Ivy League - Cohesion of The Group

Cohesion of The Group

The Ivy League schools are highly selective, with acceptance rates ranging from 6 to 16 percent.

These universities compete in many ways, as illustrated by Yale's aggressive reaction to an incident in 2002. A Princeton admissions staffer mentioned at a joint meeting of all eight Ivy admissions departments that he and others from his office had logged onto the Yale admissions website to see how their system to notify applicants worked. At the time, Princeton and many other colleges were considering a transition from using mailed letters to website notification, a process which Yale had already completed. No immediate reaction from the group resulted at the initial meeting, as was the case when the same individual brought up the subject again at a subsequent conference one month later. He told the others present that he and his colleagues had used the names, birth dates and Social Security numbers of some Princeton applicants who might have also applied to Yale. In particular, the Princeton representative brought up the topic because he was surprised to find that Yale had used no password besides a Social Security number. Despite the fact that the Princeton staffer had proactively volunteered the information and Yale officials at both meetings had voiced no objection, the Yale administration examined its computer records and called the FBI to complain that its computers had been "hacked," then issued a press release to that effect. After this apparent attempt to embarrass Princeton publicly, the admissions official at the center of the controversy was moved to a different department and the university's dean of admissions Fred Hargadon retired at the end of the academic year, though Princeton president Shirley Tilghman said that the dean's decision to retire was unconnected to the incident. In 2007, Princeton honored the dean by naming a new campus dormitory after him.

Collaboration between the member schools is illustrated by the student-led Ivy Council that meets in the fall and spring of each year, with representatives from every Ivy League school.