Artradies wrote:
The Ivy League is TOO competitive, I was talking to some university profs that my mom randomly knows (one from Lehigh University, and another from University of Pennsylvania) and they both said that you don't need to go to the Ivy League. In fact, they said it is probably better NOT to. They both remarked that most of the profs do not care about their undergrads, the more famous the professor, the more likely that all they want to do is research. Both of them graduated from humble universities as undergraduates (One of them from The University of Western Ontario and the other from The University of Maryland) and they went to Princeton and Harvard for their Ph.D's respectively.
While I agree that you don't need to go to an Ivy League school in order to be successful or get into a great Grad School I don't think it means that you shouldn't go to one if you had the opportunity. I know a couple of people in Ivy Leagues and they love their schools.
For my Harvard interview I asked about the issue concerning Professors and undergrads. She said that sometimes it is difficult but that Profs are required to have hours when students can meet with them. Any college you go to you'll end up with a Professor that probably doesn't care. College is what you make of it. The opportunities are there, all you have to do is reach for them.
Anyway, Ivies probably want 3.8+ for GPAs, though preferably a 4.0. Things such as SATs, extracurricular activities, essays are also really important. If you have other strong areas that are well emphasized in your application the admissions committee might overlook a lower GPA.