History Main / IvyLeagueForEveryOne

** This probably peaked in 2004, when opposing candidates John Kerry and UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush were not only both Yale alums, they were both members of the same exclusive secret society while there: The Skull and Bones. In response to comments that the campaign looked like a class war, one reporter quipped: "Yeah, Yale Class of '66 vs. Class of '68."
** The 2020 Democratic ticket of UsefulNotes/JoeBiden and UsefulNotes/KamalaHarris is the first of either party since 1984 to not have an Ivy League alum[[note]]Biden got his bachelor's at the University of Delaware and his JD from Syracuse University, while Harris went to Howard University (an HBCU) for undergrad and UC Hastings for law school[[/note]].

* If we're counting law schools, the US Supreme Court was made up entirely of Harvard and Yale alums with the half-exception of [[Film/{{RBG}} Ruth Bader]] [[Film/OnTheBasisOfSex Ginsburg]] before her death in 2020. She started law school at Harvard, but transferred to Columbia when her husband took a job in New York City. Both of Obama's nominees -- Sotomayor and Kagan -- got their bachelors' at Princeton. Obama himself went to Harvard Law School and was the first black President of the ''Harvard Law Review''. And the latter part of his undergraduate career was spent at Columbia - however, for the first couple of years he studied at Occidental College which... is ''not'' an Ivy League school. Trump's first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, also got his bachelor's at Columbia and JD at Harvard--though unlike Obama, he did all of his undergrad work at Columbia. Trump's second nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, earned both his bachelor's and JD at Yale. Finally averted with Trump's ''third'' nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, who had ''no Ivy League education at all''--she earned her bachelor's at Rhodes College, a well-regarded liberal arts school in Memphis but by no means an Ivy, and her JD at Notre Dame, likewise a well-regarded but non-Ivy school. The Ivies returned in full force with Biden's only nominee so far, Ketanji Brown Jackson, who earned both her BA and JD at Harvard.

* Matt Murdock of ''Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}'' fame holds a Juris Doctor (doctorate of law) from Columbia.
* ComicBook/SheHulk earned both her B.A. and her Juris Doctor from UCLA, the top-ranked public university in the world (according to ARWU, CWUR, U.S. News, and Times Higher Education) and the foremost Public Ivy (neck-and-neck with UC Berkeley). Though some later writer at some point [[MultipleChoicePast didn't get the memo]] and said she went to Harvard Law, that seems to have been explained away as a post-J.D. LLM (a specialized master's degree).
* In ''Comicbook/{{Watchmen}}'', Dr. Jon Osterman/Doctor Manhattan attends Princeton University from 1948 to 1958, graduating with a [[NotThatKindOfDoctor Ph.D.]] in atomic physics.
* A version of this is in the comic ''Comicbook/GoldDigger'': At one point, a discussion is made on how just about everyone in the area is a doctor, with multiple degrees, ridiculous accomplishments, etc. Ace, the AcePilot, is a bit annoyed.
* Flash Gordon is identified in the first issue as a "Yale graduate and world renowned polo player."
* [[https://www.marvel.com/characters/professor-x Professor Charles Xavier]] of ''Franchise/XMen'' fame has a master's degree in biophysics from Oxford University, a doctorate in anthropology from Columbia University, and ''another'' doctorate in medicine from University College London.
* ''ComicBook/DoctorStrange'' got his M.D. from Columbia.
* ''ComicBook/FantasticFour'': exaggerated with Reed Richards, who went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, California Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Columbia University, and Empire State University (fictional equivalent of New York University). He had several hard science graduate degrees by the time he was twenty.
* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' went to an Ivy League school, fitting his old money WASP backstory, but which one (and what his degree was in) varies by the story and adaptation. [[https://library.law.yale.edu/news/holy-diploma-batman-yale-law-school-alumnus One March 1974 issue]] suggests he earned an LL.B from Yale University. ''Film/TheDarkKnightTrilogy'' has him dropping out of Princeton University short of graduation. So on and so forth.

