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{{Short description|Athletic conference of American universities}}
{{About|the group of colleges and the athletic conference that gave the group its name}}
{{Redirect|Ivies|the plants|List of plants known as ivy|the singular|Ivy (disambiguation)}}
{{Use American English|date=March 2024}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2020}}
{{Infobox sports league
| name            = Ivy League
| color           = #115740; {{box-shadow border|a|#FFFFFF|2px}}
| font_color      = #FFFFFF
| title           = 
| logo            = Ivy League Logo.svg
| logo_size       = 200
| founded         = {{start date and age|1954}}
| association     = [[National Collegiate Athletic Association|NCAA]]
| division        = [[NCAA Division I|Division I]]
| subdivision     = [[NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision|FCS]]
| teams           = 8
| sports          = 33
| mens            = 17
| womens          = 16
| region          = [[Northeastern United States|Northeast]]
| headquarters    = [[Princeton, New Jersey]], U.S.
| commissioner    = Robin Harris<ref>{{cite web |url=http://ivyleaguesports.com/information/directory/bios/robin_harris |title=Executive Director Robin Harris |access-date=April 1, 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160405152035/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/information/directory/bios/robin_harris |archive-date=April 5, 2016}}</ref>
| since           = 2009
| TV              = [[ESPN]]
| website         = {{URL|https://ivyleague.com}}
| map             = Ivy League Map.svg
| map_caption     = {{clear}}<br>Home states of the eight Ivy League universities
| map_size        = 225
}}

The '''Ivy League''' is an American collegiate [[List of NCAA conferences|athletic conference]] of eight [[Private university|private]] [[Research university|research universities]] in the [[Northeastern United States]]. It participates in the [[National Collegiate Athletic Association]] (NCAA) [[NCAA Division I|Division I]], and in [[College football|football]], in the [[Football Championship Subdivision]] (FCS). The term ''Ivy League'' is used more broadly to refer to the eight schools that belong to the league, which are globally renowned as elite colleges associated with [[Academic achievement|academic excellence]], [[College admissions in the United States#Selectivity|highly selective admissions]], and social [[elitism]].<ref name="Princeton Campus Guide" /><ref name="www.crimsoneducation.org" /><ref name="Vedder" /><ref name="Gladwell" /><ref name="Princeton University Admission-2016" /> The term was used as early as 1933, and it became official in 1954 following the formation of the Ivy League athletic conference.<ref name=officialhistory>{{cite web|url=http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/timeline/index|title=Ivy League History and Timeline|access-date=November 13, 2015|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160420101456/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/timeline/index|archive-date=April 20, 2016}}</ref> At times, they have also been referred to as the "Ancient Eight".<ref>{{cite news |title=The Beginning of the Ancient Eight |url=https://cornellsun.com/2009/07/19/beginning-ancient-eight/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201026133515/https://cornellsun.com/2009/07/19/beginning-ancient-eight/ |archive-date=October 26, 2020 |access-date=November 3, 2020 |publisher=The Cornell Daily Sun}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Modernizing the Ancient Eight |url=https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2016/01/20/bronsdon-modernizing-the-ancient-eight/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201110040359/https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2016/01/20/bronsdon-modernizing-the-ancient-eight/ |archive-date=November 10, 2020 |access-date=November 3, 2020 |publisher=Yale Daily News}}</ref>

The eight members of the Ivy League are [[Brown University]], [[Columbia University]], [[Cornell University]], [[Dartmouth College]], [[Harvard University]], [[University of Pennsylvania]], [[Princeton University]], and [[Yale University]]. The conference headquarters is in [[Princeton, New Jersey]]. All of the "Ivies" except Cornell were founded during the [[Thirteen Colonies|colonial period]] and therefore make up seven of the nine [[colonial colleges]]. The other two colonial colleges, Queen's College (now [[Rutgers University]]) and the [[College of William & Mary]], became public institutions.

[[File:Scoreboard and Ivy League flags at Wien Stadium, 2024.jpg|thumb|400px|The flags of all eight Ivy League universities flying over [[Robert K. Kraft Field at Lawrence A. Wien Stadium|Wien Stadium]] at [[Columbia University]]]]

== Overview ==
Ivy League schools are some of the most prestigious universities in the world.<ref name="World's Best Colleges" /> All eight universities place in the top 15 of the 2025 [[U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges Ranking|''U.S. News & World Report'' National Universities ranking]]<!-- It is necessary to specify the category here, since liberal arts colleges are separate. -->.<ref name="U.S. News & World Report" /> ''U.S. News'' has named a member of the Ivy League as the best national university{{efn|Liberal arts colleges and regional institutions are ranked separately.}} every year since 2001: {{as of|2020|lc=y}}, Princeton eleven times, Harvard twice, and the two schools tied for first five times.<ref name="US News history" /> In the 2024–2025 [[U.S. News & World Report Best Global University Ranking|''U.S. News & World Report'' Best Global University Ranking]], six Ivies rank in the top 20: Harvard (#1), Columbia (#9), Yale (#10), Penn (#14), Princeton (#18), and Cornell (#19) —ranks that ''U.S. News'' says are based on "indicators that measure their academic research performance and their global and regional reputations."<ref name="U.S. News-2022-2023" /> All eight Ivy League schools are members of the [[Association of American Universities]], the most prestigious alliance of American research universities.<ref name="Association of American Universities" />

Undergraduate enrollments range from about 4,500 to about 15,000,<ref name="Dartmouth and Cornell respectively" /> larger than most [[liberal arts college]]s and smaller than most [[state university system]]s. Total enrollment, which includes graduate students, ranges from approximately 6,600 at Dartmouth to over 20,000 at Columbia, Cornell, Harvard, and Penn. Ivy League [[financial endowment]]s range from Brown's $6.9&nbsp;billion<ref name="The Boston Globe" /> to Harvard's $53.2&nbsp;billion,<ref name="The Harvard Crimson-2" /> the [[Lists of institutions of higher education by endowment|largest financial endowment]] of any academic institution in the world.<ref name="10 Private Universities With Largest Financial Endowments">{{cite web|url=https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/2011/06/28/10-universities-with-largest-financial-endowments|title=10 Private Universities With Largest Financial Endowments |access-date=May 30, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120801124053/https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/2011/06/28/10-universities-with-largest-financial-endowments |archive-date=August 1, 2012 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

The Ivy League is similar to other groups of universities in other countries, such as [[Oxbridge]]<ref>{{Cite web |title=What's Better for Me: Ivy League or Oxbridge? |url=http://www.ueseducation.com/blog/ivy-league-oxbridge |access-date=2023-12-29 |website=UES Education |language=en |archive-date=December 29, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231229173035/https://www.ueseducation.com/blog/ivy-league-oxbridge |url-status=live }}</ref> in [[England]], the [[C9 League]]<ref name="en.people.cn">{{cite web|url=http://en.people.cn/203691/7822275.html|title=China's Ivy League：C9 League|website=en.people.cn|access-date=November 8, 2018|archive-date=January 3, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190103063135/http://en.people.cn/203691/7822275.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> in [[China]], the [[École_normale_supérieure|Écoles Normales Supérieures]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/4190728/Frances-educational-elite.html|title=France's educational elite|date=17 November 2003|access-date=5 February 2019|work=The Daily Telegraph|location=London}}</ref> in [[France]], the [[SKY (universities)|SKY Universities]] in South Korea, and the [[Imperial Universities]]<ref name="Prestigious-2017">{{cite web|url=https://www.studyinternational.com/news/prestigious-imperial-universities-best-japan-rankings/|title=Prestigious 'Imperial Universities' the best in Japan – THE rankings – Study International|date=March 31, 2017|access-date=November 8, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190715045309/https://www.studyinternational.com/news/prestigious-imperial-universities-best-japan-rankings/|archive-date=July 15, 2019|url-status=dead}}</ref> in [[Japan]].

==Members==
Ivy League universities have some of the largest university [[financial endowment]]s in the world, allowing the universities to provide abundant resources for their academic programs, financial aid, and research endeavors. As of 2021, Harvard University had an endowment of $53.2&nbsp;billion, the largest of any educational institution.<ref name="The Harvard Crimson-2" /> Each university attracts millions of dollars in annual research funding from both the federal government and private sources.

===Current schools===
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center; margin-right:0;"
|-
! width= 200px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Institution
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Location
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Undergraduates
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Postgraduates
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Endowment<ref name=NACUBO>As of June 30, 2023. {{Cite web |url=https://www.nacubo.org/-/media/Nacubo/Documents/EndowmentFiles/2023-NCSE-Endowment-Market-Values-FINAL.ashx |title=U.S. and Canadian 2023 NCSE Participating Institutions Listed by Fiscal Year 2023 Endowment Market Value, Change in Market Value from FY22 to FY23, and FY23 Endowment Market Values Per Full-time Equivalent Student |date=February 15, 2024 |publisher=National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO) |access-date=February 26, 2024 |format=XLS |archive-date=February 15, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240215102011/https://www.nacubo.org/-/media/Nacubo/Documents/EndowmentFiles/2023-NCSE-Endowment-Market-Values-FINAL.ashx |url-status=dead }}</ref>(in $ billions)
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Academic staff
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Year founded
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Team name
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Colors
|-
! [[Brown University]]
| [[Providence, Rhode Island]] 
| {{nts|7349}}
| {{nts|3347}}
| $6.20 
| {{nts|736}}<ref name="Brown University">{{cite web|url=https://www.brown.edu/about/facts/faculty-and-employees|title=Faculty & Employees|publisher=Brown University|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=January 23, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190123151951/https://www.brown.edu/about/facts/faculty-and-employees|url-status=live}}</ref>
| {{year|1764}}
| [[Brown Bears|Bears]]
| {{college color boxes|Brown Bears}}
|-
! [[Columbia University]]
| [[New York City]] 
| {{nts|6716}}{{Efn|This figure does not include the [[Columbia University School of General Studies]], which, though it is an undergraduate school of the university, is generally not counted as such when calculating student body size and admission rates.<ref>{{Cite web|date=2020|title=Columbia University|url=https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/columbia-university-2707#:~:text=Columbia%20University%20is%20a%20private,campus%20size%20is%2036%20acres.|access-date=July 30, 2021|website=usnews.com|archive-date=March 2, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170302112624/https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/columbia-university-2707#:~:text=Columbia%20University%20is%20a%20private,campus%20size%20is%2036%20acres.|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=How many students attend Columbia? |publisher=Columbia Undergraduate Admissions|url=https://undergrad.admissions.columbia.edu/ask/faq/question/2512|access-date=2021-07-30|website=undergrad.admissions.columbia.edu|archive-date=July 9, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210709184742/https://undergrad.admissions.columbia.edu/ask/faq/question/2512|url-status=dead}}</ref> Including General Studies students, the university overall would have an undergraduate enrollment of 9704 students for 2024.}}
| {{nts|21987}}
| $13.64 
| {{nts|4370}}<ref name="Office of the Provost">{{cite web |title=Full-time Faculty Distribution by School/Division, Fall 2009–2019 |url=https://provost.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/content/Institutional%20Research/Statistical%20Abstract/opir_faculty_history.pdf |website=Office of the Provost |publisher=Columbia University |access-date=23 March 2020 |archive-date=June 21, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190621215433/https://provost.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/content/Institutional%20Research/Statistical%20Abstract/opir_faculty_history.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>
| {{year|1754}}
| [[Columbia Lions|Lions]]
| {{college color boxes|Columbia Lions}}
|-
! [[Cornell University]]
| [[Ithaca, New York]] 
| {{nts|15503}}
| {{nts|10097}}
| $10.04 
| {{nts|2908}}
| {{year|1865}}
| [[Cornell Big Red|Big Red]]
| {{college color boxes|Cornell Big Red}}
|-
! [[Dartmouth College]]
| [[Hanover, New Hampshire]]
| {{nts|4556}}
| {{nts|2205}}
| $7.93 
| 943
| {{year|1769}}
| [[Dartmouth Big Green|Big Green]]
| {{college color boxes|Dartmouth Big Green}}
|-
! [[Harvard University]]
| [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]]{{efn|Harvard's overall administration and undergraduate campus are in Cambridge. However, several of its postgraduate schools, its athletic administration, and almost all of its athletic facilities are within the city limits of [[Boston]].}}
| {{nts|7153}}
| {{nts|14495}}
| $49.50 
| {{nts|4671}}<ref name="Instructional Faculty Appointments">{{cite web|url=http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_09_18-19facuni.pdf |title=Instructional Faculty Appointments|access-date=February 15, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120425050912/http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_09_18-19facuni.pdf |archive-date=April 25, 2012 }}</ref>
| {{year|1636}}
| [[Harvard Crimson|Crimson]]
| {{college color boxes|Harvard Crimson}}
|-
! [[University of Pennsylvania]]
| [[Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]] 
| {{nts|9962}}
| {{nts|13469}}
| $20.96 
| {{nts|4464}}<ref name="penn facts">{{cite web|url=http://www.upenn.edu/about/facts.php|title=Penn: Penn Facts|publisher=The University of Pennsylvania|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=February 26, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100226023403/http://www.upenn.edu/about/facts.php|url-status=dead}}</ref>
| {{year|1740}}
| [[Penn Quakers|Quakers]]
| {{college color boxes|Penn Quakers}}
|-
! [[Princeton University]]
| [[Princeton, New Jersey]]
| {{nts|5321}}
| {{nts|3157}}
| $34.06 
| {{nts|1172}}
| {{year|1746}}
| [[Princeton Tigers|Tigers]]
| {{college color boxes|Princeton Tigers}}
|-
! [[Yale University]]
| [[New Haven, Connecticut]] 
| {{nts|6536}}
| {{nts|8031}}
| $40.75 
| {{nts|4140}}
| {{year|1701}}
| [[Yale Bulldogs|Bulldogs]]
| {{college color boxes|Yale Bulldogs}}
|}

===Former affiliate members===
Before the 2000s, many of the Ivy League championships for men's and women's cross country, indoor and outdoor track & field, and swimming & diving were formatted as invitationals that many schools across the eastern United States would attend. In other sports, such as fencing, wrestling, men's and women's ice hockey, and men's and women's rowing, all of the Ivy League schools were members of other single-sport conferences and the top-performing Ivy League team would be crowned the champion.

The [[United States Military Academy]] and the [[United States Naval Academy]] were members of the Ivy League in many sports and were crowned as Ivy League champions while competing with Ivy League teams. Both schools left the conference in the early 2000s to join with their current conference, the [[Patriot League]], except for football, for which they are affiliate members of the [[American Athletic Conference]].

==History==
[[File:Ivy League map.svg|thumb|Map of the eight Ivy League universities in the [[United States]]]]
===Institutional history===
{{sticky header}}
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width= 200px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Institution
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Founded as
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Founded
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Chartered
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| First instruction
! width= px style="{{CollegePrimaryStyle|Ivy League|border=1|color= white }}"| Founding affiliation
|-
! scope="row" |[[Harvard University]]
|Harvard College<ref>{{Cite web |date=2007-02-05 |title=The Harvard Guide: Cambridge |url=http://www.news.harvard.edu/guide/commu/index.html |access-date=2024-07-18 |quote=Cambridge was founded in 1630 as Newtowne. In 1637, the tiny village was designated as the location of the then-unnamed college, which would be named Harvard the following year. |archive-date=February 5, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070205041058/http://www.news.harvard.edu/guide/commu/index.html |url-status=bot: unknown }}</ref>
|1636
|1650
|1642
|[[Nonsectarian]],{{Citation needed|date=December 2024}} founded by [[Calvinism|Calvinist]] [[Congregationalism in the United States|Congregationalists]]
|-
! scope="row" |[[Yale University]]
|Collegiate School
|1701
|1701<ref name="The Yale Corporation-1976">{{cite web|year=1976|title=The Yale Corporation: Charter and Legislation|url=http://www.yale.edu/about/University-Charter.pdf|quote=By the Gov<sup>rn</sup>, in Council & Representatives of his Maj<sup>ties</sup> Colony of Connecticut in Gen<sup>rll</sup> Court Assembled, New-Haven, Oct<sup>r</sup> 9: 1701|access-date=April 24, 2021|archive-date=June 3, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140603002044/http://www.yale.edu/about/University-Charter.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>
|1702
|Calvinist (Congregationalist)
|-
! scope="row" |[[Princeton University]]
|College of New Jersey
|1746{{Efn|Princeton University has historical ties to an older college. Five of the twelve members of Princeton's first board of trustees were very closely associated with a "[[Log College]]" operated by Presbyterian minister [[William Tennent]] and his son [[Gilbert Tennent|Gilbert]] in [[Bucks County, Pennsylvania]] from 1726 until 1746.<ref name="princeton1">{{cite web |url=http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/log_college.html |title=Log College |publisher=Etcweb1.princeton.edu |access-date=February 19, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304022928/http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/log_college.html |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Because the College of New Jersey and the Log College shared the same religious affiliation (a moderate element within the "[[The Old Side-New Side Controversy|New Side]]" or "[[Old and New Light|New Light]]" wing of the [[Presbyterianism|Presbyterian Church]]) and there was a considerable overlap in their boards of trustees, some historians suggest that there is sufficient connection between this school and the College of New Jersey which would enable Princeton to claim a founding date of 1726. However, Princeton does not officially do so and a university historian says that the "facts do not warrant" such a claim.<ref name="princeton1"/>}}
|1746<ref name="The Princeton University Press-1906">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/chartersbylawsof00prin|title=The Charters and By-Laws of the Trustees of Princeton University|date=1906|publisher=The Princeton University Press|location=Princeton, NJ|pages=[https://archive.org/details/chartersbylawsof00prin/page/11 11]–20|quote=A Charter to Incorporate Sundry Persons to found a College pass'd the Great Seal of this Province of New Jersey ... the 22d October, 1746 ... The Charter thus mentioned has been lost ...}}</ref>
|1747
|Nonsectarian,<ref name="princetonchapeltour" /> founded by Calvinist [[Presbyterianism|Presbyterians]]<ref name="princetonchapeltour">{{cite web|url=https://www.princeton.edu/~oktour/virtualtour/english/Stop05.htm|title=University Chapel: Orange Key Virtual Tour of Princeton University|publisher=Princeton University}}</ref>{{Better source needed|date=December 2024}}
|-
! scope="row" |[[Columbia University]]
|King's College
|1754
|1754<ref name="New York, Printed for the College-1895">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/chartersactsoffi00colurich|title=Charters, acts and official documents together with the lease and re-lease by Trinity church of a portion of the King's farm|date=June 1895|publisher=New York, Printed for the College|pages=[https://archive.org/details/chartersactsoffi00colurich/page/10 10]–24|quote=Witness our Trusty and well beloved'James De Lancey, Esq., our Lieutenant Governor, and Commander in chief in and over our Province of New York ... this thirty first day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and fifty four, and of our Reign the twenty eighth.}}</ref>
|1754
|[[Church of England]]
|-
! scope="row" |[[University of Pennsylvania]]
|College of Philadelphia<ref name="PennFoundingYear">See [[University of Pennsylvania]] for details of the circumstances of Penn's origin.  Penn considered its founding date to be 1749 for over a century.[http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/trustees.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121125023024/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/trustees.html|date=November 25, 2012}}  In 1895, elite universities in the United States agreed that henceforth formal [[Academic procession|academic processions]] would place visiting dignitaries and other officials in the order of their institution's founding dates.  Penn's periodical "The Alumni Register," published by the General Alumni Society, then began a grassroots campaign to retroactively revise the university's founding date to 1740.  In 1899, the Board of Trustees acceded to the alumni initiative and voted to change the founding date to 1740, the date of foundation for the trust that was used to establish the school, following the usage used by Harvard University.  The rationale offered in 1899 was that, in 1750, founder Benjamin Franklin and his original board of trustees purchased a completed but unused building and assumed a trust from a group that had hoped to begin a church and charity school in Philadelphia.  This edifice was commonly called the "New Building" by local citizens and was referred to by such name in Franklin's memoirs as well as the legal bill of sale in Penn's archives.  No name is stated or known for the associated educational trust, hence "Unnamed Charity School" serves as a placeholder to refer to the trust which is the premise for Penn's association with a founding date of 1740.  The first named entity in Penn's early history was the 1751 secondary school for boys and charity school for indigent children called "Academy and Charitable School in the Province of Pennsylvania."[http://www.upenn.edu/about/heritage.php] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121020235939/http://www.upenn.edu/about/heritage.php|date=October 20, 2012}}  Undergraduate education began in 1755 and the organization then changed its name to "College, Academy and Charity School of Philadelphia in Pennsylvania."[http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/penn1700s.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060428155156/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/penn1700s.html|date=April 28, 2006}} Operation of the charity school was discontinued a few years later.</ref>
|1740 or 1749 or 1755{{efn|There is some disagreement about Penn's date of founding as the university has never used its legal charter date for this purpose and, in addition, took the unusual step of changing its official founding date approximately 150 years after the fact. The first meeting of the founding trustees of the secondary school which eventually became the [[University of Pennsylvania]] took place in November 1749. Secondary instruction for boys at the ''[[Academy of Philadelphia]]'' began in August 1751. Undergraduate education for men began after a collegiate charter for the ''[[College of Philadelphia]]'' was granted in 1755. Penn initially designated 1750 as its founding date. Sometime later in its early history, Penn began to refer to 1749 instead. The school considered 1749 to be its founding date for more than a century until, in 1895, elite universities in the United States agreed that formal [[academic procession]]s would place visiting dignitaries and other officials in the order of their institution's founding dates. Four years later in 1899, Penn's board of trustees voted to retroactively revise the university's founding date from 1749 to 1740 in order to become older than Princeton, which had been chartered in 1746. The premise for this revised founding date was that the Academy of Philadelphia purchased the building and assumed the educational mandate of an inactive trust which had originally hoped to open a charity school for indigent children. This was part of a 1740 project that had been planned to comprise both a church and school though because of insufficient funding, only the church was built and even it was never put into use. The dormant church building was conveyed to the Academy of Philadelphia in 1750.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/entry.html |title=Table of Contents, Penn History, University of Pennsylvania University Archives |publisher=Archives.upenn.edu |access-date=February 19, 2012 |archive-date=February 25, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120225124708/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/entry.html |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.upenn.edu/gazette/0902/thomas.html |title=Gazette: Building Penn's Brand (Sept/Oct 2002) |publisher=Upenn.edu |access-date=February 19, 2012 |archive-date=November 20, 2005 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051120020503/http://www.upenn.edu/gazette/0902/thomas.html |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.princeton.edu/mudd/news/faq/topics/older.shtml |title=Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library: FAQ Princeton University vs. University of Pennsylvania: Which is the older institution? |publisher=Princeton.edu |date=November 6, 2007 |access-date=February 19, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030319132644/http://www.princeton.edu/mudd/news/faq/topics/older.shtml |archive-date=March 19, 2003 |df=mdy-all }}</ref>

