>> US population increasing and the number of kids attenting college increasing even more the top schools have generally not increased enrollment sizes much at

>> US population increasing and the number of kids attenting college increasing even more the top schools have generally not increased enrollment sizes much at all. Also, while they used to serve almost exclusively US students they now accept students from all over the world, making the chances of an average child getting in more remote. My father got into Stanford a long time ago when you could be a local kid at public schools with nothing distinguishing you but good grades and test scores. Now to replicate that feat you need an athletic scholarship, or an amazing personal story, a legacy, or a huge donation. I believe this will begin to erode the concept of elite schools truly representing the most capable. In a previous job we sometimes found that kids who were coming from a good public engineering program were often more skilled at actually writing code than people from some fancy ivy league schools. The fancy schools turned out graduates who were usually smart and very polished. But they didn't necessarily have more of the skills we were looking for. The life experience of DE Shaw himself makes you wonder why he why he values an Ivy League school so much. His biography demonstrates it is not the skills. It is the access and the pedigree.