What If You Were a High School Senior?

[ScylaX]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

I want to know what's the inner differences between getting the sufficient knowledge to get a Doctorate Degree from an average school and an Ivy league school.
A doctorate's the same everywhere in the country, the standards are all the same (expected maybe, the greater is the school, the harsher it'll be, but ultimately, that's just a mean from getting knowledge that doesn't have much differences concerning the ends), so...
For somebody that's strictly interested by the knowledge what's the point (strictly concerning the knowledge and the way you get it) in getting in an elite university ? What's the advantage he'll get ? Isn't aiming for excellence just getting a bit... farther from the true aim of studying ?)

tl;dr what's the true foundation of this elitism except strict rules and social elitism ?
I want to know how that country works.
I find it utterly sad that people (have to) learn/study their things considering two factors : The money it'll take from you and the social recognition it'll grant you. All is ultimately decided upon economical reasons that doesn't have anything to do with studying and knowledge. Why ? (= not a rhetorical question)

[Cavernio]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

You don't HAVE to study and consider either social recognition or money.
The true foundation for the motivators of social status is that we're social beings. We're designed to care about what other people of us, it's born into us.

[ScylaX]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

Yup, and I think wether it's determined by the school you're in or not is entirely obedient to the subjectivity of individuals.
You don't have to care about the professionnal PrEsTiGE the university you studied in gave you, it's a matter of view. You can care more about the knowledge and qualities you had by studying, getting a good doctorate with good grades for instance, coming from an average school. We're social beings yes, not "socially solely determined by the hierarchy of the places we belonged to" ----> No essentialism on that determining part.
Getting a doctorate in mathematics, no matter where it comes from, is still a great achievement. Moreover, I think there's mostly rich and top-of-the-hierarchy/elite families that can care about being in a great university for some inner reasons linked to social recognition (familiy name/tradition and all : "we're the elite so we have to be in top classes compared to the average people"). (You can recognize the people belonging to this social class by the place their degree(s) come from, it'll be prestigious schools/universities 95% of the time)

So, no reason why an Ivy league school is better than an average school other than what have been said ? No hypocrisy there, I really want to know. I know you don't HAVE to care, but what would make it better anyway ? What would make anybody desire getting in a top-class school excepting the reasons I've took into consideration ?

[iironiic]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

A lot of my math professors here in college and a lot of websites that I came across one day advised me to look into the faculty's research interests rather than prestige when applying for graduate schools in mathematics (I need to start doing that this summer... blechh). A doctorate degree in mathematics is a big accomplishment in itself, so the name of the university doesn't matter much. I think attending more "prestigious" schools give you the opportunity to have closer interactions with the top mathematicians in the country or possibly the world, so it's essentially a "bonus" to the package.

All in all, there's no reason to say that Ivy schools are better than other schools. It's just that added "bonus" that makes it seem that way. Every school has a great way to educate others, but not many schools have the funding to provide these opportunities for everyone that attends the college.

[Reincarnate]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

For somebody that's strictly interested by the knowledge what's the point (strictly concerning the knowledge and the way you get it) in getting in an elite university ? What's the advantage he'll get ? Isn't aiming for excellence just getting a bit... farther from the true aim of studying ?)

If all you're after is knowledge, any good PhD program will do. At the Ivy level, the advantages tend to come in the form of access to resources/financing and the ability to work with ass-blindingly brilliant people. What matters is your dissertation advisor and the committee -- and the school you choose should be based on the prospects of researching something you plan to leverage. Like iironiic said, it's about faculty research interests. You'll find a lot of awesome opportunities at non-Ivies, but that being said, you're still going to see a big cluster of top talent at top-name schools, and sometimes strong knowledge is easier to come by that way.

tl;dr what's the true foundation of this elitism except strict rules and social elitism ?
I want to know how that country works.
I find it utterly sad that people (have to) learn/study their things considering two factors : The money it'll take from you and the social recognition it'll grant you. All is ultimately decided upon economical reasons that doesn't have anything to do with studying and knowledge. Why ? (= not a rhetorical question)

Because shit is competitive and expensive as hell, and can really set the track for, well, the rest of your life in terms of being on the "good" side of the earnings gap. This is especially true in hard times.

[ScylaX]

Re: What If You Were a High School Senior?

That was the answer I waited for. Thanks.