* Parodied in one ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}'' strip where the PointyHairedBoss hires an ex-con purely because he's an Ivy League grad. When Dilbert questions the guy about having been to Yale, the man says "I yust got out last veek".

* In ''Theatre/SongsForANewWorld'', the narrator of "The World Was Dancing" attends Princeton on a scholarship. Averted since t's unclear whether or not he finished, and also the classmate with whom he had a fling transferred to McAlester.

* This trope was deconstructed when [[https://www.npr.org/2020/09/30/914061484/lies-money-and-cheating-the-deeper-story-of-the-college-admissions-scandal#:~:text=Yet%20the%20recent%20nationwide%20scandal,system%20at%20select%20colleges%20nationwide/ it came out in 2019 that numerous wealthy parents]], including Lori Loughlin of ''Series/FullHouse'' fame and Felicity Huffman, were going beyond donating buildings and pulling strings to get their kids into prestigious colleges. The scandal, called Operation Varsity Blues, revealed that the ringleader was a college counselor named Rick Singer that rigged test scores for the SAT and ACT, faked disabilities for extended time on tests, falsified "evidence" that they were athletes. In some cases, he even hired proctors to take exams for the kids. Some of the students themselves were embarrassed when the scandal came out, with only a few willing to tell their side of the story. Singer has been arrested but not sentenced owing to his willingness to cooperate with authorities, and universities have withdrawn or expelled a few of the kids involved. It turns out Ivy League means nothing when money can manipulate the system.

* Deconstructed when high school students resort to computer hacking to change their grades to ensure Ivy League admission. As Ivy League demands exceptional grades from its applicants, those people may get upset over [[TheBGrade a weak or a single outright bad grade]] destroying their chances of acceptance; this leads to hacking school computer systems. Unfortunately for them, this is against the law and said students can end up in prison. A specific example happened in Tenafly, New Jersey in 2017 [[https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/student-hacks-high-school-changes-grades-and-sends-college-applications/ with a student being arrested]] for hacking his grades and then mailing out Ivy League applications. What is worse is that offenders are just not able to get into Ivy League; they can find themselves barred from any college or university. A criminal record can ban you from receiving financial aid in many jurisdictions and many universities actually deny applications from convicted criminals, even nonviolent ones. Obviously, safety plays a major role in said denial, and even nonviolent offenders are regularly seen as lacking in basic integrity.

A few institutions that aren't actually in the Ivy League but have strong reputations in certain contexts also count for this trope. Engineering hopefuls always go to MIT or Caltech. Juilliard is this for the performing arts. Elite West Coast students go to Stanford, UC Berkeley (especially as shorthand for them having [[StrawmanPolitical left-leaning politics]]), USC (especially if they're a film student), and UCLA. Before the Ivies went co-ed, the Seven Sisters schools were this for women. In Japanese stories, the college of choice is typically Tokyo University, or "Todai".

* Deconstructed when high school students resort to computer hacking to change their grades to ensure Ivy League admission. As Ivy League demands exceptional grades from its applicants, those people may get upset over [[TheBGrade a weak or a single outright bad grade]] destroying their chances of acceptance; this leads to hacking school computer systems. Unfortunately for them, this is against the law and said students can end up in prison. A specific example happened in Tenafly, New Jersey in 2017 [[https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/student-hacks-high-school-changes-grades-and-sends-college-applications/ with a student being arrested]] for hacking his grades and then mailing out Ivy League applications. What is worse is that offenders are just not able to get into Ivy League; they can find themselves barred from any college or university. A criminal record can ban you from receiving financial aid in many jurisdictions and many universities actually deny applications from convicted criminals for obvious safety reasons.

** The 2020 Democratic ticket of UsefulNotes/JoeBiden and Kamala Harris is the first of either party since 1984 to not have an Ivy League alum[[note]]Biden got his Bachelor's at the University of Delaware and his JD from Syracuse University, while Harris went to Howard University (an HBCU) for undergrad and UC Hastings for law school[[/note]].