}}
|1755
|1755
|Nonsectarian,<ref name="Penn">Penn's website, like other sources, makes an important point of Penn's heritage being nonsectarian, associated with [[Benjamin Franklin]] and the Academy of Philadelphia's nonsectarian board of trustees: "The goal of Franklin's nonsectarian, practical plan would be the education of a business and governing class rather than of clergymen."[http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/penn1700s.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060428155156/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/penn1700s.html|date=April 28, 2006}}. Jencks and Riesman (2001) write "The Anglicans who founded the University of Pennsylvania, however, were evidently anxious not to alienate Philadelphia's Quakers, and they made their new college officially nonsectarian."  In Franklin's 1749 founding [http://www.archives.upenn.edu/primdocs/1749proposals.html Proposals relating to the education of youth in Pensilvania] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060504075701/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/primdocs/1749proposals.html|date=May 4, 2006}} [http://dewey.library.upenn.edu/sceti/printedbooksNew/index.cfm?TextID=franklin_youth&PagePosition=20 (page images)] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071018223123/http://dewey.library.upenn.edu/sceti/printedbooksNew/index.cfm?TextID=franklin_youth&PagePosition=20|date=October 18, 2007}}, religion is not mentioned directly as a subject of study, but he states in a footnote that the study of "''History'' will also afford frequent Opportunities of showing the Necessity of a ''Publick Religion,'' from its Usefulness to the Publicks; the Advantage of a Religious Character among private Persons; the Mischiefs of Superstition, &c. and the Excellency of the CHRISTIAN RELIGION above all others antient or modern." Starting in 1751, the same trustees also operated a Charity School for Boys, whose curriculum combined "general principles of Christianity" with practical instruction leading toward careers in business and the "mechanical arts." [http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/charitysch.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060620024258/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/1700s/charitysch.html|date=June 20, 2006}}, and thus might be described as "non-denominational Christian." The charity school was originally planned and a trust was organized on paper in 1740 by followers of travelling evangelist [[George Whitefield]].  The school was to have operated inside a church supported by the same group of adherents.  But the organizers ran short of financing and, although the frame of the building was raised, the interior was left unfinished.  The founders of the Academy of Philadelphia purchased the unused building in 1750 for their new venture and, in the process, assumed the original trust.  Since 1899, Penn has claimed a founding date of 1740, based on the organizational date of the charity school and the premise that it had institutional identity with the Academy of Philadelphia. Whitefield was a firebrand Methodist associated with [[Great Awakening|The Great Awakening]]; since the Methodists did not formally break from the Church of England until 1784, Whitefield in 1740 would be labeled [[Church of England|Episcopalian]], and in fact ''Brown'' University, emphasizing its own pioneering nonsectarianism, refers to Penn's origin as "Episcopalian".[https://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120118080913/http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html|date=January 18, 2012}} Penn is sometimes assumed to have Quaker ties (its athletic teams are called "Quakers," and the cross-registration alliance between Penn, Haverford, Swarthmore and Bryn Mawr is known as the "Quaker Consortium.") But Penn's website does not assert any formal affiliation with Quakerism, historic or otherwise, and [[Haverford College]] implicitly asserts a non-Quaker origin for Penn when it states that "Founded in 1833, Haverford is the oldest institution of higher learning with Quaker roots in North America."{{cite web |title=About Haverford College |url=http://www.haverford.edu/publicrelations/news/QandA.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120204054925/https://www.haverford.edu/publicrelations/news/QandA.html |archive-date=February 4, 2012 |access-date=February 19, 2012}}</ref> founded by [[Church of England]]/[[Methodism|Methodist]] members<ref name="Dulany Addison-1911">{{cite EB1911 |wstitle=Protestant Episcopal Church |volume=22 |pages=473–475 |first=Daniel |last=Dulany Addison }}</ref><ref name="Brown.edu">{{cite web |url=https://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html |title=Brown Admission: Our History |publisher=Brown.edu |access-date=January 30, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110208022301/http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html |archive-date=February 8, 2011 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
|-
! scope="row" |[[Brown University]]
|College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations
|1764
|1764
|1765<ref name="Hoeveler">Hoeveler, David J., ''Creating the American Mind: Intellect and Politics in the Colonial Colleges'', Rowman & Littlefield, 2007, p. 192</ref>
|[[Baptist]], founding charter promises "no religious tests" and "full liberty of conscience"<ref name="Cambridge University Press-1911">Brown's website characterizes it as "the Baptist answer to Congregationalist Yale and Harvard; Presbyterian Princeton; and Episcopalian Penn and Columbia," but adds that at the time it was "the only one that welcomed students of all religious persuasions."[https://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120118080913/http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Admission/gettoknowus/ourhistory.html|date=January 18, 2012}} Brown's charter stated that "into this liberal and catholic institution shall never be admitted any religious tests, but on the contrary, all the members hereof shall forever enjoy full, free, absolute, and uninterrupted liberty of conscience." The charter called for twenty-two of the thirty-six trustees to be Baptists, but required that the remainder be "five Friends, four Congregationalists, and five Episcopalians."{{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Providence|volume=22|page=511}}</ref>
|-
! scope="row" |[[Dartmouth College]]
|Dartmouth College
|1769
|1769<ref name="Dartmouth College Charter">{{cite web|title=Dartmouth College Charter|url=http://www.dartmouth.edu/~library/rauner/dartmouth/dc-charter.html|quote=In testimony whereof, we have caused these our letters to be made patent, and the public seal of our said province of New Hampshire to be hereunto affixed. Witness our trusty and well beloved John Wentworth, Esquire, Governor and commander-in-chief in and over our said province, [etc.], this thirteenth day of December, in the tenth year of our reign, and in the year of our Lord 1769.|access-date=April 24, 2021|archive-date=September 27, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150927001030/https://www.dartmouth.edu/~library/rauner/dartmouth/dc-charter.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>
|1769
|Calvinist (Congregationalist)
|-
! scope="row" |[[Cornell University]]
|Cornell University
|1865
|1865
|1868<ref name="Geiger-2000">{{Cite book|last=Geiger|first=Roger L.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T7nFTW57MgcC|title=The American College in the Nineteenth Century|date=2000|publisher=Vanderbilt University Press|isbn=978-0-8265-1364-9|pages=163|language=en}}</ref>
|Nonsectarian
|}

:<small>'''Note:''' Six of the eight Ivy League universities consider their founding dates to be simply the date that they received their charters and thus became legal corporations with the authority to grant academic degrees. Harvard University uses the date that the legislature of the Massachusetts Bay Colony formally allocated funds for the creation of a college. Harvard was chartered in 1650, although classes had been conducted for approximately a decade by then. The University of Pennsylvania's founding date is discussed in the footnote above. "Religious affiliation" refers to financial sponsorship, formal association with, and promotion by, a religious denomination. All of the institutions in the Ivy League are private (Cornell includes both private and state-supported schools) and are no longer associated with any religion.</small>

=== Origin of the name ===
{{Multiple image
| perrow= 2 | total_width = 400
| image1 = Das östliche Eingangstor der Brown University.jpg
| caption1 = Soldiers Memorial Gate (1921) at [[Brown University]]
| image2 = Columbia University New York November 2016 002.jpg
| caption2 = [[Low Memorial Library]] (1895) at [[Columbia University]]
| image3 = Olive Tjaden Hall, Cornell University.jpg
| caption3 = Tjaden Hall (1883) at [[Cornell University]]
| image4 = Baker-Library-Dartmouth-College-Hanover-New-Hampshire-05-2018a.jpg
| caption4 = [[Baker-Berry Library]] (1928) at [[Dartmouth College]]
| image5 = Widener Library.jpg
| caption5= [[Widener Library]] (1915) at [[Harvard University]]
| image6 = Alexander Hall, the home to both the Princeton University Orchestra and the Princeton Symphony Orchestra (edited).jpg
| caption6 = [[Alexander Hall (Princeton University)|Alexander Hall]] (1894) at [[Princeton University]]
| image7 = North facade of College Hall, Penn Campus.jpg
| caption7 = [[College Hall (University of Pennsylvania)|College Hall]] (1873) at the [[University of Pennsylvania]]
| image8 = Connecticut Hall, Yale University.jpg
| caption8 = [[Connecticut Hall]] (1752) on [[Old Campus (Yale University)|Yale University's Old Campus]]
| alt1 =
}}
"Planting the [[Hedera|ivy]]" was a customary class day ceremony at many colleges in the 1800s. In 1893, an alumnus told ''[[The Harvard Crimson]]'', "In 1850, class day was placed upon the University Calendar&nbsp;... the custom of planting the ivy, while the ivy oration was delivered, arose about this time."<ref>{{cite web|title=Class Day, New and Old|url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1893/6/3/class-day-old-and-new-it-is/ |website=The Harvard Crimson |date=June 3, 1893 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230405235748/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1893/6/3/class-day-old-and-new-it-is/?print=1 |archive-date= Apr 5, 2023 }}</ref> At Penn, graduating seniors started the custom of planting ivy at a university building each spring in 1873 and that practice was formally designated as "[[Ivy stone|Ivy Day]]" in 1874.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Penn: Ivy day and Ivy Stones, a Penn Tradition|url=http://www.upenn.edu/spotlights/ivy-day-and-ivy-stones-penn-tradition|access-date=December 9, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120715230153/http://www.upenn.edu/spotlights/ivy-day-and-ivy-stones-penn-tradition|archive-date=July 15, 2012|url-status=dead}}</ref> Ivy planting ceremonies are recorded at [[Yale University]], [[Simmons College (Massachusetts)|Simmons College]], and [[Bryn Mawr College]] among other schools.<ref>{{cite news |newspaper=Boston Daily Globe |date=June 27, 1882 |page=4 |title=CLASS DAY.: Yale Seniors Plant the Ivy, Sing 'Blage,' and Entertain the Beauty of New Haven}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |newspaper=Boston Evening Transcript |date=June 11, 1912 |page=12 |title=Simmons Seniors Hosts Class Day Exercises Late in Afternoon, Planting of the Ivy will be One of the Features}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|date=June 9, 1907|title=Play a Romance and Plant Ivy, Pretty Class Day Exercises of the Women's College|newspaper=The Gazette Times|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1126&dat=19070609&id=uXpRAAAAIBAJ&pg=4741,1858451|access-date=October 22, 2012}}</ref> Princeton's "Ivy Club" was founded in 1879.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Ivy Club: History|url=http://theivyclub.net/history/|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111014234433/http://theivyclub.net/history/|archive-date=October 14, 2011}}</ref>

The first usage of ''Ivy'' in reference to a group of colleges is from sportswriter [[Stanley Woodward (editor)|Stanley Woodward]] (1895–1965).

{{blockquote|A proportion of our eastern ivy colleges are meeting little fellows another Saturday before plunging into the strife and the turmoil.|Stanley Woodward, ''[[New-York Tribune]]'', October 14, 1933, describing the football season<ref name="quotations">{{cite book |title=Yale Book of Quotations |year=2006 |publisher=[[Yale University Press]] |editor-first=Fred R. |editor-last=Shapiro}}</ref>}}

The first known instance of the term ''Ivy League'' appeared in ''[[The Christian Science Monitor]]'' on February 7, 1935.<ref name=officialhistory/><ref name="quotations"/><ref>{{cite OED|Ivy League}}</ref> Several sportswriters and other journalists used the term shortly later to refer to the older colleges, those along the northeastern seaboard of the United States, chiefly the nine institutions with origins dating from the [[Colonial colleges|colonial era]], together with the [[United States Military Academy]] (West Point), the [[United States Naval Academy]], and a few others. These schools were known for their long-standing traditions in intercollegiate athletics, often being the first schools to participate in such activities. At this time, however, none of these institutions made efforts to form an athletic league.

A common [[folk etymology]] attributes the name to the [[Roman numeral]] for four ({{rn|IV}}), asserting that there was such a sports league originally with four members. The ''Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins'' helped to perpetuate this belief. The supposed "{{rn|IV}} League" was formed over a century ago and consisted of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and a fourth school that varies depending on who is telling the story.<ref>Various ''Dear Uncle Ezra'' student columns report the "IV League" explanation, apparently relying on the ''Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins'' as the sole source.<!--If this was published in a magazine/newspaper, please cite that as work below and move "Dear Uncle Ezra..." to department-->
* {{cite web |url=https://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=895550400#question13 |title=Question 13 |work=Dear Uncle Ezra... |publisher=Cornell University |date=May 19, 1998 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030722214918/http://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=895550400#question13|archive-date=July 22, 2003}}
* {{cite web |url=https://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=798955200#question9 |title=Question 9 |work=Dear Uncle Ezra... |publisher=Cornell University  |date=April 27, 1995 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030721134212/http://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=798955200#question9 |archive-date=July 21, 2003}}
* {{cite web |url=https://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=639892800#question5 |title=Question 5 |work=Dear Uncle Ezra... |publisher=Cornell University |date=April 12, 1990 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030524211531/http://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=639892800#question5|archive-date=May 24, 2003}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/current/2002/101702/askbenny.html |work=The Penn Current |date=October 17, 2002 |title=How did the Ivy League get its name? |department=Ask Benny |publisher=University of Pennsylvania |access-date=January 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100606232308/http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/current/2002/101702/askbenny.html |archive-date=June 6, 2010 }}</ref> However, it is clear that Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and Yale met on November 23, 1876, at the so-called Massasoit Convention to decide on uniform rules for the emerging game of American football, which rapidly spread.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/sports/football/1800s/origins.html |title=Penn Football in the 1800s |publisher=University of Pennsylvania |access-date=January 30, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100718192438/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/sports/football/1800s/origins.html |archive-date=July 18, 2010 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===Pre-Ivy League===
Seven out of the eight Ivy League schools are [[Colonial colleges|Colonial Colleges]]: institutions of higher education founded prior to the [[American Revolution]]. Cornell, the exception to this commonality, was founded immediately after the [[American Civil War]]. These seven colleges served as the primary institutions of higher learning in [[British America]]'s [[New England|Northern]] and [[Middle Colonies]]. During the colonial era, the schools' faculties and founding boards were largely drawn from other Ivy League institutions. Also represented were British graduates from the [[University of Cambridge]], the [[University of Oxford]], the [[University of St. Andrews]], and the [[University of Edinburgh]].

The influence of these institutions on the founding of other colleges and universities is notable. This included the Southern public college movement which blossomed in the decades surrounding the turn of the 19th century when Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia established what became the flagship universities of their respective states. In 1801, a majority of the first board of trustees for what became the [[University of South Carolina]] were Princeton alumni. They appointed [[Jonathan Maxcy]], a Brown graduate, as the university's first president. [[Thomas Cooper (American politician, born 1759)|Thomas Cooper]], an Oxford alumnus and University of Pennsylvania faculty member, became the second president of the South Carolina college. The founders of the [[University of California]] came from Yale, hence [[University of California, Berkeley|Berkeley]]'s colors are [[Yale Blue]] and California Gold.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://resource.berkeley.edu/r_html/r01_04.html |title=Resource: Student history |publisher=Resource.berkeley.edu |access-date=January 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100909165637/http://resource.berkeley.edu/r_html/r01_04.html |archive-date=September 9, 2010 }}</ref> [[Stanford University]] has, since its earliest days, been nicknamed the "Cornell of the West": more than half of Stanford's initial faculty, as well as its first two presidents, had connections to Cornell as alumni or faculty.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Davis |first1=Margo Baumgartner|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oe0qpzomMwkC&pg=PA14|title=The Stanford Album: A Photographic History, 1885–1945 |last2=Nilan |first2=Roxanne |date=1989 |publisher=Stanford University Press|isbn=978-0-8047-1639-0 |page=14}}</ref>

A plurality of the Ivy League schools have identifiable [[Protestant]] roots. Harvard, Yale, and Dartmouth all held early associations with the [[Congregational church|Congregationalists]]. Princeton was financed by [[The Old Side-New Side Controversy|New Light]] Presbyterians, though originally led by a Congregationalist. Brown was founded by Baptists, though the university's charter stipulated that students should enjoy "full liberty of conscience." Columbia was founded by Anglicans, who composed 10 of the college's first 15 presidents. Penn and Cornell were officially nonsectarian, though Protestants were well represented in their respective founding. In the early nineteenth century, the specific purpose of training Calvinist ministers was handed off to [[Seminary|theological seminaries]], but a denominational tone and religious traditions including compulsory chapel often lasted well into the twentieth century.

"Ivy League" is sometimes used as a way of referring to an elite class, even though institutions such as Cornell University were among the first in the United States to reject racial and gender discrimination in their admissions policies. This dates back to at least 1935.<ref>{{cite book | title=Snobbery: The American Version | first=Joseph | last=Epstein | year=2003 | publisher=Houghton Mifflin | isbn=0-618-34073-4 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/snobbery00jose }} p. 55, "by WASP Baltzell meant something much more specific; he intended to cover a select group of people who passed through a congeries of elite American institutions: certain eastern [[University-preparatory school|prep schools]], the Ivy League colleges, and the [[Episcopal Church (United States)|Episcopal Church]] among them."</ref> Novels and memoirs attest this sense, as a social elite; to some degree independent of the actual schools.<ref name="autogenerated1">{{cite book|last=Auchincloss|first=Louis|url=https://archive.org/details/eastsidestorynov00auch_0|title=East Side Story|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|year=2004|isbn=0-618-45244-3}} p. 179, "he dreaded the aridity of snobbery which he knew infected the Ivy League colleges"</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=McDonald|first=Janet|title=Project Girl|publisher=University of California Press|year=2000|isbn=0-520-22345-4}} p. 163 "''Newsweek'' is a morass of incest, nepotism, elitism, racism and utter classic white male patriarchal corruption. ... It is completely Ivy League – a Vassar/Columbia J-School dumping ground ... I will always be excluded, regardless of how many Ivy League degrees I acquire, because of the next level of hurdles: family connections and money."</ref>

===History of the athletic league===
====19th century====
[[File:Yale's four-oared crew team with 1876 Centennial Regatta trophy.jpg|thumb|Yale University's four-oared [[rowing|crew]] team, posing with the 1876 Centennial [[Regatta]] trophy]]
[[File:Harvard vs yale program 1875.jpg|thumb|The 1875 program for the [[Harvard Crimson|Harvard]] vs. [[Yale Bulldogs|Yale]] game played using [[Rugby football|rugby]] rules]]
In 1870, the nation's first formal athletic league was created in 1870 with the formation of the [[Rowing Association of American Colleges]] (RAAC), composed exclusively of Ivy League universities. RAAC hosted a national championship in rowing  from 1870 to 1894.

The first [[Harvard–Yale football rivalry|Harvard vs Yale]] rugby football contest was held in 1875, two years after the inaugural [[Princeton–Yale football rivalry|Princeton–Yale]] rugby football contest. Harvard athlete Nathaniel Curtis challenged [[1875 Yale Bulldogs football team|Yale]]'s captain, William Arnold to a rugby-style game.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/lot.171.html/2005/important-sports-memorabilia-and-cards-n08155|title=First Harvard versus Yale Football Game Program, 1875 - lot - Sotheby's|work=sothebys.com|access-date=January 14, 2024|archive-date=January 11, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210111203156/http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/lot.171.html/2005/important-sports-memorabilia-and-cards-n08155|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theunbalancedline.com/2010/03/year-by-year-1875.html|title=Year by Year 1875|work=theunbalancedline.com}}</ref>
Program for the "Foot Ball Match", Harvard v Yale, the first intercollegiate game. It is considered the first rugby game between Ivy League teams. The game was played at [[Hamilton Park (New Haven)|Hamilton Park]], a venue in [[New Haven, Connecticut]] (located at the intersection of Whalley Avenue and West Park Avenue<ref name=Stannard>Ed Stannard, [http://www.newhavenregister.com/articles/2009/02/08/news/new_haven/ctoldnewhaven.txt Photography exhibit reveals 'lost New Haven'] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120306222022/http://www.newhavenregister.com/articles/2009/02/08/news/new_haven/ctoldnewhaven.txt |date=2012-03-06 }}, The New Haven Register, Sunday, February 8, 2009</ref>). The two teams played with 15 players (rugby) on a side instead of 11 (soccer) as Yale would have preferred.

In 1881, [[University of Pennsylvania|Penn]], [[Harvard College]], [[Haverford College]], Princeton University (then known as College of New Jersey), and Columbia University (then known as Columbia College) formed The [[Intercollegiate sports team champions#Cricket|Intercollegiate Cricket Association]],<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/10/penn-cricket-team-historical-feature |title=Penn's oldest sport goes back 168 years, and it's not one you might think |website=www.thedp.com |access-date=April 17, 2021}}</ref> which [[Cornell University]] later joined.<ref name="web.archive.org">{{cite web |url=http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/sports/cricket/1864.html |website= |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20180723200322/http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/sports/cricket/1864.html|access-date=April 17, 2021|archive-date= July 23, 2018|title=Cricket: Penn's First Organized Sport}}</ref> Penn won The Intercollegiate Cricket Association championship 23 times, including 18 solo victories and three shared with Haverford and Harvard, one shared with Haverford and Cornell, and one shared with just Haverford, during the 44 years that the Intercollegiate Cricket Association existed from 1881 through 1924.<ref>Haverford won such championship 19 times (3 shared with Penn and Harvard, 1 shared with Penn and Cornell, and 1 shared with Penn), and, in third place, Harvard won it 6 times, none after 1899 (3 shared with Haverford and Penn) accessed April 18, 2021.</ref>

In 1895, Cornell, Columbia, and Penn founded the [[Intercollegiate Rowing Association]], which remains the oldest collegiate athletic organizing body in the US. To this day, the IRA Championship Regatta determines the national champion in rowing and all of the Ivies are regularly invited to compete.

