Will the Yale and Harvard Streak End?
In 2016 the American voters had to decide whether to continue the Harvard-Yale presidential monopoly, or just continue the Ivy League monopoly of the presidency. After 28 straight years of Yale and Harvard controlling the most powerful position in world politics, another Ivy League school broke the streak.
When Trump won, his Ivy League School, Penn University Wharton School of Business, snatched the crown jewel, the US presidency, from their fellow Ivy League universities. Now we face 32 straight years of elitist, Ivy League rule with a chance, if he gets reelected, of 36 straight years by graduates of just three schools.
Now average Americans are going to have a hard time accepting this because average Americans consider the Ivy League to be something found on Wall Street, Madison Avenue, in the history books, movies, or maybe in prose or fiction books. The Great Gatsby comes to mind.
When it comes to power, the Ivy League is IT but normally in terms of the dominant Ivy influence over Wall Street, the international banking community, the State Department, and various other engines of commerce.
Of course, the Ivy League is firmly placed in the middle of many great conspiracy theories involving the mysterious Illuminati, the Council on Foreign Relations, Freemasons, the Bilderberg Group, the Bohemia Club, the Skull and Bones Society and the Trilateral Commission.
Where did the following Latin phrases come from?
In Deo Speramus - (In God We Hope)
In lumine Tuo videbimus lumen - (In Thy light shall we see the light)
Quisquam qui ars - (Any person -Any study)
Vox clamantis in deserto - (The voice of one crying in the wilderness)
Veritas -(Truth)
Dei sub numine viget - (Under God's power she flourishes)
Leges sine moribus vanae - (Laws without morals are useless)
Lux et veritas - (Light and truth)
Those are the mottos of the eight venerated Ivy League schools.
Brown
Columbia
Cornell
Dartmouth
Harvard
Princeton
Pennsylvania
Yale
It seems we understand the power and influence of the Ivy League in terms of commerce but we really do not when it comes to national politics. In fact, the attitude of the general public, in terms of the Ivy League in politics, is rather bleak.
According to recent Rasmussen polls, only five percent (5%) of American Adults think it is better for America to have presidents only from Ivy League schools. A recent Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 85% believe it is better for the country to have presidents who come from a variety of schools.
Try this!
There have been 44 men who served as US President including President Obama and Trump. It is often said that President Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States of America. However, President Obama is only the 43rd different person to serve as President of the United States. This is due to the fact, that President Grover Cleveland served non-consecutive terms and so is often counted as both the 22nd and the 24th President.
- Sixteen out of forty-four presidents have attended one or more Ivy League schools.
- Twenty-five out of one hundred U.S. Senators have attended one or more Ivy League schools.
- Fifty-seven out of one hundred and nine Supreme Court justices have attended one or more Ivy League schools.
All considered, more than a third of all U.S. presidents, Supreme Court justices, and currently serving U.S. senators have attended an Ivy League school for undergraduate or graduate study.
When Obama completed his 2nd term we had 28 straight years of presidents from Yale and Harvard alone, consisting of Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2 and Obama. In fact, in the 227 years we have elected presidents, remember George Washington first took office in 1789, the Ivy League has held the presidency 85 of those years, or 37% of our history.
No matter who won in 2016, Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, it was assured the 15th president from the Ivy League would serve and that may be a bit much for a nation in which the Ivy League represents just 8 out of 4,140 institutions of higher education.
For those of you into decimals the Ivy League makes up under two tenths of one percent (.001932) of our institutions yet controlled the presidency 37% of the time.
Public 4-year institutions 629
Private 4-year institutions 1,845
Total 4 year 2,474
Public 2-year institutions 1,070
Private 2-year institutions 596
Total 2 year 1,666
Total 4 and 2 year 4,140
Money talks and legacy institutions prosper but you may be surprised when it comes to the costliest universities in America, long thought to be dominated by the Ivy League.
A recently compiled list of the 20 Most Expensive Colleges in the country shows prices, which include Tuition, Fees, Room and Board, range from $63,750 to just under $67,225 per year.
#1 Harvey Mudd College $67,255
#2 Columbia University $66,383
#3 New York University $65,860
#4 Sarah Lawrence College $65,630
#5 University of Chicago $64,965
#6 Bard College at Simon's Rock $64,519
#7 University of Southern California $64,482
#8 Claremont McKenna College $64,325
#9 Oberlin College $64,266
#10 Scripps College $64,260
#11 Bard College $64,254
#12 Haverford College $64,216
#13 Duke University $64,188
#15 Northwestern University $63,983
#16 Trinity College $63,970
#17 Pitzer College $63,880
#18 Southern Methodist University $63,840
#19 Amherst College $63,772
#20 John Hopkins University $63,750
Source: Business Insider and U.S. Department of Education
To my amazement only two Ivy League schools, Columbia and Dartmouth, made the list.
Compare that to a list of the best colleges and universities in the world for 2020.
The Times
Higher Education World University Ranking 2020
1. University
of Oxford
United Kingdom
2. Cambridge
University
United Kingdom
3. Stanford
University
United
States
4. Massachusetts
Institute of Technology
United
States
5. California
Institute of Technology
United
States
6. Harvard University
United
States
7. Princeton University
United
States
8. Yale University
United States
9. Imperial
College London
United
Kingdom
10. University of Chicago
United
States
11. ETH Zurich
Switzerland
12. John Hopkins University
United States
12. University of
Pennsylvania
United States
14. UCL
United Kingdom
15. University of California Berkeley
United states
16. Columbia University
United States
17. University of California Los Angeles
United States
18. Duke University
United States
19. Cornell University
United States
20. University of Michigan Ann Arbor
United States
21. University of Toronto
Canada
22. Tsinghua University
China
23. National University of Singapore
Singapore
24. Carnegie Mellon University
United
States
25. Northwestern University
United States
(Ivy League Schools in Green)
Source: The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2020
Sorry rest of the world, but seventeen of the top twenty-five are from the United States, including seven of the top ten. Harvard is the top ranked Ivy League school but six of the eight Ivy League schools are in the top twenty in the world.
What does this all mean? Here in the colonies it seems the more other schools catch up with the Ivy League in terms of the number of schools and the cost of education, the stronger those dastardly Ivy League schools get control of our presidency and political processes.
Harvard was the first university in America founded in 1636. By 1800, six of the first 16 universities in America were Ivy League, 37%. Now the Ivy League represents less than one percent of institutions of higher education. In spite of that we are completing 32 straight years of presidents from just three Ivy League schools, Harvard, Yale and Penn, and now Donald Trump assures an extension of that Ivy stranglehold on the presidency up to 36 straight years.
Isn't it about time we give someone else a chance like The California Institute of Technology, Stanford, MIT, Slippery Rock, or even The Pennsylvania State University New Kensington Campus of the Commonwealth College, (the longest college name in the USA)?
My goal was to attend Yale for undergraduate and Harvard Law for graduate school and I went through the multi-year application process, but fate had other plans for me and I wound up at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Though I retain my Ivy League loyalty, even I think enough is enough, give someone else a chance. What do you think?
