn't do, though, is try a…

> Then why the long rambling on the moral outcome?

The moral outcome the author is promoting isn't about anti-collusion, but diversity: "The need for diversity in education is as vital today as ever. But it’s not clear whether the Ivy Agreement’s ban on athletic scholarships actually promotes that end. One might even wonder whether, by not competing over sports stars, the schools are reducing the diversity of their student bodies."

Except, the author admits later that athletic programs simply promote more athletics and the claims of diversity through athletics is dubious.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#188

Post by whimsicalism »

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #185
whimsicalism wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the purpose of a merit scholarship is to help someone who can’t afford to go to a school but who is academically outstanding No, that’s not the purpose of a merit scholarship. A merit scholarship is to encourage someone of merit to go to your school in particular by providing them money

That doesn't seem consistent with e.g. the National Merit Scholarship program, where the scholarship funding can be used towards an undergraduate course at any accredited school.

Right, but I'm discussing the purpose of individual schools offering merit programs in the context of already meeting full need.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#189

Post by whimsicalism »

riku_iki wrote: post #172
NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose this is the “middle class” family taking home $600K per year and with a couple of million in a brokerage account. Yes, that family is probably not going to get much financial aid. I have no problem with that; speaking as someone who is in the broad vicinity of that category and will be paying for college in due course.

I entered numbers: two adults 150k income, 700k house with 300k mortgage left, 200k retirement, 50k investment. Tuition would be $38k.

I put those numbers into https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/net-price-calculat... and got ~$19k/yr estimate cost of Harvard.

That is competitive with many in-state tuitions.

Re: Ivy League Schools Sure Look Like a Cartel

#190

Post by musicale »

grogenaut wrote: post #107
musicale wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting that doubling tuition didn't actually put more money in Yale's pockets? Yale currently takes in some $475 million in tuition, room and board. In 1990 the number was $165M, equivalent to about $378M today.

How is $475 2x $378? At 14,567 students that's 32,607 each. Website says tuition is 59,950.

Good point - $32K per student is actually lower than it was in 1991, and that is likely due to including grad students, whose numbers have increased and whose tuition is often covered by assistantships.

Grad students are still paid poorly however, especially when one considers the amount of money the research they perform brings into the university.

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