A basketball league was later created in 1902, when Columbia, Cornell, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton formed the [[Eastern Intercollegiate Basketball League]]; they were later joined by Penn and Dartmouth.

====20th century====
In 1906, the organization that eventually became the [[NCAA|National Collegiate Athletic Association]] was formed, primarily to formalize rules for the emerging sport of football. But of the 39 original member colleges in the NCAA, only two of them (Dartmouth and Penn) later became Ivies. In February 1903, intercollegiate wrestling began when Yale accepted a challenge from Columbia, published in the Yale News. The dual meet took place prior to a basketball game hosted by Columbia and resulted in a tie.

Two years later, Penn and Princeton also added wrestling teams, leading to the formation of the student-run Intercollegiate Wrestling Association, now the [[Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association]] (EIWA), the first and oldest collegiate wrestling league in the US.<ref>{{cite news | title = Columbia Celebrates College Wrestling Centennial | publisher = Columbia College Today | url = http://www.college.columbia.edu/cct_archive/may03/features5.php | access-date = September 4, 2014 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20141010054526/http://www.college.columbia.edu/cct_archive/may03/features5.php | archive-date = October 10, 2014 | url-status=dead }}</ref>

[[File:Yale-Princeton May 30 1882.jpg|thumb|A sketch of the Yale versus Princeton baseball game on May 30, 1882]]
Though schools now in Ivy League (such as Yale and Columbia) played against each other in the 1880s, it was not until 1930 that Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Penn, Princeton and Yale formed the [[Eastern Intercollegiate Baseball League]]; they were later joined by Harvard, Brown, Army and Navy. Before the formal establishment of the Ivy League, there was an "unwritten and unspoken agreement among certain Eastern colleges on athletic relations". The earliest reference to the "Ivy colleges" came in 1933, when [[Stanley Woodward (editor)|Stanley Woodward]] of the ''[[New York Herald Tribune]]'' used it to refer to the eight current members plus Army.<ref name=officialhistory/> In 1935, the [[Associated Press]] reported on an example of collaboration between the schools:

{{blockquote|The athletic authorities of the so-called "Ivy League" are considering drastic measures to curb the increasing tendency toward riotous attacks on goal posts and other encroachments by spectators on playing fields.|The Associated Press|''The New York Times''<ref>{{cite news | agency = Associated Press | title = Colleges Searching for Check On Trend to Goal Post Riots | work = The New York Times | page = 33 | date = 1935-12-06 | url = https://www.nytimes.com/1935/12/06/archives/colleges-searching-for-check-on-trend-to-goal-post-riots-eastern.html | access-date = July 23, 2018 | archive-date = July 24, 2018 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180724002313/https://www.nytimes.com/1935/12/06/archives/colleges-searching-for-check-on-trend-to-goal-post-riots-eastern.html | url-status = live }}</ref>}}

Despite such collaboration, the universities did not seem to consider the formation of the league as imminent. [[Romeyn Berry]], Cornell's manager of athletics, reported the situation in January 1936 as follows:

{{blockquote|text=I can say with certainty that in the last five years—and markedly in the last three months—there has been a strong drift among the eight or ten universities of the East which see a good deal of one another in sport toward a closer bond of confidence and cooperation and toward the formation of a common front against the threat of a breakdown in the ideals of amateur sport in the interests of supposed expediency.

Please do not regard that statement as implying the organization of an Eastern conference or even a poetic "Ivy League". That sort of thing does not seem to be in the cards at the moment.<ref>{{cite news | first = Robert F. | last = Kelley | title = Cornell Club Here Welcomes Lynah | work = The New York Times | page = 22 | date = 1936-01-17}}</ref>}}

Within a year of this statement and having held month-long discussions about the proposal, on December 3, 1936, the idea of "the formation of an Ivy League" gained enough traction among the undergraduate bodies of the universities that the ''[[Columbia Daily Spectator]]'', ''[[The Cornell Daily Sun]]'', ''[[The Dartmouth]]'', ''[[The Harvard Crimson]]'', ''[[The Daily Pennsylvanian]]'', ''[[The Daily Princetonian]]'' and the ''[[Yale Daily News]]'' would simultaneously run an editorial entitled "Now Is the Time", encouraging the seven universities to form the league in an effort to preserve the ideals of athletics.<ref>{{cite news | title = Immediate Formation of Ivy League Advocated at Seven Eastern Colleges | work = The New York Times | page = 33 | date = December 3, 1936}}</ref> Part of the editorial read as follows:

{{blockquote|The Ivy League exists already in the minds of a good many of those connected with football, and we fail to see why the seven schools concerned should be satisfied to let it exist as a purely nebulous entity where there are so many practical benefits which would be possible under definite organized association. The seven colleges involved fall naturally together by reason of their common interests and similar general standards and by dint of their established national reputation they are in a particularly advantageous position to assume leadership for the preservation of the ideals of intercollegiate athletics.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=456169 |title=The Harvard Crimson :: News :: AN EDITORIAL |publisher=Thecrimson.com |date=1936-12-03 |access-date=2011-01-30 |archive-date=October 16, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071016204452/http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=456169 |url-status=dead }}</ref>}}

The Ivies have been competing in sports as long as intercollegiate sports have existed in the United States. Rowing teams from Harvard and Yale met in the first sporting event held between students of two U.S. colleges on [[Lake Winnipesaukee]], [[New Hampshire]], on August 3, 1852. Harvard's team, "The Oneida", won the race and was presented with trophy black walnut oars from then-presidential nominee General [[Franklin Pierce]]. The proposal to create an athletic league did not succeed. On January 11, 1937, the athletic authorities at the schools rejected the "possibility of a [[heptagon]]al league in football such as these institutions maintain in basketball, baseball and track." However, they noted that the league "has such promising possibilities that it may not be dismissed and must be the subject of further consideration."<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1937/01/12/archives/plea-for-an-ivy-football-league-rejected-by-college-authorities.html |title = Plea for an Ivy Football League Rejected by College Authorities | work = The New York Times | page = 26 | date = January 12, 1937}}</ref>

====Integration of athletic competition in the ''Ivy League''====
[[File:The 1879 Brown University Baseball Team.jpg|thumb|The 1879 Brown varsity baseball team. [[William Edward White|W.E. White]] (seated second from right) may have been the [[Baseball color line|first African-American]] to play major league baseball.<ref>Robert Siegel, "Black Baseball Pioneer William White's 1879 Game," National Public Radio, broadcast January 30, 2004 (audio at npr.org); Stefan Fatsis, [https://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB107541676333815810 "Mystery of Baseball: Was William White Game's First Black?"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140307215344/http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB107541676333815810 |date=March 7, 2014 }}, ''Wall Street Journal'', January 30, 2004; Peter Morris and Stefan Fatsis, "Baseball's Secret Pioneer: William Edward White, the first black player in major-league history," ''Slate'', February 4, 2014; Rick Harris, ''Brown University Baseball: A Legacy of the game'' (Charleston: The History Press, 2012), pp. 41–43</ref>]]
The integration of athletics followed a similar pattern to the overall integration of the Ivy League's in the 19th and early 20th century. There was no active policy that would discriminate against incorporating Black student athletes into the athletic coalition. Harvard has the earliest record of breaking the color barrier in athletics after recruiting [[William H. Lewis|William Henry Lewis]] to their [[Harvard Crimson football|football team]] in 1892.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Harvard Athletics and Black History |url=https://gocrimson.com/news/2021/1/19/general-harvard-athletics-and-black-history.aspx |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=Harvard University |date=February 2021 |language=en |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183202/https://gocrimson.com/news/2021/1/19/general-harvard-athletics-and-black-history.aspx |url-status=live }}</ref> Dartmouth followed suit, with Black athletes integrating onto their football teams in 1904.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Black History Month: Pioneer Profiles |url=https://dartmouthsports.com/news/2021/2/18/black-history-month-pioneer-profiles-210217.aspx |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=Dartmouth College Athletics |language=en |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183204/https://dartmouthsports.com/news/2021/2/18/black-history-month-pioneer-profiles-210217.aspx |url-status=live }}</ref> Brown integrated their football team shortly after, in 1916.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Fritz Pollard, Class of 1919 |url=https://www.brown.edu/about/history/timeline/fritz-pollard-class-1919 |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=Brown University Timeline |language=en |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183206/https://www.brown.edu/about/history/timeline/fritz-pollard-class-1919 |url-status=live }}</ref> Cornell would follow suit in 1937.

[[File:Track (men's), 1907 ICAA point winners UPenn.jpg|thumb|right|The University of Pennsylvania men's track team was the 1907 [[IC4A]] point winner. Left to right: Guy Haskins, R.C. Folwell, T.R. Moffitt, [[John Taylor (relay runner)|John Baxter Taylor, Jr.]], the first black athlete in the U.S. to win a gold medal in the Olympics,<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/79112 |title=John Taylor |work=Olympedia |access-date=5 March 2021 |archive-date=August 16, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240816111659/https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/79112 |url-status=live }}</ref> [[Nathaniel Cartmell]], and J.D. Whitham (seated)]]
Penn had black students on their track and field team as early as 1903 ([[John Taylor (relay runner)|John Baxter Taylor, Jr.]], the first black athlete in the U.S. to win a gold medal in the Olympics) and a black student was named captain of the track team in 1918.<ref>{{Cite web |last=March |first=Lochlahn |title=Breaking barriers: Documenting the illustrious history of Black athletes at Penn |url=https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/09/penn-athletics-black-documenting-illustrious-history-ivy-league-discrimination-integration |access-date=2023-09-13 |website=www.thedp.com |language=en-us |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183215/https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/09/penn-athletics-black-documenting-illustrious-history-ivy-league-discrimination-integration |url-status=live }}</ref> Columbia's track and field team would be integrated in 1934.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ben Johnson {{!}} Columbia Celebrates Black History and Culture |url=https://blackhistory.news.columbia.edu/people/ben-johnson |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=blackhistory.news.columbia.edu |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183204/https://blackhistory.news.columbia.edu/people/ben-johnson |url-status=live }}</ref> Basketball would become integrated at Yale in 1926,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Jay Swift, the first African-American to play a varsity sport at Yale, is remembered here during Black History Month |date=February 14, 2018 |url=https://roundballdaily.com/2018/02/13/jay-swift-first-african-american-play-varsity-sport-yale-remembered-black-history-month/ |access-date=2022-12-08 |language=en-US |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208184706/https://roundballdaily.com/2018/02/13/jay-swift-first-african-american-play-varsity-sport-yale-remembered-black-history-month/ |url-status=live }}</ref> at Princeton in 1947.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ivy League Black History |url=http://ivy50.com/blackhistory/story.aspx?sid=1/7/2009 |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=ivy50.com |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208183200/http://ivy50.com/blackhistory/story.aspx?sid=1/7/2009 |url-status=live }}</ref>

====Post-World War II====
In 1945 the presidents of the eight schools signed the first ''Ivy Group Agreement'', which set academic, financial, and athletic standards for the [[American football|football]] teams.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://ivyleague.com/sports/2017/7/28/history-timeline-index.aspx|title=A History of Tradition|website=ivyleague.com|access-date=July 28, 2023|archive-date=July 28, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230728001700/https://ivyleague.com/sports/2017/7/28/history-timeline-index.aspx|url-status=live}}</ref> The principles established reiterated those put forward in the Harvard-Yale-Princeton presidents' Agreement of 1916. The Ivy Group Agreement established the core tenet that an applicant's ability to play on a team would not influence admissions decisions:

{{blockquote|The members of the Group reaffirm their prohibition of athletic scholarships. Athletes shall be admitted as students and awarded financial aid only on the basis of the same academic standards and economic need as are applied to all other students.<ref>{{cite news|last=Gwertzman |first=Bernard M. |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=128992 |title=Ivy League: Formalizing the Fact  |work=The Harvard Crimson |date=October 13, 1956 |access-date=2011-01-30}}</ref>}}

In 1954, the presidents extended the Ivy Group Agreement to all intercollegiate sports, effective with the 1955–56 basketball season. This is generally reckoned as the formal formation of the Ivy League. As part of the transition, Brown, the only Ivy that had not joined the EIBL, did so for the 1954–55 season. A year later, the Ivy League absorbed the EIBL. The Ivy League claims the EIBL's history as its own. Through the EIBL, it is the oldest basketball conference in Division I.<ref>[https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/conferences/ivy/ "Ivy Group"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150118075519/http://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/conferences/ivy/ |date=January 18, 2015}}, ''Sports-reference.com''</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/BK09.pdf|title=Official 2009 NCAA Men's Basketball Records Book – p. 221 "Division I Conference Alignment History"|access-date=February 13, 2018|archive-date=April 11, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160411094117/http://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/BK09.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>
[[File:Snow and Pforzheimer House, Harvard Campus, Cambridge, Massachusetts.JPG|thumb|[[Pforzheimer House]] (1901) at Harvard, originally part of Radcliffe College, which was fully integrated with Harvard in 1999]]
As late as the 1960s many of the Ivy League universities' undergraduate programs remained [[Open (sport)|open]] only to men, with Cornell the only one to have been coeducational from its founding (1865) and Columbia being the last (1983) to become coeducational. Before they became coeducational, many of the Ivy schools maintained extensive social ties with nearby [[Seven Sisters (colleges)|Seven Sisters]] [[women's college]]s, including weekend visits, dances and parties inviting Ivy and Seven Sisters students to mingle. This was the case not only at [[Barnard College]] and [[Radcliffe College]], which are adjacent to Columbia and Harvard, but at more distant institutions as well. The movie ''[[Animal House]]'' includes a satiric version of the formerly common visits by Dartmouth men to Massachusetts to meet [[Smith College|Smith]] and [[Mount Holyoke College|Mount Holyoke]] women, a drive of more than two hours. As noted by Irene Harwarth, Mindi Maline, and Elizabeth DeBra, "The '[[Seven Sisters (colleges)|Seven Sisters']] was the name given to Barnard, Smith, Mount Holyoke, [[Vassar College|Vassar]], [[Bryn Mawr College|Bryn Mawr]], [[Wellesley College|Wellesley]], and Radcliffe, because of their parallel to the Ivy League men's colleges."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ed.gov/offices/OERI/PLLI/webreprt.html |title=Archived: Women's Colleges in the United States: History, Issues, and Challenges |publisher=Ed.gov |access-date=January 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050204110037/http://www.ed.gov/offices/OERI/PLLI/webreprt.html |archive-date=February 4, 2005 }}</ref>

In 1982 the Ivy League considered adding two members, with Army, Navy, and [[Northwestern University|Northwestern]] as the most likely candidates; if it had done so, the league could probably have avoided being moved into the recently created Division I-AA (now Division I FCS) for football.<ref name="white19820110">{{cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/sports/ivy-league-considers-adding-2-schools.html | title=Ivy League Considers Adding 2 Schools | work=The New York Times | date=January 1, 1982 | access-date=September 18, 2013 | last=White | first=Gordon S. Jr. | archive-date=December 20, 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131220141905/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/sports/ivy-league-considers-adding-2-schools.html | url-status=live }}</ref> In 1983, following the admission of women to Columbia College, Columbia University and Barnard College entered into an athletic consortium agreement by which students from both schools compete together on Columbia University women's athletic teams, which replaced the women's teams previously sponsored by Barnard.[[File:Yale Varsity.jpg|thumb|Yale [[rowing (sport)|rowing]] team in the annual [[Harvard–Yale Regatta]], 2007]]When Army and Navy departed the Eastern Intercollegiate Baseball League in 1992, nearly all intercollegiate competition involving the eight schools became united under the Ivy League banner. The major exception is hockey, with the Ivies that sponsor hockey—all except Penn and Columbia—members of ECAC Hockey. Wrestling was a second exception through the 2023-24 academic calendar; up until that point the Ivies that sponsor wrestling—all except Dartmouth and Yale— were members of the [[Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Six Ivy League schools leaving EIWA to form own league in 2024-25 |url=https://ctwrestling.com/2023/12/six-ivy-league-schools-leaving-eiwa-to-form-own-league-in-2024-25/7734/ |access-date=26 June 2024 |publisher=Connecticut Wrestling Online |date=19 December 2023 |archive-date=June 26, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240626225821/https://ctwrestling.com/2023/12/six-ivy-league-schools-leaving-eiwa-to-form-own-league-in-2024-25/7734/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

The Ivy League was the first athletic conference to respond to the [[COVID-19 pandemic in the United States|COVID-19 pandemic]] by shutting down all athletic competition in March 2020, leaving many Spring schedules unfinished.<ref name="Higgins">{{cite news |last1=Higgins |first1=Laine |title=The Ivy League Is Still on the Sidelines. Wealthy Alumni Are Not Happy. |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ivy-league-is-still-on-the-sidelines-wealthy-alumni-are-not-happy-11613397614 |access-date=19 February 2021 |work=The Wall Street Journal |date=19 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210219170033/https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ivy-league-is-still-on-the-sidelines-wealthy-alumni-are-not-happy-11613397614?page=1 |archive-date=19 February 2021}}</ref> The Fall 2020 schedule was canceled in July, and winter sports were canceled before Thanksgiving.<ref name="Higgins" /> Of the 357 men's basketball teams in [[NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament|Division I]], only ten did not play; the Ivy League made up eight of those ten.<ref name="Higgins" /> By giving up its automatic qualifying bid to [[March madness|March Madness]], the Ivy League forfeited at least $280,000 in NCAA basketball funds.<ref name="Higgins" /> As a consequence of the pandemic, an unprecedented number of student athletes in the Ivy League either transferred to other schools, or temporarily unenrolled in hopes of maintaining their eligibility to play post-pandemic.<ref name="Higgins" /> Some Ivy alumni expressed displeasure with the League's position.<ref name="Higgins" /> In February 2021 it was reported that Yale declined a multi-million dollar offer from alum [[Joseph Tsai]] to create a sequestered "bubble" for the lacrosse team.<ref name="Higgins" /> The league announced in a May 2021 joint statement that "regular athletic competition" would resume "across all sports" in fall 2021.<ref name="GoLocalProv20210504">{{cite news |title=Ivy League Planning to Return to Regular Athletic Competition in Fall |url=https://www.golocalprov.com/sports/new-ivy-league-planning-to-return-to-regular-athletic-competition-in-fall |access-date=5 May 2021 |publisher=GoLocal Prov |date=4 May 2021 |archive-date=May 7, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210507121747/https://www.golocalprov.com/sports/new-ivy-league-planning-to-return-to-regular-athletic-competition-in-fall |url-status=live }}</ref>

Following the [[Black Lives Matter]] protests in 2020, the Ivy League Conference committed itself to uphold "diversity, equity, and inclusion," to combat racism and homophobia. At Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, and Princeton there are Black Student Athlete groups and other [[affinity group]]s that are dedicated to ensuring their organizations are committed to anti-racism and anti-homophobia.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Diversity, Equity and Inclusion |url=https://ivyleague.com/sports/2021/2/24/general-untitled-sportfile.aspx |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=ivyleague.com |language=en |archive-date=December 16, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221216142648/https://ivyleague.com/sports/2021/2/24/general-untitled-sportfile.aspx |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2023, two former Brown University basketball players sued the Ivy League alleging that by denying athletic scholarships, the 1954 "Ivy League Agreement" is anticompetititive and violates antitrust laws.<ref name="BDH20230309" /><ref name="AP20230308" /> The lawsuit claims that the agreement constitutes price-fixing in violation of the [[Sherman Antitrust Act]] of 1890, and in effect raises the cost of Ivy League education for student athletes.<ref name="BDH20230309">{{cite news |last1=Vaz |first1=Julia |title=Brown students sue Ivy League over athletic scholarship policy |url=https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2023/03/brown-students-sue-ivy-league-over-athletic-scholarship-policy |access-date=1 April 2023 |publisher=Brown Daily Herald |date=9 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230330133458/https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2023/03/brown-students-sue-ivy-league-over-athletic-scholarship-policy |archive-date=30 March 2023}}</ref><ref name="AP20230308">{{cite news |last1=Eaton-Robb |first1=Pat |title=Athletes sue Ivy League over its no-scholarship policy |url=https://apnews.com/article/ivy-league-lawsuit-athletes-brown-scholarship-771b34fa36ea06f6109435102d939299 |access-date=1 April 2023 |work=Associated Press News |date=8 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230311083335/https://apnews.com/article/ivy-league-lawsuit-athletes-brown-scholarship-771b34fa36ea06f6109435102d939299 |archive-date=11 March 2023}}</ref>

