Figuring The Factors

I don’t find any of these arguments to be particularly persuasive. I found in a few that they tended to go off on a tangent and that this tangent wasn’t particularly on-topic. For example, in “The Specialization Trade-off”, Shulman begins by speaking about how Ivy-League Colleges represent, and I quote, “liquid pools of opportunity... students who get into these schools graduate at higher rates and have clear advantages over peers in getting jobs” yet he ends his piece by saying this: “these schools should realize that they are not merely reflecting the fact that we are a “sports crazy culture.” They are helping to make it so. “. Consequently, when I read this piece for the first time I did a double take, thinking: Wait, What? How did we end up on sports culture?! So, as you can probably imagine, I had to read it through once or twice more.

Now, in the sense of good sport, I’ll share with you one of the articles I found interesting, though I probably shouldn’t claim it to be the one I found most persuasive. In this  piece, “Skip the Admissions Game” by Kevin Carey, he speaks of Ivy-League schools only representing an advantage for the few students who have the test scores and money to pay for them. On the other hand, if you can’t, things are more difficult.
“If you're among the small handful of students who have stellar SAT scores and parents with several hundred thousand dollars to spend, you should seriously consider going to an elite college or university...If, on the other hand, you're not one of those people -- and the odds are very high that you're not -- your decision-making will be somewhat more complicated.”
He continues to shed light on the shadows that have been obscuring smaller and lesser known colleges as being as good - if not better - than Ivy league schools BECAUSE they aren’t being paid the huge tuition fees and the teachers are more likely to be able to handle smaller classes at schools smaller than ones in the Ivy League, so it logically follows that they will be able to teach better if they can handle their students better.

Overall, I’m not too sure what to think about these articles. I have seen some interesting points, such as the ones made by Carey, and some points that I can’t makes sense of, such as the one written by Mr. Shulman.