* If we're counting law schools, the US Supreme Court was made up entirely of Harvard and Yale alums with the half-exception of [[Film/{{RBG}} Ruth Bader]] [[Film/OnTheBasisOfSex Ginsburg]] before her death in 2020. She started law school at Harvard, but transferred to Columbia when her husband took a job in New York City. Both of Obama's nominees -- Sotomayor and Kagan -- got their bachelors' at Princeton. Obama himself went to Harvard Law School and was the first black President of the ''Harvard Law Review''. And the latter part of his undergraduate career was spent at Columbia - however, for the first couple of years he studied at Occidental College which... is ''not'' an Ivy League school. Trump's first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, also got his bachelor's at Columbia and JD at Harvard—though unlike Obama, he did all of his undergrad work at Columbia. Trump's second nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, earned both his bachelor's and JD at Yale. Finally averted with Trump's ''third'' nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, who had ''no Ivy League education at all''—she earned her bachelor's at Rhodes College, a well-regarded liberal arts school in Memphis but by no means an Ivy, and her JD at Notre Dame, likewise all-regarded but non-Ivy school.
* Justice Thomas has a strained relationship with Yale Law School, his alma mater.[[note]]Thomas is only a law school Ivy man. He earned his bachelor's at Holy Cross, which made him the only current justice who didn't attend an Ivy or the equivalent as an undergrad until Barrett's confirmation. The only other non-Ivy undergraduate on the current court, Stephen Breyer, went to Stanford.[[/note]] In 2013, he cracked a joke at their expense during oral arguments. It was the first thing he said in oral arguments ''for seven years.''

* Ivy Leaguers are not represented very frequently in professional sports[[note]] The actual UsefulNotes/IvyLeague schools do not offer athletic scholarships, which makes it hard to attract or produce elite talent. Particularly for major sports like basketball and football, athletics tends to be less important to most students and alumni than it is at top-tier schools.[[/note]] Despite this, the late-2000's Buffalo Bills had a General Manager from Harvard, a head coach from Yale and a backup quarterback from Harvard.[[note]]The starter was from Stanford, but they play in the Pac-12 and do offer athletic scholarships, so he doesn't fit the example.[[/note]] (Incidentally, then-backup quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick later became a starter.)

* Stanford has also used this to build a once-moribund football program into a national power in its own right, and under current coach David Shaw, the Cardinal are noted for playing a very physical style of play. Stanford has a team of {{Genius Bruiser}}s. First overall 2012 draft pick and retired Colts quarterback Andrew Luck is an alumnus.

* A lot of major newspapers and magazines, especially in and around the publishing hub of New York City, recruit almost exclusively graduates of Ivy League universities for editorial positions.

Despite being considered among the most selective colleges in the United States, with admission rates from 4% to 9%,UsefulNotes/IvyLeague schools show up frequently in fiction. In {{teen drama}}s, a main character (or two) will always get accepted into an Ivy League school. Expect this to become a key part of high school [[SeniorYearStruggles senior year stress]], whether the character is trying to get into a certain Ivy League school, or deciding between an Ivy League college far away from home and a [[CaliforniaUniversity local college]] that keeps the show in the same setting.

A few institutions that aren't actually in the Ivy League but have strong reputations in certain contexts also count for this trope. Engineering hopefuls always go to MIT or Caltech. Elite students on the West Coast go to Stanford. Juilliard is this for the performing arts. Before the Ivies went co-ed, the Seven Sisters schools were this for women. In Japanese stories, the college of choice is typically Tokyo University, or "Todai".

* Flash Gordon is identified in the first issue as a "Yale graduate and world renowned polo player"
* Played with in a ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}'' strip where the PHB hires a career criminal purely because he went to Yale. When Dilbert asks the man about it, he replies "I yust got out last veek."