==Academics==

===Undergraduate admissions===
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center; float:left; margin-right:2em"
|+ Admission statistics (Class of 2028)
! !! Applicants !! Admission rates
|-
| '''Brown'''
| 48,898
| 5.2%<ref name="Bergman-2021">{{Cite web |last=Bergman |date=2024-03-10 |title=Class of 2028 Admission Rates |url=https://www.ivywise.com/blog/college-admission-rates/ |access-date= |website=Ivywise |language=en-US}}</ref>
|-
| '''Columbia'''
| 60,248
| 3.9%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Cornell'''
| 61,178
| 8.4%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Dartmouth'''
| 31,656
| 5.3%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Harvard'''
| 54,008
| 3.7%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Penn'''
| 65,236
| 5.4%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Princeton'''
| 39,644
| 4.6%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|-
| '''Yale'''
| 57,517
| 3.9%<ref name="Bergman-2021" />
|}
[[File:Cannon Green and Nassau Hall, Princeton University.jpg|thumb|[[Nassau Hall]] (1756) at Princeton ]]
The Ivy League schools are highly selective, with seven out of the eight universities reporting undergraduate acceptance rates below 6%. Admitted students come from around the world, although those from the [[Northeastern United States]] make up a significant proportion of students.<ref>{{cite news|last=Waldman|first=Peter|date=September 4, 2014|title=How to Get Into an Ivy League College—Guaranteed|url=http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-09-03/college-consultant-thinktank-guarantees-admission-for-hefty-price|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140904213820/http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-09-03/college-consultant-thinktank-guarantees-admission-for-hefty-price|url-status=dead|archive-date=September 4, 2014|work=Bloomberg.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=National University Rankings|url=http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110521210513/http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities|archive-date=May 21, 2011|access-date=May 11, 2011|publisher=U.S. News & World Report LP}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last1=Annicchiarico|first1=Francesca|last2=Weinstock|first2=Samuel Y.|date=September 3, 2013|title=Freshman Survey Part I: Meet Harvard's Class of 2017|url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/9/3/freshmen-employment-demographics-geography/?page=2|work=The Harvard Crimson|access-date=October 11, 2014|archive-date=August 16, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210816112142/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/9/3/freshmen-employment-demographics-geography/?page=2|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 2021, all eight Ivy League schools recorded record high numbers of applications and record low acceptance rates.<ref name="Kubzansky-2021">{{Cite web |last=Kubzansky |first=Will |date=2021-04-06 |title=Brown admits record-low 5.4 percent of applicants to the class of 2025 |url=https://www.browndailyherald.com/2021/04/06/brown-admits-record-low-5-4-percent-applicants-class-2025/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210406235148/https://www.browndailyherald.com/2021/04/06/brown-admits-record-low-5-4-percent-applicants-class-2025/ |archive-date=April 6, 2021 |access-date=2021-04-14 |website=Brown Daily Herald |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Diverse group of admitted students navigated virtual admission in most competitive year on record|url=https://www.thedartmouth.com/article/2021/04/diverse-group-of-admitted-students-navigated-virtual-admission-in-most-competitive-year-on-record|access-date=2021-04-14|website=The Dartmouth|archive-date=April 14, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414033559/https://www.thedartmouth.com/article/2021/04/diverse-group-of-admitted-students-navigated-virtual-admission-in-most-competitive-year-on-record|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="The Harvard Crimson">{{Cite web |title=Harvard College Accepts Record-Low 3.43% of Applicants to Class of 2025 |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/4/7/harvard-admissions-2025/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210412184845/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/4/7/harvard-admissions-2025/ |archive-date=April 12, 2021 |access-date=2021-04-14 |website=The Harvard Crimson}}</ref><ref name="Tilitei">{{Cite web |last=Tilitei |first=Leanna |title=Penn accepts record-low 5.68% of applicants to the Class of 2025 |url=https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/04/penn-admissions-class-of-2025-acceptance-rate |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220317060620/https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/04/penn-admissions-class-of-2025-acceptance-rate |archive-date=March 17, 2022 |access-date=2021-04-14 |website=www.thedp.com |language=en-us}}</ref><ref name="Davidson-2021">{{Cite news |last=Davidson |first=Amelia |date=April 6, 2021 |title=Yale's acceptance rate drops to 4.62 percent amid record applicant pool |url=https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2021/04/06/yales-acceptance-rate-drops-to-4-62-percent-amid-record-applicant-pool/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181113021049/https://oir.yale.edu/sites/default/files/cds_2017-2018.pdf |archive-date=November 13, 2018 |access-date=2021-04-14 |newspaper=Yale Daily News |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|date=2021-04-08|title=Thousands of Applications and 49 States Later, Cornell Admits its Class of 2025|url=https://cornellsun.com/2021/04/08/thousands-of-applications-and-49-states-later-cornell-admits-its-class-of-2025/|access-date=2021-04-14|website=The Cornell Daily Sun|language=en-US|archive-date=April 14, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414033549/https://cornellsun.com/2021/04/08/thousands-of-applications-and-49-states-later-cornell-admits-its-class-of-2025/|url-status=live}}</ref> Year-over-year increases in the number of applicants ranged from 14.5% at Princeton to 51% at Columbia.<ref name="The Princetonian">{{Cite web |title=Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants in historic application cycle |url=https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2021/04/princeton-college-admissions-class-of-2025-ivy-league |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414033549/https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2021/04/princeton-college-admissions-class-of-2025-ivy-league |archive-date=April 14, 2021 |access-date=2021-04-14 |website=The Princetonian}}</ref><ref name="Columbia Daily Spectator">{{Cite web |title=Columbia acceptance rate drops to record low 3.7 percent after 51 percent spike in applications |url=http://columbiaspectator.com/news/2021/04/07/columbia-acceptance-rate-drops-to-record-low-37-percent-after-51-percent-spike-in-applications/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210514030131/https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2021/04/07/columbia-acceptance-rate-drops-to-record-low-37-percent-after-51-percent-spike-in-applications/ |archive-date=May 14, 2021 |access-date=2021-04-14 |website=Columbia Daily Spectator}}</ref>

There have been arguments that Ivy League schools discriminate against Asian-American candidates. For example, in August 2020, the U.S. [[United States Department of Justice|Justice Department]] argued that Yale University discriminated against Asian-American candidates on the basis of their race, a charge the university denied.<ref name="CNN">{{Cite web|author=David Shortell and Taylor Romine|title=Justice Department accuses Yale of discriminating against Asian American and White applicants|url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/13/politics/justice-department-yale-discrimination/index.html|access-date=August 14, 2020|website=CNN|date=August 13, 2020|archive-date=August 14, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200814000151/https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/13/politics/justice-department-yale-discrimination/index.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Harvard faced a similar challenge from [[Students for Fair Admissions]], which ultimately won its [[Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard|case]] in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2023, leading to the end of affirmative action in college admissions.<ref>{{Cite news |title=Supreme Court guts affirmative action, effectively ending race-conscious admissions |url=https://www.npr.org/2023/06/29/1181138066/affirmative-action-supreme-court-decision |access-date=2025-02-27 |work=NPR |language=en}}</ref>

===Prestige===
{{see also|List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation}}
[[File:Brown's University Hall in 2007.jpg|thumb|[[University Hall (Brown University)|University Hall]] (1770) at Brown University]]
Members of the League have been highly ranked by various [[university rankings]]. All of the Ivy League schools are consistently ranked within the top 20 national universities by the [[U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges Ranking|''U.S. News & World Report'' Best Colleges Ranking]].<ref name="U.S. News & World Report"/>

{{col-begin}}
{{col-2}}
{|  class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; float:left; margin-right:2em"
|+ National academic rankings
! University<br /><small>(in alphabetical order)</small> !! [[Forbes]]<br /><small>(2025)</small><ref>{{cite web|title=America's Top Colleges|website=[[Forbes]]|url=https://www.forbes.com/top-colleges/|access-date=September 1, 2017|archive-date=October 28, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111028172147/http://www.forbes.com/top-colleges/|url-status=live}}</ref>!! [[U.S. News & World Report|USNWR]]<br /><small>(2025)</small><ref name="U.S. News & World Report"/>!! [[The Wall Street Journal|WSJ]]/College Pulse<br />
<small>(2025)</small><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.wsj.com/rankings/college-rankings/best-colleges-2024 |title=2024 Best Colleges in the U.S. |date=September 6, 2023 |publisher=[[The Wall Street Journal]]/College Pulse |access-date=February 26, 2024 |archive-date=September 14, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230914105737/https://www.wsj.com/rankings/college-rankings/best-colleges-2024 |url-status=live }}</ref>

|-
| '''Brown'''
|18
|13 (tie)
|36
|-
| '''Columbia'''
|6
|13 (tie)
|14
|-
| '''Cornell'''
|10
|11 (tie)
|27
|-
| '''Dartmouth'''
|16
|15 (tie)
|57
|-
| '''Harvard'''
|8
|3 
|7
|-
| '''Penn'''
|7
|10
|13
|-
| '''Princeton'''
|1
|1
|1
|-
| '''Yale'''
|4
|5
|4
|}
{{col-2}}
{|  class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; float:left; margin-right:2em"
|+ Endowment (FY2023) per student
!University!!Per [[Full-time equivalent|FTE]] Student (Fall 2022)<ref name=NACUBO />
|-
|Princeton University||$3,832,426.46
|-
|Yale University||$2,781,928.04
|-
|Harvard University||$2,032,820.27
|-
|Dartmouth College||$1,175,878.56
|-
|University of Pennsylvania|| $834,978.31
|-
|Brown University||$582,294.27
|-
|Columbia University||$447,066.03
|-
|Cornell University||$368,615.52
|}
{{col-end}}

===Collaboration===
Collaboration between the member schools is illustrated by the student-led [[Ivy Council]] that meets in the fall and spring of each year, with representatives from every Ivy League school. The governing body of the Ivy League is the Council of Ivy Group presidents, composed of each university president. During meetings, the presidents discuss common procedures and initiatives for their universities.

The universities collaborate academically through the IvyPlus Exchange Scholar Program, which allows students to cross-register at one of the Ivies or another eligible school such as [[University of California, Berkeley|Berkeley]], [[University of Chicago|Chicago]], [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology|MIT]], and [[Stanford University|Stanford]].<ref name="Princeton" /><ref name="Yale" />

==History of diversity==
=== Racial segregation and integration ===
Ivy League institutions have a complex history of racial segregation, and, eventually, integration. All of the universities in the Ivy League besides Cornell University were chartered during the [[Slavery in the United States|American era of slavery]].<ref name="Bradley-2021" /> In 2003, Brown University was the first of the Ivies to take accountability for their historic ties to slavery and the [[Atlantic slave trade#:~:text=The Atlantic slave trade, transatlantic,16th to the 19th centuries.|transatlantic slave trade]].<ref name="Brown's Slavery & Justice Report, Digital 2nd Edition | Brown University" /><ref>{{cite news |last=Editorial |date=2006-10-23 |title=Opinion {{!}} Brown University's Debt to Slavery |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/23/opinion/23mon3.html |access-date=2023-07-02 |issn=0362-4331 |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703021359/https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/23/opinion/23mon3.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Following Brown, other Ivy League universities formed committees to examine their ties to slavery, and found various institutional relationships to slavery. Yale University, for example, used profits from slave traders and owners to fund its first scholarships, libraries, and faculty positions.<ref>{{cite web |title=First Scholarship Fund |url=http://www.yaleslavery.org/Endowments/e2schol.html |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=www.yaleslavery.org |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215210913/http://yaleslavery.org/Endowments/e2schol.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=First Endowed Professorship |url=http://yaleslavery.org/Endowments/e1prof.html |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=yaleslavery.org |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215210910/http://yaleslavery.org/Endowments/e1prof.html |url-status=live }}</ref> To date, some of Yale's residential colleges are named after slave traders and supporters.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Berkeley College |url=http://www.yaleslavery.org/WhoYaleHonors/berk.html |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=www.yaleslavery.org |archive-date=November 26, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221126133541/http://yaleslavery.org/WhoYaleHonors/berk.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The investigations at Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and the University of Pennsylvania all found that, in the century following their charters, enslaved Black people lived on campus to care for students, professors, or the universities' presidents.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Harvard & Slavery |url=http://www.harvardandslavery.com/ |access-date=2022-12-15 |language=en-US |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215210911/http://www.harvardandslavery.com/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="slavery.princeton.edu" /><ref name="Time">{{cite magazine |title=This Is How Columbia University Benefited From Slavery |url=https://time.com/4645241/columbia-university-slavery-ties-report/ |access-date=2022-12-15 |magazine=Time |language=en |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215210914/https://time.com/4645241/columbia-university-slavery-ties-report/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Slave Ownership · |url=http://pennandslaveryproject.org/exhibits/show/slaveownership |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=pennandslaveryproject.org}}</ref> Notably, Princeton's first nine presidents were slave owners, and in 1766, a slave auction reportedly took place on Princeton's campus.<ref name="slavery.princeton.edu" />

A small number of Black people did attend Ivy League institutions as students during their early years. These early students, however, were not always granted degrees. For example, some Black students were recorded studying privately with the Princeton University president as early as 1774, but no Black students received Princeton degrees until the middle of the twentieth century.<ref name="Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University">{{Cite web |title=The Long Legacies of Slavery: Segregation, Marginalization, and Resistance at Harvard |url=https://legacyofslavery.harvard.edu/report/the-long-legacies-of-slavery-segregation-marginalization-and-resistance-at-harvard |access-date=2022-12-01 |website=Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University |language=en |archive-date=December 1, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221201103708/https://legacyofslavery.harvard.edu/report/the-long-legacies-of-slavery-segregation-marginalization-and-resistance-at-harvard |url-status=live }}</ref> Jonathan and Philip Gayienquitioga, two brothers of the [[Mohawk Nation|Mohawk People]],<ref>{{cite web|title=Mohawk Nation Council of Chiefs - Akwesasne, NY|url=http://www.mohawknation.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=47&Itemid=56|access-date=July 24, 2021|website=www.mohawknation.org|archive-date=August 11, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140811190057/http://www.mohawknation.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=47&Itemid=56|url-status=live}}</ref> were the first people of color to enroll at Penn in 1755 after being recruited by Benjamin Franklin to attend the Academy of Philadelphia (then part of [[University of Pennsylvania|Penn]]).<ref name="sas.upenn">{{cite web | url=https://nais.sas.upenn.edu/about/history-native-american-studies-penn | title=History: Native American Studies at Penn &#124; Native American & Indigenous Studies at Penn | access-date=May 4, 2023 | archive-date=December 14, 2020 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201214055159/https://nais.sas.upenn.edu/about/history-native-american-studies-penn | url-status=live }}</ref> But there is no evidence that either earned a degree as the first Native American to graduate Penn did not occur until 1847 when Robert Daniel Ross, a member of the [[Cherokee Nation]], graduated with a degree from [[University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine|Penn's medical school]].<ref name="sas.upenn"/>

==== 19th and early 20th centuries ====
In 1900, [[W. E. B. Du Bois]] oversaw and edited ''The College-bred Negro''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Du Bois |first1=W. E. B. |title=The college-bred negro : a report of a social study made under the direction of Atlanta University in 1900 edited by W.E. Burghardt Du Bois |date=1902 |publisher=Atlanta University Press |url=https://repository.wellesley.edu/object/wellesley30405 |access-date=September 1, 2023 |archive-date=September 1, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230901054008/https://repository.wellesley.edu/object/wellesley30405 |url-status=live }}</ref> a study on Black integration in colleges and universities that found a combined total of 52 Black students had graduated from Ivy League schools in their collective histories. Since no official policies prohibited schools in the Ivy League from admitting students of color each university in the League had different policies regarding the admission of Black students.<ref name="Bradley-2021" /> Dartmouth's first Black student graduated in 1828, while Princeton would only admit their first Black student under the [[V-12 Navy College Training Program]] in the 1940s.<ref name="Bradley-2021" /><ref name="www.dartmouth.edu">{{Cite web |title=Finding Community: The Life of Edward Mitchell 1828 |url=https://www.dartmouth.edu/library/rauner/exhibits/finding-community.html |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=www.dartmouth.edu |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207190407/https://www.dartmouth.edu/library/rauner/exhibits/finding-community.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

Early Black student admits to Ivy League universities were controversial and often faced backlash. Dartmouth initially denied its first Black graduate, Edward Mitchell, supposedly to avoid "offend[ing] students". Dartmouth students protested this decision, leading to Mitchell's admission in 1824.<ref name="www.dartmouth.edu" /> [[Richard Henry Green]] was awarded an [[Doctor of Medicine|MD]] degree by Dartmouth College in 1864.<ref name=":2" />

Harvard admitted its first Black student, Beverly Garnett Williams, in 1847. News of his admission incited protests by Harvard students and faculty.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Perfloff-Giles |first=Alexandra |date=2008-04-24 |title=Seminar Studies Slave Ties |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2008/4/24/seminar-studies-slave-ties-span-stylefont-style/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304083624/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2008/4/24/seminar-studies-slave-ties-span-stylefont-style/ |archive-date=2016-03-04 |access-date= |website=www.thecrimson.com}}</ref> Williams died before the academic year began, however, and never matriculated.<ref name=":1">{{cite journal |last1=Newman |first1=Richard |date=2002 |title=Harvard's Forgotten First Black Student |journal=The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education |issue=38 |pages=92 |doi=10.2307/3134217 |jstor=3134217 |id={{ProQuest|195532551}}}}</ref> [[Richard Theodore Greener]] was the first African American to receive a Harvard degree in 1870.<ref name="Chicago Sun docs">{{cite web |last=Janssen |first=Kim |date=2012-03-11 |title='It gives me gooseflesh': Remarkable find in South Side attic |url=http://www.suntimes.com/11149243-417/it-gives-me-gooseflesh-remarkable-find-in-s-side-attic.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120313232009/http://www.suntimes.com/11149243-417/it-gives-me-gooseflesh-remarkable-find-in-s-side-attic.html |archive-date=2012-03-13 |work=Chicago Sun-Times}}</ref> Between 1890 and 1940, an average of three Black men enrolled at Harvard per year.<ref name="Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University" /> In 1923, Harvard's Board of Overseers overruled University President Abbot Lawrence's ban on Black students living in dorms, announcing that all freshmen would be permitted to live in dorms regardless of race, but upheld that “men of the white and colored races shall not be compelled to live and eat together."<ref name="The Harvard Crimson-3">{{Cite web |title=Compelled to Coexist: A History on the Desegregation of Harvard's Freshman Housing |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/11/4/housing-desegregation/ |access-date=2022-12-01 |website=The Harvard Crimson |archive-date=September 28, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220928084627/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/11/4/housing-desegregation/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Brown seems to have refused admission to Black students outright prior to the Civil War. Abolitionist Elizabeth Buffum Chase wrote in her book ''Anti Slavery Reminiscences'' about "a lad of rare excellence and attainments [who] was refused an examination for admission by the authorities of Brown University on account of the color of his skin." Inman Page was the first Black student to graduate from Brown in 1877, and was class speaker.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Slater |first=Robert Bruce |date=1994 |title=The Blacks who First Entered the World of White Higher Education |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2963372 |journal=The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education |issue=4 |pages=47–56 |doi=10.2307/2963372 |jstor=2963372 |issn=1077-3711 |access-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703051855/https://www.jstor.org/stable/2963372 |url-status=live |url-access=subscription }}</ref>

William Adger, James Brister, and [[Nathan Francis Mossell]] were the first Black students enrolled at [[University of Pennsylvania|Penn]] in 1879.<ref name="PT-Adger">{{cite web |last=Davis |first=Heather A. |date=September 21, 2017 |title=For the Record: William Adger |url=https://penntoday.upenn.edu/for-the-record/for-the-record-william-adger |website=Penn Today, University of Pennsylvania |access-date=May 4, 2023 |archive-date=June 23, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210623194522/https://penntoday.upenn.edu/for-the-record/for-the-record-william-adger |url-status=live }}</ref> Brister graduated from the [[University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine|School of Dental Medicine (Penn Dental)]] in 1881 as the first African American to earn a degree from Penn, while Adger was the first African American to graduate from the college in 1883.<ref>{{cite web |title=James Brister |url=https://archives.upenn.edu/exhibits/penn-people/biography/james-brister |access-date=February 28, 2021 |website=University Archives and Records Center |publisher=Penn |archive-date=February 28, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210228043551/https://archives.upenn.edu/exhibits/penn-people/biography/james-brister |url-status=live }}</ref>

Columbia University has claimed that four Black students earned University degrees between 1875 and 1900,<ref name=":1" /> though their names are apparently unknown.

