Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown, certainly not unknown names to most readers. These are 4 of the total of 8 ‘Ivy League Schools’ in the USA. Students from all over the world want to study there. The emphasis is on ‘want’, because in reality it is only a very selective group that can study here.
Last year, there were 40,000 applications for Harvard, of which 8,000 students had a list of only A’s and a Math SAT Score of 800 (that is 0 errors). Yet only about 5% of all registrations were admitted, that is 2000 students in total. Ivy League Schools only want the very best students, but also look at other factors such as family background and involvement in charities. For student-athletes, the level of sport is obviously very important, because the athletic level is just as important at Ivy League Schools as the academic level.
Getting accepted at an Ivy League School sounds a bit like climbing Mount Everest barefoot, you don’t just do that. But hey, cheer up! The USA wouldn’t be the USA if they did not find a solution for this. Ever heard of Public Ivy Schools? We’ll tell you more about it here.
In 1985, Richard Moll published the book ‘Public Ivies: A guide to America’s best public undergraduate colleges and universities.’ At the time, eight universities were in the list of ‘Public Ivy Schools’. Now, more than 35 years later, the list has been adjusted to include 30 universities spread over the states.
Those 30 Public Ivy Schools with associated regions are the following:
Northeastern
- Pennsylvania State University (University Park)
- Rutgers University (New Brunswick)
- State University of New York at Binghamton
- University of Connecticut (Storrs)
Mid-Atlantic
- University of Delaware (Newark)
- University of Maryland (College Park)
- College of William & Mary (Williamsburg)
- University of Virginia (Charlottesville)
Southern
- University of Florida (Gainesville)
- University of Georgia (Athens)
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- University of Texas at Austin
Western
- University of Arizona (Tucson)
- University of California (Berkeley)
- University of California (Davis)
- University of California (Irvine)
- University of California (Los Angeles)
- University of California (San Diego)
- University of California (Santa Barbara)
- University of Colorado (Boulder)
- University of Washington (Seattle)
Great Lakes and Midwest
- Indiana University (Bloomington)
- Miami University (Oxford, Ohio)
- Michigan State University (East Lansing)
- The Ohio State University (Columbus)
- University of Illinois (Urbana–Champaign), University of Iowa (Iowa City)
- University of Michigan (Ann Arbor)
- University of Minnesota (Minneapolis–Saint Paul)
- University of Wisconsin (Madison)
Quite a list, right? 30 Public Ivies in total! The list was created to meet the high registrations for Ivy League Schools. A big difference between both is that the study costs of Public Ivy Schools are much lower than those of Ivy League Schools. That does not mean that the universities are less interesting, because all universities in the list compete with Ivy League Schools at educational level. In addition, as a student-athlete at Public Ivy Schools you can receive an athletic scholarship, that is not the case at the Ivy League Schools.
Did you know that 11 of our slamstox athletes are currently at Public Ivy Schools? Other athletes have been part of Public Ivy Schools. One of them is our Slamstox field hockey specialist Kim van der Meulen! She attended the University of California Davis. Want to know more about her time in the USA? Check out this video!
Julia and Berber, two Slamstox hockey players, are active at the University of Delaware, another Public Ivy School. Last year we made a ‘Catching Up With…’ video with them. Check it our here!
Slamstox hockey player Anthe Nijziel is part of the field hockey team at the University of Iowa. A Public Ivy School with private jet and stadium with 77,000 seats! Last year, we wrote this University Spotlight about Anthe and the University of Iowa.
Also the future university of tennis star Min Chae Kim is a Public Ivy School, Rutgers University. This beautiful university was also previously in the University Spotlight, which you can read here.
Aurelia Meijer was student-athlete at Penn State University since 2015, one of the Public Ivy Schools. During her studies she made an Around and About video of Penn State University! Check out the video below.
When asked whether you should do everything you can to get into an Ivy League School, Public Ivy School or another university in the USA, the answer is actually very simple: it depends entirely on your situation. What major do you want to do, what sport do you do and where in the USA would you like to study?
Together we will have a look at your options. This way we find the best suitable place in the USA for every student-athlete! Do you want more information about the life of a student-athlete or do you want to know what your options are? Reach out, we will help you!
