Do grad schools have a tendency to admit students from similar schools?

[ward]

…and I don’t mean this in the sense that they choose from similarly ranked programs. I noticed on “In (I think) at Ohio State (In (I Think) at Ohio State)” thread that many of the admits come from mid-to-large, regional state schools. I don’t know why I think this, but it seems that many of the Ivy League schools draw from other more prestigious private schools rather than from the larger state schools (at least the ones that aren’t “public ivies”)

This is probably due to my lack of information, and that I would rather have people tell me this information rather than look into further myself.

Just thought I would see what everyone else thinks about this..

[macroeconomicus]

Look at the resumes of job market candidates at OSU and the schools you're comparing it to and that should answer some of your questions. I have done similar comparisons, and it seems like the top 10 admit mostly people who come from elite undergraduate institutions (top LACs, private universities, and top public universities, as well as people with foreign masters degrees from top places, like LSE). Schools ranked between 10-20 also get people from top undergraduate institutions but they are also more likely to admit people from less prestigious places, and then schools ranked below 25 for the most part do not enroll students from top undergraduate institutions, although every once in a while there are some exceptions (e.g. last year U Wash had someone on the job market who did his undergrad studies at Columbia and MSU had someone from Northwestern). I don't think there is necessarily a tendency to always pick people who the same kind of institution. There is just too much competition from the applicants who went to top colleges and universities. People who go to top schools for undergraduate education also tend to apply mostly to higher ranked economics departments. Other things being equal, they will be picked over someone coming from a lesser known university. Besides the school name, they also have access to well-known faculty, and their courses in either math or economics are probably more rigorous on average.

[Dannyb19]

Hopkins is probably barely in the top 25 and from my first year class (of 9 students) we have students from:

Caltech
Cornell
Northwestern
Columbia (MA)

And elsewhere in the program we have people from:

Harvard
Yale (Multiple)
MIT (MA)
Michigan
Oxford

Along with many other great undergrad schools like Wesleyan and so forth, so I don't think you can stereotype in this way - great undergrad institutions will put people in a wide range of graduate programs, although the top students from the elite universities usually end up in the top 5-10 programs I would venture.

Oh, and good luck to everyone waiting on decisions, I know its a very stressful time, but you will make it through, I promise .

[TruDog]

Out of the first-years here at Wisconsin who got bachelors' degrees from American universities, we've got one from the Ivy League, one from a school with a top-30 program, one from a big state school with a lower-tier program, and the rest of us are from LACs or smaller state schools without PhD programs. It seems like Wisconsin likes taking a chance on students from less 'prestigious' backgrounds.

[macroeconomicus]

Out of the first-years here at Wisconsin who got bachelors' degrees from American universities, we've got one from the Ivy League, one from a school with a top-30 program, one from a big state school with a lower-tier program, and the rest of us are from LACs or smaller state schools without PhD programs. It seems like Wisconsin likes taking a chance on students from less 'prestigious' backgrounds.

I wouldn't be surprised if they're losing some applicants due to less than perfect funding offers..