Yale's [[Edward Bouchet]], was the first Black person (a) elected to [[Phi Beta Kappa]] in the US in 1874 and (b) to earn a [[Ph.D.]] from any American university, completing his [[dissertation]] in [[physics]] in 1876.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Branch |first1=Mark Alden |title=Before Green and Bouchet, another African American Yale College grad. Maybe. |url=https://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/blog_posts/1729 |website=Yale Alumni Magazine |access-date=10 November 2023 |date=March 7, 2014 |archive-date=November 10, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231110153537/https://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/blog_posts/1729 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=http://www.ams.org/samplings/math-history/hmath3-index|title=A Century of Mathematics in America|date=1988–1989|publisher=American Mathematical Society|last=Donaldson|first=James|location=Providence, R.I.|oclc=18191729|isbn=0-8218-0136-8|pages=453|access-date=September 1, 2023|archive-date=December 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171224231131/http://www.ams.org/samplings/math-history/hmath3-index|url-status=live}} accessed September 1, 2023</ref> Bouchet was thought to have been the first African-American graduate of Yale, but research publicized in 2014 reported that Yale awarded a Black man, [[Richard Henry Green]], a bachelor of arts degree in 1857.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=NYT>{{cite web | last = Kaminer | first = Ariel | title = Discovery Leads Yale to Revise a Chapter of Its Black History | newspaper = The New York Times | location = New York, New York | date = February 28, 2014 | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/01/nyregion/discovery-leads-yale-to-revise-a-chapter-of-its-black-history.html?hp | access-date = September 1, 2023 | archive-date = September 22, 2023 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20230922125840/https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/01/nyregion/discovery-leads-yale-to-revise-a-chapter-of-its-black-history.html?hp | url-status = live }}</ref>

Cornell seemed the most inclusive of the Ivy Leagues at its inception, with admission open to any race and gender.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Our Historic Commitment |url=https://diversity.cornell.edu/our-story/our-historic-commitment |access-date=2022-12-01 |website=Cornell University Diversity and Inclusion |archive-date=December 1, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221201234558/https://diversity.cornell.edu/our-story/our-historic-commitment |url-status=live }}</ref> University co-founder Andrew Dickson White wrote in 1874 that the school had ''"''no colored students...at present but shall be very glad to receive any who are prepared to enter...if even one offered himself and passed the examinations, we should receive him even if all our five hundred white students were to ask for dismissal on that account."<ref>{{Cite web |date=September 5, 1874 |title=Letter from A. D. White to C. H. McCormick regarding African-American students at Cornell |url=https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/presidents/view_image-img=28.php.html |access-date=2023-07-03 |website=rmc.library.cornell.edu |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703035239/https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/presidents/view_image-img=28.php.html |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1890, Charles Chauveau Cook and Jane Eleanor Datcher were the first Black students awarded four-year undergraduate Cornell degrees.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Early Black Women at Cornell |url=https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/earlyblackwomen/introduction/ |access-date=2023-07-03 |website=rmc.library.cornell.edu |archive-date=December 9, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221209122531/https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/earlyblackwomen/introduction/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Despite this, Black students faced legal and social segregation in the town of Ithaca, New York. In 1905, Black students reported being denied housing while attending Cornell.<ref name="Bradley-2021" />

Princeton University, sometimes referred to as the "Southern-most Ivy", was the last to integrate. In Du Bois' ''The College-bred Negro'' (1900)'','' a Princeton representative is quoted: "We have never had any colored students here, though there is nothing in the University statutes to prevent their admission. It is possible, however, in view of our proximity to the South and the large number of southern students here, that Negro students would find Princeton less comfortable than some other institutions."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Du Bois |first=William Edward Burghardt |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4RYiAQAAIAAJ&q=princeton&pg=PA36 |title=The College-bred Negro; Report of Social Study Made Under the Direction of Atlanta University; Together with the Proceedings of the Fifth Conference for the Study of the Negro Problems, Held at Atlanta University, May 29-30, 1900 ... |publisher=Atlanta University Press |year=1900 |location=Atlanta, GA |pages=36 |language=en |access-date=July 10, 2023 |archive-date=July 15, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230715024622/https://books.google.com/books?id=4RYiAQAAIAAJ&q=princeton&pg=PA36 |url-status=live }}</ref> Notably, in 1939, Princeton revoked admittance to Black student Bruce Wright upon his arrival on campus, when Director of Admission Radcliffe Heermance noticed Wright's race.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Armstrong |first=April |date=2017-02-08 |title=Integrating Princeton University: Robert Joseph Rivers '53 |url=https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2017/02/integrating-princeton-university/ |access-date=2022-12-06 |website=Mudd Manuscript Library Blog |language=en-US |archive-date=December 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208000703/https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2017/02/integrating-princeton-university/ |url-status=live }}</ref> When a disappointed Wright wrote Heermance requesting an explanation, Heermance responded:<blockquote>"I cannot conscientiously advise a colored student to apply for admission to Princeton simply because I do not think that he would be happy in this environment. There are no colored students in the University and a member of your race might feel very much alone...My personal experience would enforce my advice to any colored student that he would be happier in an environment of others of his race, and that he would adjust himself far more easily to the life of a New England college or university, or one of the large state universities than he would to a residential college of this particular type."<ref>{{Cite web |date=2015-02-04 |title="Princeton University Does Not Discriminate…": African American Exclusion at Princeton |url=https://universityarchives.princeton.edu/2015/02/princeton-university-does-not-discriminate-african-american-exclusion-at-princeton/ |access-date=2023-07-03 |website=University Archives |language=en-US |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703021359/https://universityarchives.princeton.edu/2015/02/princeton-university-does-not-discriminate-african-american-exclusion-at-princeton/ |url-status=live }}</ref></blockquote>The few early Black students admitted to Ivy League universities were often from wealthy Caribbean families.<ref name="Bradley-2021" /> Barriers preventing African American students from attending Ivy League universities included the universities' policies, poor recruitment, tuition costs, and the lack of secondary education opportunities in a [[Racial segregation|racially segregated]] country.<ref name="Bradley-2021" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Clewell |first1=Beatriz Chu |last2=Anderson |first2=Bernice Taylor |date=1995 |title=African Americans in Higher Education: An Issue of Access |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23263010 |journal=Humboldt Journal of Social Relations |volume=21 |issue=2 |pages=55–79 |jstor=23263010 |issn=0160-4341 |access-date=December 16, 2022 |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207190335/https://www.jstor.org/stable/23263010 |url-status=live }}</ref> More Black students attended Ivy League graduate and professional schools than their undergraduate programs.<ref name="Bradley-2021" /> By the middle of the 20th century, only 54 Black men and women had graduated with a Bachelor degree from Ivy League universities.<ref name="Bradley-2021" />

==== Late 20th century ====

By the middle of the 20th century, some Ivy League students and alumni were advocating for increased racial integration efforts.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Editorial |date=September 30, 1942 |title=White Supremacy at Princeton |url=https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19420930-01&getpdf=true |journal=[[The Daily Princetonian]] |volume=LXVII |issue=84 |pages=1–2 |access-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703035238/https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19420930-01&getpdf=true |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=William H. |first=Greider |date=October 25, 1956 |title=Students Push to Have More Negroes Admitted |url=https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19561025-01&getpdf=true |journal=The Daily Princetonian |volume=LXXX |issue=107 |pages=1, 3–4 |quote=The fact that Princeton, a liberal university of 2800 undergraduates, has but two Negro students...is a point of concern for a small group of undergraduates, the members of the Westminster Fellowship of the Presbyterian Church. |access-date=July 2, 2023 |archive-date=July 2, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230702224905/https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19561025-01&getpdf=true |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=April 21, 1950 |title=JRC Probes Negro Admission Policy |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1950/4/21/jrc-probes-negro-admission-policy-pbecause/ |access-date=2023-07-02 |website=The Harvard Crimson |archive-date=July 2, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230702224854/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1950/4/21/jrc-probes-negro-admission-policy-pbecause/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=December 1, 1948 |title=Racial Equality Group Started |url=https://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/?a=is&oid=cs19481201-01&type=staticpdf&pdfaccesscode=PdkGcxuwzf9DRwVwstREzK0NHk5KXviu6wibCYmK/91oI=&submitted=1&e=------194-en-20--1--txt-txIN-segregation------&g-recaptcha-response=03AAYGu2R2ZxGGw39CrWMYwcFnzYqwKtaA7QaOkCsSDlEG4roLgeIRI_i49dt2PeLA3wOzSz0r2hgrDpjxFmvYv5bfVCNxFyZOsUsz-kzXzkHhGx0ZH5T2-6Dj_if5cGFFOYiWFrZbp0VGzwyWiSMedFc7n-s27W9JFXE9Fpw6z5Xx9eVv8auSdwry4pReCBq-wEgv-6aFpgIpLNJVEaCwK6UcaoiMnbTxvJQTyYPoF7rySd4OiXRJAjlXUR90adz6yXFryhmB9EDX-vgpe-4qrVp35BxQVKes0hOFBdl8cc4vVCkrjnbnNHMioe1lVSF4DNOFwej6Zlx8PZSE1B7h5fqPncPdrcWJ9E7D4t0eGKaWpXVrjITQFn4WxxqHiaZwcLh8KAknKeiitheKCfP1V81cH7yo7TAqPWYJ2nqYaLtqNtQD_T02KYldQntMPDQpOLQmhfQyVyXJ3GY26-NtuY-Ya7Km4rRMsOxGGMPvDFjCaP788oecQiDQCPTjoVvYOTuXsgNHqA9XdyDzPMSeMo-c71_TV3ohQMM5GESPmozcdAaP-um2vbJY9qF_0gNW1sgP1ilm-4G03OpvrRt-6uC3LNsu6bGSgVBapQZK-MufVRTXY5asDlI |access-date=2023-07-03 |website=Columbia Spectator |archive-date=July 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230703051901/https://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/?a=is&oid=cs19481201-01&type=staticpdf&pdfaccesscode=PdkGcxuwzf9DRwVwstREzK0NHk5KXviu6wibCYmK/91oI=&submitted=1&e=------194-en-20--1--txt-txIN-segregation------&g-recaptcha-response=03AAYGu2R2ZxGGw39CrWMYwcFnzYqwKtaA7QaOkCsSDlEG4roLgeIRI_i49dt2PeLA3wOzSz0r2hgrDpjxFmvYv5bfVCNxFyZOsUsz-kzXzkHhGx0ZH5T2-6Dj_if5cGFFOYiWFrZbp0VGzwyWiSMedFc7n-s27W9JFXE9Fpw6z5Xx9eVv8auSdwry4pReCBq-wEgv-6aFpgIpLNJVEaCwK6UcaoiMnbTxvJQTyYPoF7rySd4OiXRJAjlXUR90adz6yXFryhmB9EDX-vgpe-4qrVp35BxQVKes0hOFBdl8cc4vVCkrjnbnNHMioe1lVSF4DNOFwej6Zlx8PZSE1B7h5fqPncPdrcWJ9E7D4t0eGKaWpXVrjITQFn4WxxqHiaZwcLh8KAknKeiitheKCfP1V81cH7yo7TAqPWYJ2nqYaLtqNtQD_T02KYldQntMPDQpOLQmhfQyVyXJ3GY26-NtuY-Ya7Km4rRMsOxGGMPvDFjCaP788oecQiDQCPTjoVvYOTuXsgNHqA9XdyDzPMSeMo-c71_TV3ohQMM5GESPmozcdAaP-um2vbJY9qF_0gNW1sgP1ilm-4G03OpvrRt-6uC3LNsu6bGSgVBapQZK-MufVRTXY5asDlI |url-status=live }}</ref> These efforts were met with mixed reactions from the schools themselves.<ref>{{Cite journal |date=March 24, 1955 |title=Applications for Class of '59 Soar to Record 3,400 Total |url=https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19550324-01&getpdf=true |journal=[[The Daily Princetonian]] |volume=LXXIX |issue=39 |pages=1 |quote=Questioned on the Admission's Office reaction to Yale University's decision to encourage more Negro applicants, [director of admissions C. William] Edwards commented that Princeton 'is neither discouraging nor encouraging Negro students to come here.' |access-date=July 2, 2023 |archive-date=July 2, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230702224902/https://theprince.princeton.edu/princetonperiodicals/cgi-bin/imageserver.pl?oid=Princetonian19550324-01&getpdf=true |url-status=dead }}</ref> Without a goal for integration shared by the institutions as a collective, each school increased racial diversity at different rates, with Dartmouth having 120 Black undergraduates in the class of 1945 and Princeton having a cumulative total of fewer than 100 Black undergraduates by 1967.<ref name="Bradley-2021" />

The [[V-12 Navy College Training Program]] in 1942 effectively forced all eight Ivy institutions to increase Black student enrollment.<ref name="Bradley-2021"/> At Princeton University, the Black students in this program were the first ever granted bachelor's degrees by the University.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Armstrong |first=April |date=2015-05-27 |title=African Americans and Princeton University |url=https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2015/05/african-americans-and-princeton-university/ |access-date=2022-12-13 |website=Mudd Manuscript Library Blog |language=en-US |archive-date=November 28, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221128023849/https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2015/05/african-americans-and-princeton-university/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

The 1954 Supreme Court decision in ''[[Brown v. Board of Education]]'' did not require private universities like those in the Ivy League to abide by the ruling.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2021-09-29 |title=Brown v. Board of Education (1954) |url=https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/brown-v-board-of-education |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=National Archives |language=en |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215193011/https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/brown-v-board-of-education |url-status=live }}</ref> It wasn't until the Court's 1976 decision in ''[[Runyon v. McCrary]]'' that private institutions became legally prohibited from discriminating on the basis of race.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Runyon v. McCrary, 427 U.S. 160 (1976) |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/427/160/ |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=Justia Law |language=en |archive-date=November 29, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221129052121/https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/427/160/ |url-status=live }}</ref> By the early 1960s, however, some admissions offices in the Ivy League began to make concerted efforts to increase their number of Black applicants, rolling out initiatives that actively sought Black talent from high schools.<ref name="The Current">{{Cite web |title=Breaking Through a Bastion of Whiteness |url=http://www.columbia-current.org/breaking-through-a-bastion-of-whiteness.html |access-date=2022-12-04 |website=The Current |language=en |archive-date=December 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221212122946/http://www.columbia-current.org/breaking-through-a-bastion-of-whiteness.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Efforts for racial integration at Ivy League institutions relied on the support of student organizations, faculty-led initiatives, and third-party organizations like the National Scholarship Service and Fund for Negro Students<ref name=":0" /> to seek prospective Black applicants.<ref name="The Current" /> These efforts also prompted internal University action, such as the creation of [[History of Cornell University|Cornell's Committee on Special Educational Projects (COSEP)]], an organization aimed to recruit and support Black students.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Our History {{!}} Office of Academic Diversity Initiatives |url=https://oadi.cornell.edu/about/our-history |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=oadi.cornell.edu |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207190949/https://oadi.cornell.edu/about/our-history |url-status=live }}</ref> By 1965, however, Black students still were only 2% of admitted students across all the Ivies.<ref name="Bradley-2021" />

Prior to the 1960s, the majority of Ivy League universities explicitly prohibited the admission of women, instead forming partnerships with nearby women's colleges.<ref name="BestColleges">{{Cite web |title=A History of Women in Higher Education |url=https://www.bestcolleges.com/news/analysis/2021/03/21/history-women-higher-education/ |access-date=2022-12-12 |website=BestColleges |language=en-US |archive-date=June 6, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230606135024/https://www.bestcolleges.com/news/analysis/2021/03/21/history-women-higher-education/ |url-status=live }}</ref> As such, Black women were not able to attend Ivy League universities until they changed their policies. [[Lillian Lincoln|Lillian Lincoln Lambert]] was the first Black woman to receive a degree from Harvard University after graduating with a master's degree from [[Harvard Business School]] in 1969.<ref name="BestColleges" /> Lincoln Lambert was also a founding member of Harvard's African American Student Union, which according to her, actively recruited Black students and created "a space where Black students could find not only support but resources for everything from barber shops that cut Black hair to churches."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Entrepreneur Lillian Lambert on Being the First Black Woman to Graduate from Harvard Business School |url=https://www.sarasotamagazine.com/news-and-profiles/2022/05/lillian-lincoln-lambert-harvard |access-date=2022-12-12 |website=Sarasota Magazine |language=en-US |archive-date=December 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221212195244/https://www.sarasotamagazine.com/news-and-profiles/2022/05/lillian-lincoln-lambert-harvard |url-status=live }}</ref>

As Black student populations grew at Ivy League schools, on-campus activism saw an increase during the civil rights movement. In 1969, students in Cornell's Afro-American Society led an armed occupation of [[Willard Straight Hall]] to protest the university's racist policies and “its slow progress in establishing a Black studies program.”<ref>{{Cite book |last=Kendi |first=Ibram |title=The Black campus movement : Black students and the racial reconstitution of higher education, 1965-1972 |date=2012 |isbn=978-1-137-01650-8 |edition=First |location=New York |oclc=795517755}}</ref><ref name="Bradley-2021" /> In the same year, students associated with Yale's New Left organization, [[Students for a Democratic Society]], worked closely with the New Haven [[Black Panther Party|Black Panthers]] to lead sit-ins and protests that advocated for the admission of more students of color and the establishment of an African American studies department.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Vaz |first1=Megan |date=2022-02-18 |title=Memories of May Day: A look back at Black Panther protests at Yale |url=https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/02/18/memories-of-may-day-a-look-back-at-black-panther-protests-at-yale/ |access-date=2022-12-04 |website=Yale Daily News |language=en |archive-date=December 4, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221204195338/https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/02/18/memories-of-may-day-a-look-back-at-black-panther-protests-at-yale/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Bradley-2021" /> At Brown University, identity-based student organizations such as the United African People and the African American Society called for an increase to the number of Black faculty and increased attention to the needs of Black students.<ref name="Brown's Slavery & Justice Report, Digital 2nd Edition | Brown University" /> Demonstrations at Harvard and Columbia took the form of occupations and non-violent sit-ins that were often subject to forceful removal by local police called by University administrators.<ref>{{cite web |title=Harvard Students Occupy University Hall |url=https://www.massmoments.org/moment-details/harvard-students-occupy-university-hall.html |access-date=2022-12-04 |website=www.massmoments.org |date=April 11, 2006 |language=en |archive-date=December 4, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221204195335/https://www.massmoments.org/moment-details/harvard-students-occupy-university-hall.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Bradley-2021" /> Activism at Dartmouth took a different shape during this time period, as students would use demonstrations that were happening at other Ivies and colleges around the country, to effectively position their demands for progress within the prospect of taking actions similar to those happening elsewhere.

==== 21st century ====

Continuing the trajectory of the late 20th century, the number of Black students on Ivy League campuses has continued to increase in the 21st century. From 2006 to 2018, there was an approximated 50% increase in the admission of Black students into entering classes, growing from 1,110 to 1,663.<ref name="The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education-2018">{{Cite journal |date=January 31, 2018 |title=Black First-Year Students at the Nation's Leading Research Universities |url=https://www.jbhe.com/2018/01/black-first-year-students-at-nations-leading-research-universities/ |journal=The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education |access-date=December 16, 2022 |archive-date=November 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108010025/https://www.jbhe.com/2018/01/black-first-year-students-at-nations-leading-research-universities/ |url-status=live }}</ref> As of 2018, the Ivy League universities unanimously supported Harvard University's “race-conscious admissions” model.<ref name="Franklin-2018">{{Cite news |last1=Franklin |first1=Delano R. |last2=Zwickel |first2=Samuel W. |date=July 31, 2018 |title=Top Universities Defend Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Policies in Court |work=The Harvard Crimson |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/7/31/top-universities-defend-harvard/ |access-date=November 7, 2022 |archive-date=November 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108003017/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/7/31/top-universities-defend-harvard/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Harvard University representatives credited this form of [[Affirmative action in the United States|affirmative action]] as one of the factors increasing campus diversity.<ref name="Franklin-2018" />

In 2014 case ''[[Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action]]'', {{ussc|572|291|2014}} — the Supreme Court upheld [[Michigan Civil Rights Initiative|Michigan's ban]] on affirmative action for public institutions and in 2016 in''[[Fisher v. University of Texas (2016)|Fisher v. University of Texas II]]'', {{ussc|docket=14-981|volume=579|date=2016}} the court upheld the university's limited use of race in admissions decisions because the university showed it had a clear goal of limited scope without other workable race-neutral means to achieve it.
However, in 2023 — ''[[Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College]]'', {{ussc|docket=20-1199|volume=600|year=2023}} the [[United States Supreme Court]] overruled the decades old decisions''Regents of University of California v. Bakke'' and ''Grutter v. Bollinger'' and other cases mentioned above in this paragraph but disallowing non-individualized racial preferences in admissions for civilian universities. 
In essence, the court interpreted the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fourteenth Amendment]] as not permitting Harvard's “race-conscious admissions” as the court decision now forbids the consideration of race in higher education admissions.

Institutions in favor of Harvard's model argue that in addition to academic excellence they also aim to form a diverse student body, while individuals that argue against the model state that it is discriminatory against certain applicants.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Totenberg |first=Nina |date=October 31, 2022 |title=Can race play a role in college admissions? The Supreme Court hears the arguments |language=en |work=NPR |url=https://www.npr.org/2022/10/31/1131789230/supreme-court-affirmative-action-harvard-unc |access-date=2022-11-08}}</ref>

The growing Black student population in Ivy League universities in the early 2000s was accompanied by an increase in the number of Black faculty at these institutions, though rates of change among faculty have been slower and inconsistent. In 2005, 588– or about 3.9%– of the Ivies' 14,831 full-time faculty members were Black.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Black Faculty at the Nation's Highest-Ranked Colleges and Universities |url=https://www.jbhe.com/features/48_blackfaculty_colleges-uni.html |access-date=2022-11-08 |website=www.jbhe.com |archive-date=November 8, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108003016/https://www.jbhe.com/features/48_blackfaculty_colleges-uni.html |url-status=live }}</ref> This proportion decreased to 3.4% in 2015.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lurie |first=Julia |title=Just how few college professors aren't white men? Check out these charts. |url=https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/11/university-faculty-diversity-race-gender-charts/ |access-date=2022-12-01 |website=Mother Jones |language=en-US |archive-date=December 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221211155356/https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/11/university-faculty-diversity-race-gender-charts/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Notably, in 2001, [[Ruth Simmons|Ruth J. Simmons]] became the president of Brown University, making her the first and only Black president of an Ivy League institution.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2011-09-22 |title=Key Events in Black Higher Education |url=https://www.jbhe.com/chronology/ |access-date=2022-11-08 |website=The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education |archive-date=April 1, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190401010424/https://www.jbhe.com/chronology/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

The 21st century saw the continuation of demonstrations by Ivy League students revolving around race. Many of these demonstrations have sought to continue the work of their 20th century predecessors by advocating for increased admission and support of Black students. In light of the ''[[Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College]]'' Supreme Court case, students from Yale and Harvard joined other universities in protesting in defense of race-conscious admissions policies.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Seth |first=Anika |date=2022-10-28 |title=Yale student delegation heads to D.C. to protest in defense of affirmative action |url=https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/10/27/yale-student-delegation-in-d-c-to-protest-in-defense-of-affirmative-action/ |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=Yale Daily News |language=en |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207175229/https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/10/27/yale-student-delegation-in-d-c-to-protest-in-defense-of-affirmative-action/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last1=Lu |first1=Vivi E. |last2=Teichholtz |first2=Leah J. |date=2022-10-28 |title=Meet the Harvard Students Rallying to Save Affirmative Action |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/10/28/activists-support-affirmative-action-dc-rally/ |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=www.thecrimson.com |archive-date=November 18, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221118223927/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/10/28/activists-support-affirmative-action-dc-rally/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

