Although "Ivy League" has a concrete and specific definition, it's frequently used in an unconsciously metaphorical sense to refer to other schools. Schools in this nebulous Ivy League have certain characteristics in common:
- high
prestige
- extremely
selective
- very well
endowed (err...)
- high
tuition
-
academic reputation
In
2000, the average cost of
tuition and fees at Ivy League schools was $32,020, with most schools varying from that level by no more than $1,200. Their endowments register in the
billions of dollars, with 40% of
alumni contributing to
Yale in
2000, and the
William and Flora Hewlett Foundation giving $400 million to
Stanford in
2001.
Articles about Ivy League schools that do not originate in one of the 8 Ivy Leaguers frequently include
Stanford,
MIT,
Johns Hopkins, and so on.