OneKeg;842468835 said:

---

Just to be clear (which you may have already gotten), in no way was I calling Duke a bad school in my post. In fact, I was calling Duke a good school. I just don't think it's *that* much better a school than Virginia as the huge disparity in acceptance rates might indicate (10% vs. 30%). Obviously, I could be wrong.

I will say that if Duke's acceptance rate is less than 10% and truly 25% of those your friend interviews go to Duke, then perhaps he's not seeing the larger pool of unqualified applicants because they have already been auto-screened out by the time it gets to him?

---

Read your post as you intended. Know lots of Duke and UVa grads and the students are pretty similar. Don't pay much attention to those who think publics or privates are the only way to go. Cal grads have much more in common with LSJU and Duke grads than they do with ASU or Kansas State grads.

TheSouseFamily;842468911 said:

---

I always find the "Duke arrogance" narrative to be amusing and a bit intellectually lazy, usually espoused by people who have never met anyone from the school, been to Durham or know anything about Duke outside of a sports context. Having degrees from both Cal and Duke, I think there's far more in common among the students of both schools than there are differences and smart people anywhere are always perceived to be arrogant. However, if I had to rate both schools on a "My worldview is superior to your worldview" scale, Cal students win that going away.

---

I think you're probably right in that Duke, along the same lines as, say, Notre Dame, has become "cool" to dislike. In my context, the Duke arrogance narrative doesn't go far enough to describe the manipulative behavior of a C-level executive at a major tech company who covered his @ss when he messed up the strategic alliance he was working on, and then had his right hand Operations VP, another Dookie, pointed the finger at the sales organization. I also dealt with a Dookie in Finance who truly did not know his debits from his credits (Duke undergrad & Fuqua MBA -- not kidding), which should be table stakes for a Finance guy. And the last of the 4 Dookies I knew was just plain lazy -- did not want to roll up his sleeves and do the work necessary to actually, you know, help our firm grow. So, again, I am biased by my small sample size of 4 -- but all 4 really reflected poorly on their school.

I did have the opportunity to visit the Duke campus back in 2007, and was amazed at how gorgeous it is. Duke Chapel, the inter-connected gothic building and all the arches, the lawns and courtyards -- all very picturesque. I also thought that Wallace Wade Stadium was beautiful, although the track around the field is a detraction. I was surprised by how small Cameron Indoor Stadium is, but credit to Duke for allowing a couple of summer tourists into the place.

I guess the exception you take to the "Duke arrogance" narrative is very similar to the exception I take to people who ascribe to the "Arkansas inbreds" narrative. You know, folks who are so witty and urbane that they say stuff like, "If you have a child that doesn't get into Arkansas, it's probably best for everyone involved to just put him or her down." Lots of those folks are sanctimonious jerks who have never set foot in places like Arkansas.

68great;842468488 said:

---

No it is not wealth envy (assuming you comment is not facetious) since I make a very good income as a lawyer.

What I hate is the fact that wealthy people are given a lot of credit (and I do not mean financial credit) that they do not deserve simply because they are wealthy. They take advantage of the various "private" perks as if it were there due and just recognition of their "specialness" and the "specialness" of their children when compared to the common man or woman. Therefore their kids cannot go to a "public" institution. Therefore the criteria for reports such as USN&WR are skewed to favor the private institutions.

---

From Fiddler on the Roof, "If I Were A Rich Man." At apt lyric.

The most important men in town would come to fawn on me!
They would ask me to advise them,
Like a Solomon the Wise.
"If you please, Reb Tevye..."
"Pardon me, Reb Tevye..."
Posing problems that would cross a rabbi's eyes!
And it won't make one bit of difference if i answer right or wrong.
When you're rich, they think you really know!

BearBoarBlarney;842468947 said:

---

I think you're probably right in that Duke, along the same lines as, say, Notre Dame, has become "cool" to dislike. In my context, the Duke arrogance narrative doesn't go far enough to describe the manipulative behavior of a C-level executive at a major tech company who covered his @ss when he messed up the strategic alliance he was working on, and then had his right hand Operations VP, another Dookie, pointed the finger at the sales organization. I also dealt with a Dookie in Finance who truly did not know his debits from his credits (Duke undergrad & Fuqua MBA -- not kidding), which should be table stakes for a Finance guy. And the last of the 4 Dookies I knew was just plain lazy -- did not want to roll up his sleeves and do the work necessary to actually, you know, help our firm grow. So, again, I am biased by my small sample size of 4 -- but all 4 really reflected poorly on their school.

