actually with professional qualifications like accounting, programming, finance and even music grades,, because there is a centralized qualifications board stud

actually with professional qualifications like accounting, programming, finance and even music grades,, because there is a centralized qualifications board students choose where they get their education (kaplan, etc. ) based on teaching quality/price etc and they have much more consumer power... i think the solution with elite universities is to have standardised university level exams, especially in maths and science where there is a high degree of similarity in the material at undergraduate level across different universities.. how elite unis differentiate themselves from non-elite is in annual research projects where better resources/professors as well as additional 'value-add lectures' where professors - rather than talking about basic maths and science concepts, instead take advantage of their 'superior research' and have them give regular lectures on what they are researching, so students at elite schools get exposure to high level research...