Likewise, Black students from Ivy League institutions continue to protest for the betterment of Black students' lives on campus and beyond. Following [[Shooting of Michael Brown|Michael Brown's death]] in 2014, students across the Ivies formed the Black Ivy Coalition, which included members from all eight institutions and aimed to combat anti-Black racism.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wu |first=Huizhong |title=After Ferguson, black Ivy League students form civil rights coalition |url=https://www.thedp.com/article/2014/09/black-ivy-coalition |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=www.thedp.com |language=en-us |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207175234/https://www.thedp.com/article/2014/09/black-ivy-coalition |url-status=live }}</ref> Individual Ivy League universities also formed their own advocacy organizations and movements as a direct response to instances of anti-Black violence. After the murder of Michael Brown, Princeton University students formed the Black Justice League, which in 2015, occupied [[Nassau Hall]] and presented a list of demands to university administrators.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Li |first1=Ellen |last2=Farah |first2=Omar |date=2020-07-30 |title=PART I {{!}} 'Resurfacing History': A Look Back at the Black Justice League's Campus Activism |url=https://aas.princeton.edu/news/part-i-resurfacing-history-look-back-black-justice-leagues-campus-activism |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=Princeton University Department of African American Studies |language=en |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207175239/https://aas.princeton.edu/news/part-i-resurfacing-history-look-back-black-justice-leagues-campus-activism |url-status=live }}</ref> Similarly, in 2017, Cornell students made demands to their administration protesting the assault of a Black student. Led by Black Students United, the demands included banning the [[Psi Upsilon]] fraternity for hate crimes, implementing [[implicit bias training]], and introducing policies to increase the number of Black students at the university.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Devlin |first=Tessie |title=WATCH: Black Students United delivers demands to Cornell President {{!}} The Ithacan |url=https://theithacan.org/news/breaking-black-students-united-deliver-list-of-demands-to-cornell-president/ |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=theithacan.org |date=September 20, 2017 |language=en |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207175228/https://theithacan.org/news/breaking-black-students-united-deliver-list-of-demands-to-cornell-president/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

Student demonstrations have also focused on sparking change beyond Ivy League campuses. Following the [[Black Lives Matter]] protests in 2020, Harvard's Black Law Students Association, beyond calling for more Black faculty, [[critical race theory]] curriculum, and protection for student protestors, also called on the university to divest from prisons and denounce state-sanctioned violence.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-06-05 |title=Harvard's Black Law Student Association's Letter to the Administration Regarding Black Lives |url=https://orgs.law.harvard.edu/blsa/2020/06/05/harvards-black-law-student-associations-letter-to-the-administration-regarding-black-lives/ |access-date=2022-12-07 |website=Harvard Black Law Students Association |language=en-US |archive-date=December 7, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221207175233/https://orgs.law.harvard.edu/blsa/2020/06/05/harvards-black-law-student-associations-letter-to-the-administration-regarding-black-lives/ |url-status=dead }}</ref>

In response to racially charged incidents across the country and prompting from student activists, Ivy League universities have removed and renamed campus landmarks. In response to the [[Black Lives Matter|2016 Black Lives Matter protests]], Cornell renamed [[Cornell Botanic Gardens|their botanical gardens]], previously called the "Cornell Plantations," to the "Cornell Botanical Gardens."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Almendarez |first=Jolene |date=2016-10-31 |title=Cornell Plantations no more! University renames site 'Cornell Botanic Gardens' |url=http://ithacavoice.com/2016/10/cornell-plantations-no-university-renames-site-cornell-botanic-gardens/ |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=The Ithaca Voice |language=en-US |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180832/https://ithacavoice.com/2016/10/cornell-plantations-no-university-renames-site-cornell-botanic-gardens/ |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2018, Brown renamed one of its largest academic and administrative buildings after its first black graduates, [[Inman E. Page]] and Ethel Tremaine Robinson.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Hyde-Keller |first1=O'rya |title=Newly renamed Page-Robinson Hall will honor Brown's first black graduates |url=https://www.brown.edu/news/2018-09-22/page-robinson |access-date=5 April 2023 |publisher=Brown University |date=22 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221203051203/https://www.brown.edu/news/2018-09-22/page-robinson |archive-date=3 December 2022 |location=Providence, Rhode Island |quote=To celebrate the legacies of two pioneering black graduates, Brown University will rename its J. Walter Wilson Building in recognition of Inman Edward Page and Ethel Tremaine Robinson.}}</ref> In response to the [[murder of George Floyd]] in 2020, Princeton University removed [[Woodrow Wilson|Woodrow Wilson's]] name from a residential college and the [[Princeton School of Public and International Affairs|School of Public and International Affairs]] because of his “racist thinking and policies.”<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-06-27 |title=Princeton Renames Wilson School and Residential College, Citing Former President's Racism |url=https://paw.princeton.edu/article/princeton-renames-wilson-school-and-residential-college-citing-former-presidents-racism |access-date=2022-12-16 |website=Princeton Alumni Weekly |language=en |archive-date=December 16, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221216013739/https://paw.princeton.edu/article/princeton-renames-wilson-school-and-residential-college-citing-former-presidents-racism |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Fashion and lifestyle===
{{See also|Ivy League (clothes)|Preppy|Take Ivy|Ivy League (haircut)}}
[[File:Cornell Rowing - Penfield 1907.jpg|thumb|An illustration of Cornell's [[Rowing (sport)|rowing]] team. Rowing is often associated with traditional upper class [[New England]] culture.]]

Different fashion trends and styles have emerged from Ivy League campuses over time, and fashion trends such as [[Ivy League (clothes)|Ivy League]] and [[preppy]] are styles often associated with the Ivy League and its culture.

[[Ivy League (clothes)|Ivy League style]] is a style of men's dress, popular during the late 1950s, believed to have originated on Ivy League campuses. The clothing stores [[J. Press]] and [[Brooks Brothers]] represent perhaps the quintessential Ivy League dress manner. The Ivy League style is said to be the predecessor to the [[preppy]] style of dress.

Preppy fashion started around 1912 to the late 1940s and 1950s as the Ivy League style of dress.<ref>{{cite book | title =Elements of Fashion and Apparel Design | publisher = New Age Publishers | isbn = 978-81-224-1371-7 |page=25 |quote=Ivy League: A popular look for men in the fifties that originated on such campuses as Harvard, Priceton {{sic}} and Yale; a forerunner to the preppie look; a style characterized by button-down collar shirts and pants with a small buckle in the back.| year = 2007 }}</ref> [[J. Press]] represents the quintessential preppy clothing brand, stemming from the collegiate traditions that shaped the preppy subculture. In the mid-twentieth century J. Press and [[Brooks Brothers]], both being pioneers in preppy fashion, had stores on Ivy League school campuses, including Harvard, Yale, and Princeton.

Some typical preppy styles also reflect traditional upper class [[New England]] leisure activities, such as [[horse riding|equestrian]], [[sailing]] or [[yacht]]ing, [[hunting]], [[fencing]], [[rowing (sport)|rowing]], [[lacrosse]], [[tennis]], [[golf]], and [[rugby football|rugby]]. Longtime New England outdoor outfitters, such as [[L.L. Bean]], became part of conventional preppy style.<ref name="Zlotnick">{{cite web|last=Zlotnick|first=Sarah|date=February 24, 2012|title=Your cheat sheet to preppy style|url=http://www.washingtonian.com/blogs/shoparound/people/your-cheat-sheet-to-preppy-style.php|work=[[The Washingtonian (magazine)|The Washingtonian]]|access-date=October 11, 2014|archive-date=October 17, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141017174157/http://www.washingtonian.com/blogs/shoparound/people/your-cheat-sheet-to-preppy-style.php|url-status=live}}</ref> This can be seen in sport stripes and colors, equestrian clothing, plaid shirts, field jackets and nautical-themed accessories. Vacationing in [[Palm Beach, Florida]], long popular with the East Coast upper class, led to the emergence of bright colors combinations in leisure wear seen in some brands such as [[Lilly Pulitzer]].<ref name=Zlotnick/> By the 1980s, other brands such as [[Lacoste]], [[Izod]] and [[Dooney & Bourke]] became associated with preppy style.<ref name="Peterson Kellogg 285">{{cite book|last1=Peterson|first1=Amy T.|title=The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Clothing Through American History 1900 to the Present: 1900–1949|last2=Kellogg|first2=Ann T.|publisher=ABC-CLIO|year=2008|isbn=9780313043345|page=285}}</ref>

Though the Ivy League style is most commonly associated with the white, male elites that historically made up Ivy League campuses, the style was quickly popularized among Black communities during the [[civil rights era]]. Reinterpretations of this style by African-American men in the 1950s and 1960s combined the preppy Ivy League style with other popular Black styles of dress. This led to the emergence of a new style of dress, the Black Ivy style.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Jules |first=Jason |title=Black ivy : a revolt in style |date=2021 |others=Graham Marsh |isbn=978-1-909526-82-2 |edition= |location=London, UK |oclc=1264401381}}</ref>

Today, Ivy League styles continue to be popular on Ivy League campuses, throughout the U.S., and abroad, and are oftentimes labeled as "Classic American style" or "Traditional American style".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.details.com/fashion-style/rules-of-style/201006/ultimate-guide-to-american-style|title=The Ultimate Guide to American Style|work=Details|access-date=October 11, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923223223/http://www.details.com/fashion-style/rules-of-style/201006/ultimate-guide-to-american-style|archive-date=September 23, 2015|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.gq.com/style/wear-it-now/200804/american-classic|title=The American Way|first=Adam|last=Rapoport|work=GQ|date=March 31, 2008|access-date=September 9, 2017|archive-date=April 16, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150416051616/http://www.gq.com/style/wear-it-now/200804/american-classic|url-status=dead}}</ref>

===Social elitism===
[[File:Columbiaman.jpg|thumb|A cartoon portrait of the stereotypical Columbia man, 1902]]
The Ivy League is often associated with the [[American upper class|upper class]] [[White Anglo-Saxon Protestant]] community of the [[Northeastern United States|Northeast]], [[Old money]], or more generally, the [[Upper middle class in the United States|American upper middle]] and upper classes.<ref>{{cite book | title=Snobbery: The American Version | first=Joseph | last=Epstein | year=2003 | publisher=Houghton Mifflin | isbn=0-618-34073-4 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/snobbery00jose }} p. 55, "by WASP Baltzell meant something much more specific; he intended to cover a select group of people who passed through a congeries of elite American institutions: certain eastern prep schools, the Ivy League colleges, and the Episcopal Church among them." and {{cite book | title=The Ideal of the University | first = Robert Paul |last = Wolff | publisher = Transaction Publishers | year=1992 | isbn = 1-56000-603-X}} p. viii: "My genial, aristocratic contempt for Clark Kerr's celebration of the University of California was as much an expression of Ivy League snobbery as it was of radical social critique."</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/09/17/161295588/the-end-of-wasp-dominated-politics|title=The End Of WASP-Dominated Politics|first=Alan|last=Greenblatt|date=September 19, 2012|work=NPR}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://spectator.org/articles/34941/missing-wasps|title=Missing the WASPs|first=Christopher|last=Orlet|date=August 23, 2012|work=The American Spectator|access-date=October 12, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160107201033/http://spectator.org/articles/34941/missing-wasps|archive-date=January 7, 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/28/opinion/28feldman.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220103/https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/28/opinion/28feldman.html |archive-date=2022-01-03 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live | work=The New York Times | first=Noah | last=Feldman | title=The Triumphant Decline of the WASP | date=June 2, 2010}}{{cbignore}}</ref> Although most Ivy League students come from upper-middle and upper-class families, the student body has become increasingly more economically and ethnically diverse. The universities provide significant financial aid to help increase the enrollment of lower income and middle class students.<ref name="theatlantic.com">{{cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/why-ivy-league-schools-are-so-bad-at-economic-diversity/284076/|title=Why Ivy League Schools Are So Bad at Economic Diversity|first=Robin J.|last=Hayes|date=February 2014|work=The Atlantic|access-date=March 7, 2017|archive-date=March 7, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170307113555/https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/why-ivy-league-schools-are-so-bad-at-economic-diversity/284076/|url-status=live}}</ref> Several reports suggest, however, that the proportion of students from less-affluent families remains low.<ref>Time magazine, Noliwe M. Rooks, February 27, 2013, [https://ideas.time.com/2013/02/27/the-biggest-barrier-to-elite-education-isnt-affordability-its-accessibility/ The Biggest Barrier to Elite Education Isn't Affordability. It's Accessibility], Retrieved August 27, 2014, "... accessibility of these schools to students who are poor, minority ... the weight that Ivy League and other highly selective schools ... unfortunate set of circumstances ... gifted minority, poor and working class students can benefit most from the educational opportunities ..."</ref><ref>August 26, 2014, Boston Globe (via NY Times), [http://www.boston.com/business/news/2014/08/26/generation-later-poor-are-still-rare-elite-colleges/pL5EU7PrPXvpEflvgXAuEJ/story.html A Generation Later, Poor are Still Rare at Elite Colleges] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140903094207/http://www.boston.com/business/news/2014/08/26/generation-later-poor-are-still-rare-elite-colleges/pL5EU7PrPXvpEflvgXAuEJ/story.html |date=September 3, 2014 }}, Retrieved August 30, 2014, "more elite group of 28 private colleges and universities, including all eight Ivy League members, ... from 2001 to 2009, ... enrollment of students from the bottom 40 percent of family incomes increased from just 10 percent to 11 percent. ... "</ref>

Phrases such as "Ivy League snobbery"<ref>{{cite book | title=The Ideal of the University | first = Robert Paul |last = Wolff | publisher = Transaction Publishers | year=1992 | isbn = 1-56000-603-X}} p. viii: "My genial, aristocratic contempt for Clark Kerr's celebration of the University of California was as much an expression of Ivy League snobbery as it was of radical social critique."</ref> are ubiquitous in nonfiction and fiction writing of the early and mid-twentieth century. A [[Louis Auchincloss]] character dreads "the aridity of snobbery which he knew infected the Ivy League colleges".<ref name="autogenerated1"/> A business writer, warning in 2001 against discriminatory hiring, presented a cautionary example of an attitude to avoid (the bracketed phrase is his):

{{blockquote|We Ivy Leaguers [read: mostly white and Anglo]<!--This bracketed phrase is part of the quotation and is in the original, not an editorial interpolation.---> know that an Ivy League degree is a mark of the kind of person who is likely to succeed in this organization.<ref>{{cite book|title=The 10 Lenses: your guide to living and working in a multicultural world|url=https://archive.org/details/10lenses00mark|url-access=registration|first=Mark|last=Williams|year=2001|publisher=Capital Books|isbn=9781892123596}}, [https://books.google.com/books?id=bkiuOG-k2vUC&pg=RA1-PA85 p. 85]</ref>}}

The phrase ''Ivy League'' historically has been perceived as connected not only with academic excellence but also with social elitism. In 1936, sportswriter [[John Kieran]] noted that student editors at [[Harvard University|Harvard]], [[Yale]], [[Columbia University|Columbia]], [[Princeton University|Princeton]], [[Cornell University|Cornell]], [[Dartmouth College|Dartmouth]], and [[University of Pennsylvania|Penn]] were advocating the formation of an athletic association. In urging them to consider "[[United States Military Academy|Army]] and [[United States Naval Academy|Navy]] and [[Georgetown University|Georgetown]] and [[Fordham University|Fordham]] and [[Syracuse University|Syracuse]] and [[Brown University|Brown]] and [[University of Pittsburgh|Pitt]]" as candidates for membership, he exhorted:

{{blockquote|It would be well for the proponents of the Ivy League to make it clear (to themselves especially) that the proposed group would be inclusive but not "exclusive" as this term is used with a slight up-tilting of the tip of the nose.<ref>{{cite news|last=Kieran|first=John|title=Sports of the Times—The Ivy League|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C0CE3D9173EEE3BBC4C53DFB467838D629EDE|work=The New York Times|date=December 4, 1936|access-date=May 30, 2017|page=36|quote=There will now be a little test of 'the power of the press' in intercollegiate circles since the student editors at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, Columbia, Dartmouth and Penn are coming out in a group for the formation of an Ivy League in football. The idea isn't new. ... It would be well for the proponents of the Ivy League to make it clear (to themselves especially) that the proposed group would be inclusive but not 'exclusive' as this term is used with a slight up-tilting of the tip of the nose." He recommended the consideration of "plenty of institutions covered with home-grown ivy that are not included in the proposed group. [such as ] Army and Navy and Georgetown and Fordham and Syracuse and Brown and Pitt, just to offer a few examples that come to mind" and noted that "Pitt and Georgetown and Brown and Bowdoin and Rutgers were old when Cornell was shining new, and Fordham and Holy Cross had some building draped in ivy before the plaster was dry in the walls that now tower high about Cayuga's waters.}}</ref>}}

Aspects of Ivy stereotyping were illustrated during the [[1988 United States presidential election|1988 presidential election]], when [[George H. W. Bush]] (Yale '48) derided [[Michael Dukakis]] (graduate of Harvard Law School) for having "foreign-policy views born in Harvard Yard's boutique."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.tarpley.net/bush22.htm|title=George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography: Chapter XXII Bush Takes The Presidency|first1=Webster G.|last1=Tarpley|first2=Anton|last2=Chaitkin|publisher=Webster G. Tarpley|access-date=December 17, 2006|archive-date=February 7, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100207080707/http://www.tarpley.net/bush22.htm|url-status=live}} <!-- Obviously a poor source but it has the exact phrase the New York Times columnists are referring to, which I couldn't find in the NYT articles themselves. --></ref> ''New York Times'' columnist [[Maureen Dowd]] asked "Wasn't this a case of the pot calling the kettle elite?" Bush explained, however, that, unlike Harvard, Yale's reputation was "so diffuse, there isn't a symbol, I don't think, in the Yale situation, any symbolism in it. ... Harvard boutique to me has the connotation of liberalism and elitism" and said ''Harvard'' in his remark was intended to represent "a philosophical enclave" and not a statement about class.<ref>Dowd, Maureen (1998), "Bush Traces How Yale Differs From Harvard". ''The New York Times'', June 11, 1998, p. 10.</ref> Columnist [[Russell Baker]] opined that "Voters inclined to loathe and fear elite Ivy League schools rarely make fine distinctions between Yale and Harvard. All they know is that both are full of rich, fancy, stuck-up and possibly dangerous intellectuals who never sit down to supper in their [[undershirt]] no matter how hot the weather gets."<ref>Baker, Russell (1998). "The Ivy Hayseed". ''The New York Times'', June 15, 1988, p. A31.</ref> Still, the next five consecutive presidents all attended Ivy League schools for at least part of their education—George H. W. Bush (Yale undergrad), [[Bill Clinton]] (Yale Law School), [[George W. Bush]] (Yale undergrad, Harvard Business School), [[Barack Obama]] (Columbia undergrad, Harvard Law School), and [[Donald Trump]] (Penn undergrad).  Indeed, since 1989, [[Joe Biden]] has been the only president to ''not'' be Ivy League-educated.

=== U.S. presidents in the Ivy League ===
{{See also|List of presidents of the United States by education}}

[[File:Franklin D. Roosevelt with Harvard class of 1904, group shot in Nantasket Beach, Massachusetts - NARA - 195358.jpg|right|thumb|[[Franklin Delano Roosevelt]], third from left, top row, with his Harvard class in 1904]]

Of the 45<!-- DO NOT change this number; forty-five (45) is CURRENT and CORRECT. Grover Cleveland served two non-consecutive terms and is numbered as both the 22nd and 24th U.S. president, and Donald Trump served two non-consecutive terms and is numbered as both the 45th and 47th president. Thank you. -->{{efn|{{As of|2025}}. While there have been 47 presidencies, only 45 individuals have served as president. Two presidents have served non-consecutive terms: and thus, [[Grover Cleveland]] is numbered as both the 22nd and 24th U.S. president, and [[Donald Trump]] is numbered as both the 45th and 47th U.S. president.}} persons who have served as [[President of the United States]], 16 have graduated from an Ivy League university with either a Bachelor's or advanced degree. Of them, eight have degrees from Harvard, five from Yale, three from Columbia, two from Princeton and one from Penn. Twelve presidents have earned Ivy undergraduate degrees. Four of these were transfer students: Woodrow Wilson transferred from [[Davidson College]], Barack Obama transferred from [[Occidental College]], Donald Trump transferred from [[Fordham University]], and John F. Kennedy transferred from Princeton to Harvard. [[John Adams]] was the first president to graduate from college, graduating from Harvard in 1755.

