- It is sometimes synonymous with the " Little Three ," Amherst , Wesleyan , and Williams . (The term "Little Three" is well-defined as a former athletic league, and has often been used to identify these schools as a socially and academically elite trio). Encarta defines "Little Ivies" to refer to these three schools, which it characterizes as "small" and "exclusive" and as having "high academic standards and long traditions."
- It can refer to the schools of the modern-day New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC), which includes the "Little Three" together with Bates , Bowdoin , Colby , Connecticut , Middlebury , Tufts , Hamilton , and Trinity .
- Greene and Greene's guide, ''The Hidden Ivies: Thirty Colleges of Excellence'' uses it to refer to "Amherst, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Swarthmore, Wesleyan, and Williams," schools which it says have "scaled the heights of prestige and selectivity and also turn away thousands of our best and brightest young men and women."
Some schools that are often called "Little Ivies" include:
Some believe that the term "Little Ivies" can be misleading, saying that small liberal arts colleges offer a very different undergraduate experience from that of research universities such as the Ivy League schools.
The schools of the Seven Sisters , historically women's colleges, could be considered a counterpart of the Little Ivies. Schools in this group are occasionally described as "little Ivies" themselves; for example, the '' Business Times '' of Singapore mentions "Amherst, Williams, Smith, Wellesley and Swarthmore" as examples.
- ''The New York Times'', February 10, 1955, p. 33 quotes the President of Swarthmore , describing and decrying social snobbery: "We not only have the Ivy League, and the pretty clearly understood though seldom mentioned gradations within the Ivy League, but we have the Little Ivy League, and the jockeying for position within that."
- '' Harvard Magazine ''
- Associate Justice Kennedy
- Episcopal High School of Houston
- Midwest Elite Hockey League
- The Williams Club
- '' The Atlantic Monthly '': "Swarthmore, Amherst, Williams"
- Tamalpais Union High School : "Amherst, Bowdoin, Hamilton, Haverford, Middlebury, Swarthmore, Trinity, Tufts, Wesleyan, and Williams."
- ''Boston Globe'', September 20, 1985, p. 36 refers to "The New England Small College Athletic Conference (alias NESCAC or the 'Little Ivies')".
# See reference #1, Tyre, Peg, and William Lee Adams (2005).
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