Why We're Starting With the Ivies - My Q & A With Nicole

by Dr. Ellen Brandt



I've gotten at least fifty questions already about why we've decided to make the initial focus of the Bring Back the Meritocracy! project the Ivy League and other top-tier universities in the U.S. and abroad.

The short answer is: We think it's the correct thing to do in terms of tactics, the right place to launch the project before approaching other concerned constituencies.

This is what I told a lovely lady named Nicole, an intelligent Baby Boomer with a Masters degree from a non-Ivy school, in the Q & A Comments stream of one of the Destitute Ivy Leaguer blogs.

(Most readers of the blog, let alone those interested or already involved in the Bring Back the Meritocracy! project, will not have read this exchange, particularly because Google's "More/Less" toggle switch added to all Comments streams effectively lops off anything longer than two sentences, unless you specifically click on the "More.")

Current and future proponents of Bring Back the Meritocracy! certainly should understand why we are focusing on the Ivies first - thus, this blog post.

So here is Nicole's comment and question to me:

(Ellen, this is) clever and very well articulated . . . (but) as a non-Ivy Leaguer, I find myself left out of the discussion, and I imagine my non-Ivy League colleagues will as well. Who is this Proletariat Ivy League Meritocracy - a rare breed, I assume - and why is it only them you are addressing, with some of the best points made about the tragic influences of Western media and the growing imbalance of wealth and power in the U.S. that I have read in a long time?

And here is my subsequent reply:

Nicole, (the decision is) tactical, and I hope it will not discourage you from connecting with me and participating in this important effort.

First, to address one point you made: Far from being a small group,  Ivy Leaguers on the verge of financial disaster are an extremely large group, particularly among those of us over age 50. That's because we were more, not less, apt to belong to the (various) groups which have been hit very hard by the economic events of the past several decades: investors, homeowners, small business owners, (and) managers.

Since writing my Baby Boomers - The Angriest Generation blog in the wake of the Great Crash, I have personally heard from thousands of my peers in similar situations. And as I (have) pointed out, as Gen-X'ers approach 50 - the current cut-off point (in the developed economies) for being financially eradicated - they are bound to feel threatened, too. Nor are the brash Millennials getting off scot-free, since all those Happy Retirees whose jobs they were counting on taking will now fight hard to push their retirements to 95 or so - since most Boomers are anything but happy.

But back to tactics: I am starting with the Ivies (and other top-tier schools), because they have the most to lose and now truly need to save face. We've all read about those Armies of the Displaced and Discarded who went to Washington or state capitals in the 1930's, living in tents and reminding the nation how unjust and impossible things had become.

Well, those Armies of Unfortunates were primarily farmers or factory workers or blue collar laborers back then. Today, they'd be crowded with displaced lawyers and accountants and engineers and journalists and teachers and entrepreneurs whose small businesses went under . . .  You get the picture.

So universities as a group have an immense stake in staving off their alumni's financial devastation, with the Ivies (and other top universities), one hopes, more sensitive to the rout of their reputations than other institutions of higher learning.

And tactical reason number two: (Those) Ivy (and other prestigious-school) graduates who have been more fortunate than many of their peers are well-represented among the executive ranks of venture funds, top-tier foundations, and other institutions which will need to be persuaded to participate in this grand (broad-based and ambitious) effort.

(Many) in my own network have already expressed keen interest in participating. Others will follow, not only because it's the right thing to do, but because their participation can be potentially quite lucrative. Supporting Boomer entrepreneurs, for instance, may turn out to be a spectacularly smart move in terms of investment return.

What an idea! 60-year-olds may actually be better-educated, more sophisticated, far more skilled, and - I dunno, wiser??? - than 16-year-olds. 

So that's the Q & A. If Bring Back the Meritocracy! supporters are confronted with "But Why the Ivies?" questions, please feel free to send them this post by way of explanation. 

The next post in the series will explicate the term Meritocracy and explain why some irresponsible groups and publications are distorting its meaning to support (very bad) political agendas.