{|class="wikitable"
! President
! School(s)
! Graduation year
|-
| nowrap | [[John Adams]]
|Harvard University
|1755
|-
| nowrap | [[James Madison]]
|Princeton University
|1771
|-
| nowrap | [[John Quincy Adams]]
|Harvard University
|1787
|-
| nowrap | [[William Henry Harrison]]
|University of Pennsylvania
|(withdrew, class of 1793)
|-
| nowrap | [[Rutherford B. Hayes]]
|[[Harvard Law School]]
|1845
|-
| nowrap | [[Theodore Roosevelt]]
|Harvard University<br />[[Columbia Law School]]
|1880<br />(withdrew, class of 1882)<ref>New York Sun, [http://www.nysun.com/new-york/presidents-roosevelt-honored-with-posthumous/86666/ Presidents Roosevelt Honored With Posthumous Columbia Degrees] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220206143325/http://www.nysun.com/new-york/presidents-roosevelt-honored-with-posthumous/86666/ |date=February 6, 2022 }}, September 26, 2008</ref>
|-
| nowrap | [[William Howard Taft]]
|Yale University
|1878
|-
| nowrap | [[Woodrow Wilson]]
|Princeton University
| 1879
|-
| nowrap | [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]
|Harvard University<br />Columbia Law School
|1903<br />(withdrew, class of 1907)<ref>Columbia Law School, [http://www.law.columbia.edu/media_inquiries/news_events/2008/september2008/roosevelt_jds Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt to Receive Posthumous Law Degrees from Columbia Law School] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161221083043/http://www1.law.columbia.edu/media_inquiries/news_events/2008/september2008/roosevelt_jds |date=December 21, 2016}}, September 25, 2008</ref>
|-
| nowrap | [[John F. Kennedy]]
|Princeton University<br />Harvard University
|(withdrew)<br />1940
|-
| nowrap | [[Gerald Ford]]
|[[Yale Law School]]
|1941
|-
| nowrap | [[George H. W. Bush]]
|Yale University
|1948
|-
| nowrap | [[Bill Clinton]]
|Yale Law School
|1973
|-
| nowrap | [[George W. Bush]]
|Yale University<br />[[Harvard Business School]]
|1968<br />1975
|-
| nowrap | [[Barack Obama]]
|Columbia University<br />Harvard Law School
|1983<br />1991
|-
| nowrap | [[Donald Trump]]
|University of Pennsylvania
|1968
|}

==Student demographics==

===Race and ethnicity===
{|  class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto; text-align:center; width:75%"
|+ '''Racial and ethnic background (2020)'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System |url=https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/use-the-data |access-date=2022-12-06 |website=nces.ed.gov |archive-date=January 4, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200104184916/https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/use-the-data |url-status=live }}</ref>
|-
! College !! [[Asian Americans|Asian]] !! [[African Americans|Black]] !! [[Hispanic and Latino Americans|Hispanic]] (of any race) !! [[Non-Hispanic whites|Non-Hispanic White]] !! Other/
International
! [[Multiracial Americans|Two or more races]] !! Unknown
|-
| '''Brown''' || 16% || 7% || 10% || 39% || 18% || 5% || 4%
|-
| '''Columbia''' || 13% || 5% || 8% || 31% || 35% || 3% || 4%
|-
| '''Cornell''' || 17% || 6% || 11% || 34% || 22% || 4% || 6%
|-
| '''Dartmouth''' || 14% || 5% || 9% || 48% || 17% || 5% || 3%
|-
| '''Harvard''' || 14% || 7% || 9% || 40% || 23% || 4% || 3%
|-
| '''Penn''' || 18% || 7% || 8% || 40% || 20% || 4% || 3%
|-
| '''Princeton''' || 19% || 6% || 9% || 35% || 23% || 5% || 3%
|-
| '''Yale''' || 16% || 7% || 11% || 39% || 21% || 5% || 1%
|-
| '''United States'''<ref>{{Cite web |date=2021 |title=QuickFacts |url=https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045221 |website=United States Census Bureau |access-date=December 16, 2022 |archive-date=February 2, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220202181905/https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045221 |url-status=live }}</ref>|| 6% || 14% || 19% || 59% || 2% || 3% || —
|}

===Geographic distribution===
Students of the Ivy League largely hail from [[Northeastern United States|the Northeast]], largely from the New York City, [[Boston]], and [[Philadelphia]] areas. As all eight Ivy League universities are within the Northeast, most graduates end up working and residing in the Northeast after graduation. An unscientific survey of Harvard seniors from the Class of 2013 found that 42% hailed from the Northeast and 55% overall were planning on working and residing in the Northeast.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thecrimson.com/flash-graphic/2013/5/28/senior-survey-2013-graphic/|title=The Harvard Crimson|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=June 9, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130609231921/http://www.thecrimson.com/flash-graphic/2013/5/28/senior-survey-2013-graphic/|url-status=live}}</ref> Boston and New York City are traditionally where many Ivy League graduates end up living.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-where-ivy-league-students-go-when-they-graduate-presentation-2012-6?op=1|title=Here's Where Ivy League Students Go When They Graduate [Presentation]|date=June 29, 2012|work=Business Insider|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=August 16, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210816112208/https://www.businessinsider.com/heres-where-ivy-league-students-go-when-they-graduate-presentation-2012-6?op=1|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/why-do-so-many-ivy-league-grads-go-to-wall-steet/253245/|title=Why Do So Many Ivy League Grads Go to Wall Street?|date=February 17, 2012|work=The Atlantic|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=October 6, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006130432/http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/why-do-so-many-ivy-league-grads-go-to-wall-steet/253245/|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Socioeconomics and social class===
{|  class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto; text-align:center; width:75%"
|+ Family income of students (2013)<ref name="NYT socioeconomic diversity">{{cite news |title=Some Colleges Have More Students From the Top 1 Percent Than the Bottom 60. Find Yours. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/18/upshot/some-colleges-have-more-students-from-the-top-1-percent-than-the-bottom-60.html |access-date=26 August 2020 |work=The New York Times |date=18 January 2017 |archive-date=April 10, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190410135504/https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/18/upshot/some-colleges-have-more-students-from-the-top-1-percent-than-the-bottom-60.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
! College !! Median !! Top 1% !! Top 10% !! Top 20% !! Bottom 20%
|-
| '''Brown'''
| $204,200 || 19% || 60% || 70% || 4.1%
|-
| '''Columbia'''
| $150,900 || 13% || 48% || 62% || 5.1%
|-
| '''Cornell'''
| $151,600 || 10% || 48% || 64% || 3.8%
|-
| '''Dartmouth'''
| $200,400 || 21% || 58% || 69% || 2.6%
|-
| '''Harvard'''
| $168,800 || 15% || 53% || 67% || 4.5%
|-
| '''Penn'''
| $195,500 || 19% || 45% || 58% || 3.3%
|-
| '''Princeton'''
| $186,100 || 17% || 58% || 72% || 2.2%
|-
| '''Yale'''
| $192,600 || 19% || 57% || 69% || 2.1%
|}
[[File:Learned Hand at Harvarda.jpg|thumb|[[Harvard Law School]] students {{circa|1895}}|alt=]]
Students of the Ivy League, both graduate and undergraduate, come primarily from [[Upper middle class in the United States|upper middle]] and [[American upper class|upper class]] families. In recent years, however, the universities have looked towards increasing socioeconomic and class diversity, by providing greater financial aid packages to applicants from [[American lower class|lower]], [[American working class|working]], and [[Lower middle class#United States|lower middle class]] American families.<ref name="theatlantic.com"/><ref name="McGrath">{{cite news | url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/maggiemcgrath/2013/11/27/the-challenge-of-being-poor-at-americas-richest-colleges/ | work=Forbes | first=Maggie | last=McGrath | title=The Challenge Of Being Poor At America's Richest Colleges | date=November 27, 2013 | access-date=September 1, 2017 | archive-date=October 16, 2017 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171016005556/https://www.forbes.com/sites/maggiemcgrath/2013/11/27/the-challenge-of-being-poor-at-americas-richest-colleges/ | url-status=live }}</ref>

In 2013, a [[Harvard Crimson]] writer estimated that 46% of Harvard undergraduate students came from families in the top 3.8% of all American households (i.e., over $200,000 annual income).<ref name="McGrath"/> In 2012, the bottom 25% of the American income distribution accounted for only 3–4% of students at Brown, a figure that had remained unchanged since 1992.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.browndailyherald.com/2012/04/23/how-diverse-are-we/|title=How diverse are we?|first1=Margaret|last1=Nickens|first2=Kate|last2=Nussenbaum|date=April 23, 2012|work=The Brown Daily Herald|access-date=October 14, 2014|archive-date=October 19, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141019034442/http://www.browndailyherald.com/2012/04/23/how-diverse-are-we/|url-status=live}}</ref> In 2014, 69% of incoming freshmen students at Yale College came from families with annual incomes of over $120,000, putting most Yale College students in the upper-middle and upper classes. (The median household income in the U.S. in 2013 was $52,700.)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2014/01/22/miele-wanted-fewer-dumb-students/|title=MIELE: Wanted, fewer dumb students|first=Adriana|last=Miele|date=January 22, 2014|work=Yale Daily News}}</ref>

In the 2011–2012 academic year, students qualifying for [[Pell Grant]]s (federally funded scholarships on the basis of need) constituted 20% at Harvard, 18% at Cornell, 17% at Penn, 16% at Columbia, 15% at Dartmouth and Brown, 14% at Yale, and 12% at Princeton. Nationally, 35% of American university students qualify for a Pell Grant.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3801|title=Wanted: smart students from poor families|first=David|last=Zax|work=Yale Alumni Magazine|access-date=October 14, 2014|archive-date=August 8, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140808054204/http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3801|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Graduation rates ===
{|  class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto; text-align:center; width:75%"
|+Graduation rate by race/ethnicity (2022)<ref>{{Cite web |title=Explorer Colleges by Type, Location, and Degrees |url=https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/colleges/ |access-date=2022-12-09 |website=College Tuition Compare |language=en |archive-date=December 9, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221209044150/https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/colleges/ |url-status=live }}</ref>
!College
!American Indian or
Alaska Native
!Asian
!Black
!Hispanic
(of any race )
!Native Hawaiian or
Other Pacific Islander
!Non-Hispanic White
!Two or more
races
!Unknown
|-
|'''Brown'''
|57%
|96%
|95%
|95%
| -
|97%
|98%
|96%
|-
|'''Columbia'''
|83%
|98%
|95%
|98%
|50%
|98%
|95%
|100%
|-
|'''Cornell'''
|73%
|96%
|90%
|90%
|75%
|95%
|95%
|94%
|-
|'''Dartmouth'''
|96%
|96%
|82%
|93%
|100%
|95%
|93%
|83%
|-
|'''Harvard'''
|75%
|98%
|96%
|97%
| -
|97%
|98%
|100%
|-
|'''Penn'''
|100%
|97%
|96%
|95%
| -
|96%
|99%
|98%
|-
|'''Princeton'''
|100%
|99%
|95%
|99%
|100%
|99%
|96%
|94%
|-
|'''Yale'''
|100%
|99%
|95%
|95%
| -
|97%
|97%
|100%
|}

== Faculty demographics ==

=== Race and ethnicity ===
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto; text-align:center; width:75%"
|+ '''Racial and ethnic background (2021/2022)'''
|-
! College !! Asian !! Black !! Hispanic (of any race) !! Non-Hispanic White !! '''Native American,'''
'''Native Alaskan or'''

'''Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander'''
! Two or more races !! Unknown
!"Under Represented Minorities" &
"Historically Underrepresented Groups"
|-
| '''Brown'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Faculty from HUGs by Discipline |url=https://diap.brown.edu/data/diversity-dashboards/faculty-data/faculty-hugs-discipline |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=Diversity & Inclusion Action Plan {{!}} Brown University |language=en |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180834/https://diap.brown.edu/data/diversity-dashboards/faculty-data/faculty-hugs-discipline |url-status=dead }}</ref> || - || - || - || 86% || - || || -
|13%
|-
| '''Columbia'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Faculty Diversity {{!}} Office of the Provost |url=https://provost.columbia.edu/content/faculty-diversity |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=provost.columbia.edu |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180829/https://provost.columbia.edu/content/faculty-diversity |url-status=live }}</ref> || 19% || - || - || 63% || - || - || 3%
|12%
|-
| '''Cornell'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Composition |url=https://irp.dpb.cornell.edu/university-factbook/diversity/composition |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=Institutional Research & Planning |language=en-US |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180832/https://irp.dpb.cornell.edu/university-factbook/diversity/composition |url-status=live }}</ref> || 12% || ''8%'' || ''(Combined''
''with Black)''
| 72% || - || - || 7%
| -
|-
| '''Dartmouth'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Faculty |url=https://www.dartmouth.edu/oir/data-reporting/factbook/faculty.html |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=www.dartmouth.edu |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180832/https://www.dartmouth.edu/oir/data-reporting/factbook/faculty.html |url-status=live }}</ref> || 9% || 4% || 6% || 80% || 1% || 2% || -
| -
|-
| '''Harvard'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Current Annual Report |url=https://faculty.harvard.edu/current-annual-report |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=faculty.harvard.edu |language=en |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180844/https://faculty.harvard.edu/current-annual-report |url-status=live }}</ref> || 12% || 4% || 3% || 79% || .1% || 1% || -
| -
|-
| '''Penn'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Facts and Figures {{!}} Diversity |url=https://diversity.upenn.edu/node/785 |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=diversity.upenn.edu |language=en |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180844/https://diversity.upenn.edu/node/785 |url-status=live }}</ref> || ''17%'' || 4% || 5% || 71% || ''(Combined with Asian)'' || 1% || .7%
| -
|-
| '''Princeton'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Demographics |url=https://inclusive.princeton.edu/about/demographics |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=Inclusive Princeton |language=en |archive-date=June 28, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210628095833/https://inclusive.princeton.edu/about/demographics |url-status=live }}</ref> || 11% || 4% || 3% || 78% || 0% || 0% || 4%
| -
|-
| '''Yale'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Faculty Demographics {{!}} Faculty Development & Diversity |url=https://faculty.yale.edu/faculty-demographics |access-date=2022-12-15 |website=faculty.yale.edu |archive-date=December 15, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221215180842/https://faculty.yale.edu/faculty-demographics |url-status=live }}</ref> || 21% || 5% || 5% || 62% || - || 1% || 6%
| -
|}

== Competition and athletics ==
[[File:Yale Bowl from south end.jpg|thumb|The [[Yale Bowl]] during a football game against Cornell]]
Ivy champions are recognized in sixteen men's and sixteen women's sports. In some sports, Ivy teams actually compete as members of another league, the Ivy championship being decided by isolating the members' records in play against each other; for example, the six league members who participate in [[ice hockey]] do so as members of [[ECAC Hockey]], but an Ivy champion is extrapolated each year. In one sport, [[College rowing (United States)|rowing]], the Ivies recognize team champions for each sex in both heavyweight and lightweight divisions. While the [[Intercollegiate Rowing Association]] governs all four sex- and bodyweight-based divisions of rowing, the only one that is sanctioned by the NCAA is women's heavyweight. The Ivy League was the last Division I [[basketball]] conference to institute a conference postseason tournament; the first tournaments for men and women were held at the end of the 2016–17 season. The tournaments only award the Ivy League automatic bids for the NCAA Division&nbsp;I [[NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament|Men's]] and [[NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament|Women's]] Basketball Tournaments; the official conference championships continue to be awarded based solely on regular-season results.<ref>{{cite press release |url=http://ivyleaguesports.com/information/general_releases/2015-16/releases/The_Ivy_League_Adds_Mens-Womens_Basketball_Tournaments_Beginning_in_2017 |title=The Ivy League Adds Men's, Women's Basketball Tournaments Beginning in 2017 |publisher=Ivy League |date=March 10, 2016 |access-date=March 10, 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160311041901/http://ivyleaguesports.com/information/general_releases/2015-16/releases/The_Ivy_League_Adds_Mens-Womens_Basketball_Tournaments_Beginning_in_2017 |archive-date=March 11, 2016 }}</ref> Before the 2016–17 season, the automatic bids were based solely on regular-season record, with a [[one-game playoff]] (or series of one-game playoffs if more than two teams were tied) held to determine the automatic bid.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2002/03/06/yale-basketball-shares-ivy-league-title/ |title=Yale basketball shares Ivy League title |publisher=Yale Daily News |date=March 6, 2002 |access-date=August 1, 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130209211908/http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2002/03/06/yale-basketball-shares-ivy-league-title/ |archive-date=February 9, 2013 }}</ref> The Ivy League is one of only two Division I conferences which award their official basketball championships solely on regular-season results; the other is the [[Southeastern Conference]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2015/1023/2016%20SEC%20MBKB%20Media%20Guide.pdf |title=Through the Years: SEC Champions |work=2015–2016 SEC Men's Basketball Media Guide |page=61 |publisher=Southeastern Conference |access-date=March 10, 2016 |quote=From 1933–50 the SEC Champion was determined by a tournament, except for 1935. Since 1951, when the round-robin schedule was introduced, the title has been decided by a winning percentage on the conference schedule. |archive-date=March 11, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160311075432/http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2015/1023/2016%20SEC%20MBKB%20Media%20Guide.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2015/1111/2015-16%20SEC%20WBB%20Guide.pdf |title=Through the Years: SEC Champions |work=2015–2016 SEC Women's Basketball Media Guide |page=54 |publisher=Southeastern Conference |access-date=March 10, 2016 |quote=Since 1986, the SEC champion has been determined by the regular season schedule. |archive-date=March 11, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160311070655/http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2015/1111/2015-16%20SEC%20WBB%20Guide.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Since its inception, an Ivy League school has yet to win either the men's or women's Division I NCAA basketball tournament.
[[File:Brown v Columbia basketball game.jpg|right|thumb|Brown plays Columbia in basketball, 2020.]]
On average, each Ivy school has more than 35 varsity teams. All eight are in the top 20 for number of sports offered for both men and women among Division I schools. Unlike most Division I athletic conferences, the Ivy League prohibits the granting of athletic scholarships; all scholarships awarded are need-based ([[Student financial aid (United States)|financial aid]]).<ref name="whatisivy">{{cite web|url=http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/timeline/index|title=Timeline|publisher=The Ivy League|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160420101456/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/timeline/index|archive-date=April 20, 2016}}</ref> In addition, the Ivies have a rigid policy against [[Redshirt (college sports)|redshirting]], even for medical reasons; an athlete loses a year of eligibility for every year enrolled at an Ivy institution.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.espn.com/blog/collegebasketballnation/post/_/id/116147/which-players-injured-last-season-will-make-the-strongest-comebacks |title=Which players injured last season will make the strongest comebacks? |first=C.L. |last=Brown |website=ESPN |date=October 5, 2016 |access-date=October 8, 2016 |quote=It's easy to forget what Siyani Chambers has meant to Harvard as a three-time all-Ivy League player because he wasn't enrolled in school last season. The Ivy League doesn't allow redshirts, so Chambers was forced to withdraw after a preseason ACL injury if he wanted to return for his senior season. |archive-date=October 7, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161007205757/http://www.espn.com/blog/collegebasketballnation/post/_/id/116147/which-players-injured-last-season-will-make-the-strongest-comebacks |url-status=live }}</ref> Additionally, the Ivies prohibit graduate students from participating in intercollegiate athletics, even if they have remaining athletic eligibility.<ref name="Borsello 2020-02-12">{{cite web|url=https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/28673063/is-ivy-league-transfer-policy-helping-players-hurting-them |title=Is the Ivy League transfer policy helping players or hurting them? |first=Jeff |last=Borzello |website=ESPN |date=February 12, 2020 |access-date=March 16, 2020}}</ref> The only exception to the ban on graduate students was that seniors graduating in 2021 were allowed to play at their current institutions as graduate students in 2021–22. This was a one-time-only response to the Ivies shutting down most intercollegiate athletics in 2020–21 due to COVID-19.<ref name="Borzello 2021-02-11">{{cite web |url=https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/30881880/ivy-league-allowing-one-waiver-grad-students-play-2021-22-due-pandemic |title=Ivy League allowing one-time waiver for grad students to play in 2021-22 due to COVID-19 pandemic |first=Jeff |last=Borzello |website=ESPN |date=February 11, 2021 |access-date=March 1, 2021 |archive-date=February 28, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210228120235/https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/30881880/ivy-league-allowing-one-waiver-grad-students-play-2021-22-due-pandemic |url-status=live }}</ref> Ivy League teams' non-league games are often against the members of the [[Patriot League]], which have similar academic standards and athletic scholarship policies (although unlike the Ivies, the Patriot League allows both redshirting and play by eligible graduate students). To promote diversity and inclusion, student-athletes are required to have their [[Personal pronoun|gender pronouns]] listed on their roster pages on the athletic websites for most Ivy League schools.

In the time before [[College recruiting|recruiting]] for college sports became dominated by those offering athletic scholarships and lowered academic standards for athletes, the Ivy League was successful in many sports relative to other universities in the country. In particular, Princeton won 26 recognized national championships in [[college football]] (last in 1935), and Yale won 18 (last in 1927).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/national_championships/nchamps_year.php|title=Recognized National Championships by Year|publisher=College Football Data Warehouse|access-date=October 8, 2014|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161015173918/http://www.cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/national_championships/nchamps_year.php|archive-date=October 15, 2016}}</ref> Both of these totals are considerably higher than those of other historically strong programs such as [[Alabama Crimson Tide football|Alabama]], which has won 15, [[Notre Dame Fighting Irish football|Notre Dame]], which claims 11 but is credited by many sources with 13, and [[USC Trojans football|USC]], which has won 11. Yale, whose coach [[Walter Camp]] was the "Father of American Football," held on to its place as the all-time wins leader in college football throughout the entire 20th century, but was finally passed by [[Michigan Wolverines football|Michigan]] on November 10, 2001. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Penn each have over a dozen former scholar-athletes enshrined in the [[College Football Hall of Fame]]. Currently Dartmouth holds the record for most Ivy League football titles, with 18, followed closely by Harvard and Penn, each with 17 titles. In addition, the Ivy League has produced [[Super Bowl]] winners [[Kevin Boothe]] ([[Cornell Big Red football|Cornell]]), two-time [[Pro Bowl]]er [[Zak DeOssie]] ([[Brown Bears football|Brown]]), [[Sean Morey (American football)|Sean Morey]] (Brown), [[All-Pro]] selection [[Matt Birk]] ([[Harvard Crimson football|Harvard]]), [[Calvin Hill]] ([[Yale Bulldogs football|Yale]]), [[Derrick Harmon (running back)|Derrick Harmon]] (Cornell) and [[Justin Watson (wide receiver)]], (three-time [[Super Bowl]] champion, winning [[Super Bowl LV]] with the [[Tampa Bay Buccaneers]] and [[Super Bowl LVII]] and [[Super Bowl LVIII|LVIII]] with the [[Kansas City Chiefs]]), ([[Penn Quakers football|Penn]]).

[[File:Cornell vs UPenn football game 2019.jpg|thumb|Penn (left) plays Cornell (right), 2019.]]