* ''WesternAnimation/AtlantisTheLostEmpire'': Sweet, the team's medical officer, is an alumni of Howard University (presumably the College of Medicine).

* Unlike the later movie mentioned above, the original novel of ''Literature/LegallyBlonde'' has Elle attending Stanford University.

* ComicBook/SheHulk earned both her B.A. and her Juris Doctor from UCLA, the top-ranked public university in the world (according to ARWU, CWUR, U.S. News, and Times Higher Education) and the foremost Public Ivy (neck-in-neck with UC Berkeley). Though some later writer at some point [[MultipleChoicePast didn't get the memo]] and said she went to Harvard Law, that seems to have been explained away as a post-J.D. LLM (a specialized master's degree).

For RealLife perspective, of the 20-21 million US college undergrads across the United States at any given time, only about 65,000-70,000 of them are in the Ivy League...a percentage of about 0.3%, and this includes international students as well, meaning the amount of American students is even ''lower''. For graduate students (whether it be law, medicine, engineering, academia, etc.), the ratio is ''slightly'' less competitive of about 90,000-100,000 US graduate students out of about 3 million, a percentage of 3%, which again includes international students, often more than undergrad. Needless to say, the median American college student, let alone the median American teenager, does not attend the Ivy League.

Despite being considered among the most selective colleges in the United States, with admission rates from 4% to 9%, UsefulNotes/IvyLeague schools show up frequently in fiction. In {{teen drama}}s, a main character (or two) will always get accepted into an Ivy League school. Expect this to become a key part of high school [[SeniorYearStruggles senior year stress]], whether the character is trying to get into a certain Ivy League school, or deciding between an Ivy League college far away from home and a [[CaliforniaUniversity local college]] that keeps the show in the same setting.

Compare to EliteSchoolMeansEliteBrain. Contrast CaliforniaUniversity.

Despite being considered among the most selective colleges in the United States, with admission rates from 6% to 16%, UsefulNotes/IvyLeague schools show up frequently in fiction. In {{teen drama}}s, a main character (or two) will always get accepted into an Ivy League school. Expect this to become a key part of high school [[SeniorYearStruggles senior year stress]], whether the character is trying to get into a certain Ivy League school, or deciding between an Ivy League college far away from home and a [[CaliforniaUniversity local college]] that keeps the show in the same setting.

* ''WebComic/DumbingOfAge'': Dorothy aspires to be admitted to Yale and leave Indiana University. She receives an acceptance letter from Yale's undergraduate equivalent about the time second semester begins, though her hastily covering it up shows something had changed about her aspirations. [[spoiler: As she later admits to Becky (who found the acceptance letter), she plans to turn it down because they only accepted her once she resubmitted her application to talk about being in the hostage situation in the first semester, but she felt guilty about using that day-a day that ended with Becky losing her father, Amber also losing her father, and Mike dying of his injuries-as a stepping stone to her future greatness.]]

* ''WebComic/DumbingOfAge'': Dorothy aspires to be admitted to Yale and leave Indiana University. [[spoiler: She receives an acceptance letter from Yale's undergraduate equivalent about the time second semester begins, though her hastily covering it up shows something had changed about her aspirations.]]

** Shirogane mentions during the parent teacher conferences that he was going to attend Stanford. [[spoiler:[[GradeSkipper He actually ends up getting accepted a year early and leaves Shuchi'in halfway through third year to start attending]]. Kaguya was originally supposed to go with him, but circumstances involving her family forced her to withdraw her initial application and put off attending until after graduation.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/XMen'' shows a young Charles Xavier attending Bard College, which in the comics is one of Beast's many alma maters. Jean Grey is also implied to be a legacy, as her father was one of Xavier's professors.

** Shirogane mentions during the parent teacher conferences that he was going to attend Stanford. [[spoiler:He actually ends up getting accepted a year early, and asks Kaguya to come with him.]]