I did have the opportunity to visit the Duke campus back in 2007, and was amazed at how gorgeous it is. Duke Chapel, the inter-connected gothic building and all the arches, the lawns and courtyards -- all very picturesque. I also thought that Wallace Wade Stadium was beautiful, although the track around the field is a detraction. I was surprised by how small Cameron Indoor Stadium is, but credit to Duke for allowing a couple of summer tourists into the place.

I guess the exception you take to the "Duke arrogance" narrative is very similar to the exception I take to people who ascribe to the "Arkansas inbreds" narrative. You know, folks who are so witty and urbane that they say stuff like, "If you have a child that doesn't get into Arkansas, it's probably best for everyone involved to just put him or her down." Lots of those folks are sanctimonious jerks who have never set foot in places like Arkansas.

---

Totally fair, BBB. My comments about Arkansas were (hopefully) obviously intended a joke after reading about their 99.5% acceptance rate. That, we know know, was mis-stated by the site I linked. Believe me, I'm sensitized to the "southerners are rubes" stuff given that I live part-time in South Carolina which incidentally is entirely by choice as my career doesn't require me to be anywhere near here.

And you're right, it is "cool" to dislike Duke and im sorry that your experience with Dukies has been less than ideal. I have great friends from both schools and, to me, they're all pretty similar. It's not as if Cal friends exude a public school mindset and Duke friends exude a privileged, private school mindset. Truth be told, I detested Duke growing up because of watching Laettner, Hurley, Collins, Wojo, etc. and I reveled in the win in the 1993 NCAA tourney. But once I arrived, it was just like going to any other school or business that attracts intelligent, hard-working people. Some a-holes but mostly good people who have the same priorities in life as everyone else.

TheSouseFamily;842469005 said:

---

Totally fair, BBB. My comments about Arkansas were (hopefully) obviously intended a joke after reading about their 99.5% acceptance rate. That, we know know, was mis-stated by the site I linked. Believe me, I'm sensitized to the "southerners are rubes" stuff given that I live part-time in South Carolina which incidentally is entirely by choice as my career doesn't require me to be anywhere near here.

And you're right, it is "cool" to dislike Duke and im sorry that your experience with Dukies has been less than ideal. I have great friends from both schools and, to me, they're all pretty similar. It's not as if Cal friends exude a public school mindset and Duke friends exude a privileged, private school mindset. Truth be told, I detested Duke growing up because of watching Laettner, Hurley, Collins, Wojo, etc. and I reveled in the win in the 1993 NCAA tourney. But once I arrived, it was just like going to any other school or business that attracts intelligent, hard-working people. Some a-holes but mostly good people who have the same priorities in life as everyone else.

---

Appreciate the balanced response on your end, SouseFam.

What you're picking up on in my response is the frustration that I occasionally have with people from California who just assume that all people from down south are dumb backwoods inbred hicks. I love Cal, but some of our graduates can be fairly close-minded when it comes to the stereotyping they are willing to do -- especially if it's stereotyping of a region of the country like Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, etc., that is easy to paint with a broad (and dismissive) brushstroke.

I know your comment was just a joke. For the record, you seem way too balanced and reasonable to be a Dukie, but I figure Cal helped "even you out." (:p Sorry, couldn't resist)

Acceptance rates are no longer as strong an indicator as they once were. Private schools now spend millions of dollars each year to encourage applicants. Every student at my daughter's school gets a letter from Harvard, Stanford, Duke, Princeton, etc. They love this KPI and want to improve it by getting more and more students to apply, most of whom have no real shot at being admitted. Public schools, to my knowledge, do nothing of the sort, making their #'s disadvantaged.

I think UCLA has a lower acceptance rate than Cal because they have more applicants.

Saw some admissions data about LSJU and several Ivies this morning. Most of the Ivies get around 30K applications. LSJU receives just over 40K. Cal receives over 70K applications and rejects just over 60K. If it were truly important, Cal and UCLA could actively try to drive up applications to improve their acceptance rates, even though they already reject twice as many applicants than most Ivies receive.