===FCS Championship===
Beginning with the [[1982 NCAA Division I-AA football season|1982 football season]], the Ivy League has competed in [[1982 NCAA Division I-AA football season|Division I-AA]] (renamed [[NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision|FCS]] {{nowrap|in 2006).<ref name=wergbt>{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=iqpfAAAAIBAJ&pg=2966%2C4685676 |work=Lewiston Morning Tribune |location=Idaho |agency=Associated Press |title=NCAA Convention: Ivy League has 'serious doubts' about I-AA status |date=January 12, 1982 |page=4C |access-date=September 22, 2020 |archive-date=October 15, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211015105721/https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=iqpfAAAAIBAJ&pg=2966,4685676 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/17/sports/ncaafootball/17ivy.html New York Times] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160413021843/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/17/sports/ncaafootball/17ivy.html |date=April 13, 2016 }} – November 17, 2006</ref>}} The Ivy League teams are eligible for the FCS tournament held to determine the national champion, and the league champion is eligible for an automatic bid (and any other team may qualify for an at-large selection) from the NCAA. However, from its inception in 1956 until 2024, the Ivy League had not played any postseason games due to concerns about the extended December schedule's effects on academics. (The last postseason game for a member was {{Years or months ago|1934}}, the [[1934 Rose Bowl]], won by {{nowrap|[[1933 Columbia Lions football team|Columbia]].)<ref name=vnqmud>{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=U7IWAAAAIBAJ&pg=6420%2C101607 |work=Milwaukee Journal |title=Gallant Columbia 'Sea' Lions vanquish Stanford in mud, 7 to 0 |date=January 2, 1934 |page=6, part 2 }}{{Dead link|date=December 2021 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref name=colamz>{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=7d9XAAAAIBAJ&pg=6453%2C5030424 |work=Eugene Register-Guard |location=Oregon |agency=Associated Press |last=Bell |first=Brian |title=Columbia amazes sport world with Stanford win, 7–0 |date=January 2, 1934 |page=6}}</ref>}} For this reason, any Ivy League team invited to the FCS playoffs turned down the bid. The Ivy League plays a strict 10-game schedule, compared to other FCS members' schedules of 11 (or, in some seasons, 12) regular season games, plus post-season, which expanded in [[2013 NCAA Division I FCS football season|2013]] to five rounds with 24 teams, with a bye week for the top eight teams. Football had been the only sport in which the Ivy League declined to compete for a national title.  However, beginning in 2025, the Ivy League will participate in the FCS playoffs, with its conference champion automatically qualifying for the tournament.<ref name="2025playoffs">{{Cite web |date=2024-12-18 |title=Ivy League To Begin Participating in the NCAA Division I FCS Playoffs Starting With 2025 Season |url=https://ivyleague.com/news/2024/12/18/football-fb-fcs-announcement.aspx |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=IvyLeague.com}}</ref>

===Sprint football===
In addition to varsity football, Penn and Cornell also field teams in the 9-team [[Sprint football|Collegiate Sprint Football League]], in which all players must weigh 178 pounds or less. With Princeton canceling its program in 2016,<ref>{{Cite web|title=Princeton to discontinue sprint football program|url=https://www.princeton.edu/news/2016/04/11/princeton-discontinue-sprint-football-program|access-date=2021-02-19|website=Princeton University|language=en|archive-date=March 18, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210318111004/https://www.princeton.edu/news/2016/04/11/princeton-discontinue-sprint-football-program|url-status=live}}</ref> Penn is the last remaining founding members of the league from its 1934 debut, and Cornell is the next-oldest, joining in 1937. Yale and Columbia previously fielded teams in the league but no longer do so.

===Teams===

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align: center"
|+ '''Teams in Ivy League competition'''<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/|title=Ivy League|publisher=Council of Ivy League Presidents and The Ivy League|access-date=October 8, 2014|archive-date=January 22, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100122140947/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/article.asp?intID=7503|url-status=live}}</ref>
!Sport || width=60 | Men's || Women's
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College baseball|Baseball]]||8||–
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College basketball|Basketball]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Cross country running|Cross-country]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Fencing]]||6||7
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Field hockey]]||–||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College football|Football]]||8||–
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Golf]]||8||7
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College ice hockey|Ice hockey]]||6||6
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College lacrosse|Lacrosse]]||7||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College rowing (United States)|Rowing]]||8||7
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|Soccer||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[College softball|Softball]]||–||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Squash (sport)|Squash]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|Swimming and [[Diving (sport)|diving]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Tennis]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Track and field#Indoor|Track and field (indoor)]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Track and field#Outdoor|Track and field (outdoor)]]||8||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Volleyball]]||–||8
|-
|style="text-align: left;"|[[Collegiate wrestling|Wrestling]]||6||–
|}

===Men's sponsored sports by school===
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; width:80%"
|-
! School !! Baseball !! Basketball !! Cross Country !! Fencing !! Football !! Golf !! Lacrosse !! Rowing !! Soccer !! Squash !! Swimming & Diving !! Tennis !! Track & Field <br />(Indoor) !! Track & Field <br />(Outdoor) !! Wrestling !! Total Ivy League Sports
|-
| Brown || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 12
|-
| Columbia || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 14
|-
| Cornell || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 14
|-
| Dartmouth || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || 13
|-
| Harvard || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Penn || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Princeton || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Yale || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || 14
|-
|Totals || 8 || 8 || 8 || 5 || 8 || 7 || 7 || 8 || 8  || 7  || 8  || 8  || 8  || 8 || 6 || 110
|}

====Men's varsity sports not sponsored by the Ivy League====
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! School !! Crew !! Ice Hockey<sup>1</sup> !! Polo !! Sailing !! Skiing !! Volleyball !! Water Polo 
|-
| Brown || Independent || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent || No || No || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]] 
|-
| Columbia || No || No || No || No || No || No || No 
|-
| Cornell || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || Independent || No  || No || No || No 
|-
| Dartmouth || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent  || Independent || No || No
|-
| Harvard || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent  || Independent || [[Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association|EIVA]] || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]] 
|-
| Penn || No || No || No || No || No || No || No 
|-
| Princeton || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || No  || No || [[Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association|EIVA]] || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]] 
|-
| Yale || Independent || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent || No || No || No 
|}
Notes:

1: Though the Ivy League lists ice hockey as a sponsored sport, all six ice hockey playing Ivy League schools participate as members of [[ECAC Hockey]].

===Women's sponsored sports by school===
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; width:80%"
|-
! School !! Basketball !! Cross Country !! Fencing !! Field Hockey !!  Golf !! Lacrosse !! Rowing !! Soccer !! Softball !! Squash !! Swimming & Diving !! Tennis !! Track & Field<br />(Indoor) !! Track & Field<br />(Outdoor) !! Volleyball !! Total Ivy League Sports
|-
| Brown || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 13
|-
| Columbia || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Cornell || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 14
|-
| Dartmouth || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{no}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 14
|-
| Harvard || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Penn || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Princeton || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
| Yale || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || {{yes}} || 15
|-
|Totals || 8 || 8 || 7 || 8 || 6 || 8 || 7  || 8  || 8  || 7  || 8  || 8 || 8 || 8 || 8 ||115
|}

====Women's varsity sports not sponsored by the Ivy League====
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! School !! Archery !! Crew !! Equestrian !! Gymnastics !! Ice Hockey<sup>1</sup> !! Polo !! Rugby<sup>2</sup> !! Sailing !! Skiing !! Water Polo
|-
| Brown || No || Independent || Independent || [[Gymnastics East Conference|GEC]]|| [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent || Independent || No || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]]
|-
| Columbia || Independent || No || No || No || No || No || No || No || No || No
|-
| Cornell || No || No || Independent || [[Gymnastics East Conference|GEC]]|| [[ECAC Hockey]] || Independent || No || Independent || No || No
|-
| Dartmouth || No || No || Independent || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent || Independent || Independent || No
|-
| Harvard || No || No || No || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent || Independent || Independent || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]]
|-
| Penn || No || No || No || [[Gymnastics East Conference|GEC]]|| No || No || No || No || No || No
|-
| Princeton || No || No || No || No || [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || Independent<ref>{{cite web | url=https://goprincetontigers.com/sports/womens-rugby | title=Women's Rugby | access-date=August 30, 2023 | archive-date=August 30, 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230830232155/https://goprincetontigers.com/sports/womens-rugby | url-status=live }}</ref>|| No || No || [[Collegiate Water Polo Association|CWPA]]
|-
| Yale || No || No || No || [[Gymnastics East Conference|GEC]]|| [[ECAC Hockey]] || No || No || Independent || No || No
|}
Notes:

1: Though the Ivy League lists ice hockey as a sponsored sport, all six ice hockey playing Ivy League schools participate as members of [[ECAC Hockey]].

2. The Ivy League is home to some of the oldest [[college rugby]] teams in the United States. Although none of the men's teams and half of the women's teams are not "varsity" sports, they all compete against each other as part of the [[Ivy Rugby Conference]]<ref>see www.ivyrugby.com</ref> in addition to their own local conferences. Four of the women's teams (Brown, Dartmouth, Harvard, and Princeton) play as part of the NCAA emerging sport category.<ref>Harvard: see {{Cite web |url=https://gocrimson.com/sports/womens-rugby |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230829151811/https://gocrimson.com/sports/womens-rugby |date=August 29, 2023 |title=Women's Rugby |archive-date=August 29, 2023 |url-status=live}}, Brown see {{Cite web |url=https://brownbears.com/sports/womens-rugby |title=Women's Rugby |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230902091527/https://brownbears.com/sports/womens-rugby |date=September 2, 2023 |archive-date=September 2, 2023 |url-status=live}}, Dartmouth see {{Cite web |url=https://dartmouthsports.com/sports/womens-rugby/ | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230902090023/https://dartmouthsports.com/sports/womens-rugby/schedule/2022-23 |date=September 2, 2023 |title=Women's Rugby |archive-date=September 2, 2023 |url-status=live}} and Princeton see {{Cite web |url=https://goprincetontigers.com/sports/womens-rugby |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230830232155/https://goprincetontigers.com/sports/womens-rugby |title=Women's Rugby |date=August 30, 2023 |archive-date=August 30, 2023 |url-status=live}}</ref>

===Historical results===
{| class="wikitable" style="margin-right:0"
|+ Total championships won (1956–2017)
|-
!Institution
!Ivy League <br /> championships
!NCAA team <br /> championships
|-
|Princeton Tigers
|476
|12
|-
|Harvard Crimson
|415
|4
|-
|Cornell Big Red
|231
|5
|-
|Pennsylvania Quakers
|210
|3
|-
|Yale Bulldogs
|202
|3
|-
|Dartmouth Big Green
|140
|3
|-
|Brown Bears
|123
|7
|-
|Columbia Lions
|105
|11
|}

The table above includes the number of team championships won from the beginning of official Ivy League competition (1956–57 academic year) through 2016–17. Princeton and Harvard have on occasion won ten or more Ivy League titles in a year, an achievement accomplished 10 times by Harvard and 24 times by Princeton, including a conference-record 15 championships in 2010–11. Only once has one of the other six schools earned more than eight titles in a single academic year (Cornell with nine in 2005–06). In the 38 academic years beginning 1979–80, Princeton has averaged 10 championships per year, one-third of the conference total of 33 sponsored sports.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://ivyleague.com/sports/2017/7/28/information-IvyChampionships-BySchool.aspx|title=Ivy League Championships – By School|publisher=Council of Ivy League Presidents and The Ivy League|access-date=November 11, 2017|archive-date=November 12, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171112185348/http://ivyleague.com/sports/2017/7/28/information-IvyChampionships-BySchool.aspx|url-status=live}}</ref>

In the 12 academic years beginning 2005–06 Princeton has won championships in 31 different sports, all except wrestling and men's tennis.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/championships/IvyLeague/WomensSports|title=Ivy League Championships – Women's Sports|publisher=Council of Ivy League Presidents and The Ivy League|access-date=October 8, 2014|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141012121929/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/history/championships/IvyLeague/WomensSports|archive-date=October 12, 2014}}</ref>

===Rivalries===
[[File:Cornell University vs Princeton Lacrosse 1987.jpg|thumb|right|Cornell and Princeton are longtime [[Cornell–Princeton lacrosse rivalry|lacrosse rivals]].]]
[[File:Harvard Stadium - 1903 Greek Play.jpg|thumb|right|Performance of a Greek play at [[Harvard Stadium]] in 1903]]
Rivalries run deep in the Ivy League. For instance, Princeton and [[Penn Quakers men's basketball|Penn]] are longstanding [[Penn – Princeton basketball rivalry|men's basketball rivals]];<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2002/02/12/sports/4317.shtml |title=The game: the tables are turned – Penn hoops travel to Jadwin tonight for premier rivalry of Ivy League basketball |newspaper=The Daily Princetonian |date=February 1, 2002|access-date=January 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071011141406/http://dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2002/02/12/sports/4317.shtml |archive-date=October 11, 2007 }}</ref> "Puck Frinceton" T-shirts are worn by Quaker fans at games.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2002/02/12/sports/4318.shtml |title=The rivalry? Not with Penn's paltry performance this season |newspaper=The Daily Princetonian |date=February 1, 2002|access-date=January 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071011141412/http://dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2002/02/12/sports/4318.shtml |archive-date=October 11, 2007 }}</ref> In only 11 instances in the history of Ivy League basketball, and in only seven seasons since Yale's 1962 title, has neither Penn nor Princeton won at least a share of the Ivy League title in basketball,<ref>[http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/sports/ivy-champs.asp?intSID=6 Ivy League Basketball] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090627003949/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/sports/ivy-champs.asp?intSID=6 |date=June 27, 2009 }}</ref> with Princeton champion or co-champion 26 times and Penn 25 times. Penn has won 21 outright, Princeton 19 outright. Princeton has been a co-champion 7 times, sharing 4 of those titles with Penn (these 4 seasons represent the only times Penn has been co-champion).

Harvard won its first title of either variety in 2011, losing a dramatic play-off game to Princeton for the NCAA tournament bid, then rebounded to win outright championships in [[2011–12 Harvard Crimson men's basketball team|2012]], [[2012–13 Harvard Crimson men's basketball team|2013]], and [[2013–14 Harvard Crimson men's basketball team|2014]]. Harvard also won the 2013 Great Alaska Shootout, defeating TCU to become the only Ivy League school to win the now-defunct tournament.

Rivalries exist between other Ivy league teams in other sports, including [[Cornell-Harvard hockey rivalry|Cornell and Harvard in hockey]], Harvard and Princeton in swimming, and Harvard and Penn in football (Penn and Harvard have won 28 Ivy League Football Championships since 1982, Penn-16; Harvard-12). During that time Penn has had 8 undefeated Ivy League Football Championships and Harvard has had 6 undefeated Ivy League Football Championships.<ref>[http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/sports/ivy-champs.asp?intSID=3 Ivy League Football] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100102231135/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/sports/ivy-champs.asp?intSID=3 |date=January 2, 2010 }}</ref> In [[field lacrosse|men's lacrosse]], [[Cornell Big Red men's lacrosse|Cornell]] and [[Princeton Tigers men's lacrosse|Princeton]] are [[Cornell–Princeton lacrosse rivalry|perennial rivals]], and they are two of three Ivy League teams to have won the NCAA tournament.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ncaa.com/history/lacrosse-men/d1|title=Men's Lacrosse Championship History|website=www.ncaa.com|language=en|access-date=November 29, 2019|archive-date=May 6, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190506002958/https://www.ncaa.com/history/lacrosse-men/d1|url-status=live}}</ref> In 2009, the Big Red and Tigers met for their 70th game in the [[2009 NCAA Division I Men's Lacrosse Championship|NCAA tournament]].<ref>[http://www.theithacajournal.com/article/20090516/SPORTS03/905160373/1128/New+wrinkle+to+Cornell-Princeton+lacrosse+rivalry New wrinkle in the Cornell Princeton lacrosse rivalry]{{Dead link|date=August 2018 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}, ''[[The Ithaca Journal]]'', May 16, 2009.</ref> No team other than Harvard or Princeton has won the men's swimming conference title outright since 1972, although Yale, Columbia, and Cornell have shared the title with Harvard and Princeton during this time. Similarly, no program other than Princeton and Harvard has won the women's swimming championship since Brown's 1999 title. Princeton or Cornell has won every indoor and outdoor track and field championship, both men's and women's, every year since 2002–03, with one exception (Columbia women won the indoor championship in 2012). Harvard and Yale are [[The Game (Harvard-Yale)|football]] and [[Harvard–Yale Regatta|crew]] rivals although the competition has become unbalanced; Harvard has won all but one of the last 15 football games and all but one of the last 13 crew races.
[[File:Ingalls Rink Highsmith.jpg|thumb|The [[Ingalls Rink]], Yale's primary hockey facility]]

====Intra-conference football rivalries====
{| class="wikitable" style="margin-right:0"
|-
!Teams
!Name
!Trophy
!First met
!Games played
!Series record
|-
|[[Columbia–Cornell football rivalry|Columbia–Cornell]]
|Empire State Bowl
|Empire Cup
|1889
|103 games
|36–64–3
|-
|[[Cornell–Dartmouth football rivalry|Cornell–Dartmouth]]
|None
|None
|1900
|103 games
|41–61–1
|-
|[[Cornell–Penn football rivalry|Cornell–Penn]]
|None
|Trustee's Cup
|1893
|122 games
|46–71–5
|-
|[[Dartmouth–Harvard football rivalry|Dartmouth–Harvard]]
|None
|None
|1882
|123 games
|47–71–5
|-
|Dartmouth–Princeton
|None
|Sawhorse Dollar
|1897
|100 games
|50–46–4
|-
|[[Harvard–Penn football rivalry|Harvard–Penn]]
|None
|None
|1881
|90 games
|49–39–2
|-
|[[Harvard–Princeton football rivalry|Harvard–Princeton]]
|None
|None
|1877
|112 games
|57–48–7
|-
|[[Harvard–Yale football rivalry|Harvard–Yale]]
|The Game
|None
|1875
|132 games
|59–65–8
|-
|[[Penn–Princeton football rivalry|Penn–Princeton]]
|None
|None
|1876
|111 games
|67–43–1
|-
|[[Princeton–Yale football rivalry|Princeton–Yale]]
|None
|None
|1873
|138 games
|52–76–10
|}

The Yale–Princeton series is the nation's second-longest by games played, surpassed only by [[The Rivalry (Lafayette–Lehigh)|"The Rivalry"]] between [[Lehigh Mountain Hawks football|Lehigh]] and [[Lafayette Leopards football|Lafayette]], which began later in 1884 but included two or three games in each of 17 early seasons.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.lehighsports.com/info/history/lehigh-lafayette.aspx|title=The Rivalry: Lehigh vs. Lafayette|work=LehigSports.com|access-date=April 25, 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130421004247/http://www.lehighsports.com/info/history/lehigh-lafayette.aspx|archive-date=April 21, 2013}}</ref> For the first three decades of the Yale-Princeton rivalry, the two played their season-ending game at a neutral site, usually New York City, and with one exception (1890: Harvard), the winner of the game also won at least a share of the [[College football national championships in NCAA Division I FBS|national championship]] that year, covering the period 1869 through 1903.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/16/sports/college-football-a-woeful-yale-loses-to-princeton.html|title=A Woeful Yale Loses To Princeton|last=Wallace|first=William N.|date=November 16, 1997|work=The New York Times|access-date=April 25, 2013|archive-date=May 12, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130512050849/http://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/16/sports/college-football-a-woeful-yale-loses-to-princeton.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://collegefootball.about.com/od/nationalchampions/a/champions-list.htm|title=College Football National Champions: The Complete List|last=Hyland|first=Tim|work=About.com|access-date=April 25, 2013|archive-date=April 25, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130425110419/http://collegefootball.about.com/od/nationalchampions/a/champions-list.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref> This phenomenon of a finale contest at a neutral site for the national title created a social occasion for the society elite of the metropolitan area akin to a [[Super Bowl]] in the era prior to the establishment of the [[National Football League|NFL]] in 1920.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.openculture.com/2012/02/princeton_v_yale_1903_the_oldest_college_football_game_on_film.html|title=Princeton v. Yale, 1903: The Oldest College Football Game on Film|last=Colman|first=Dan|date=February 23, 2012|work=OpenCulture.com|access-date=April 25, 2013|archive-date=June 1, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130601033233/http://www.openculture.com/2012/02/princeton_v_yale_1903_the_oldest_college_football_game_on_film.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://tiptop25.com/champ1903.html|title=1903 College Football National Championship|work=TipTop25.com|access-date=April 25, 2013|archive-date=July 8, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130708171421/http://tiptop25.com/champ1903.html|url-status=live}}</ref> These football games were also financially profitable for the two universities, so much that they began to play baseball games in New York City as well, drawing record crowds for that sport also, largely from the same social demographic.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1904/06/19/101167239.pdf|title=Princeton Beats Yale|date=June 19, 1904|work=The New York Times|access-date=April 25, 2013|archive-date=March 8, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308054031/https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1904/06/19/101167239.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> In a period when the only professional team sports were fledgling baseball leagues, these high-profile early contests between Princeton and Yale played a role in popularizing spectator sports, demonstrating their financial potential and raising public awareness of Ivy universities at a time when few people attended college.

====Extra-conference football rivalries====
{| class="wikitable" style="margin-right:0"
|-
!Teams
!Name
!Trophy
!First met
!Games played
!Series record
|-
|Brown–[[Rhode Island Rams football|Rhode Island]]
|None
|[[Brown–Rhode Island football rivalry|Governor's Cup]]
|1909
|107 games
|73–32–2
|-
|Columbia–[[Fordham Rams football|Fordham]]
|None
|[[Liberty Cup]]
|1890
|24 games
|12–12–0
|-
|Cornell–[[Colgate Raiders football|Colgate]]
|[[Colgate–Cornell football rivalry|None]]
|None
|1896
|95 games
|48–44–3
|-
|Dartmouth–[[New Hampshire Wildcats football|New Hampshire]]
|[[Dartmouth–New Hampshire football rivalry|Granite Bowl]]
|Granite Bowl Trophy
|1901
|42 games
|21–19–2
|-
|Harvard–[[Holy Cross Crusaders football|Holy Cross]]
|None
|None
|1904
|67 games
|41–24–2
|-
|Penn–[[Lafayette Leopards football|Lafayette]]
|None
|None
|1882
|90 games
|63–23–4
|-
|Penn–[[Lehigh Mountain Hawks football|Lehigh]]
|None
|None
|1885
|56 games
|43–13
|-
|Princeton–[[Rutgers Scarlet Knights football|Rutgers]]
|[[Princeton–Rutgers rivalry|None]]
|None
|1869
|71 games
|53–17–1
|-
|Yale–[[Army Black Knights football|Army]]
|None
|None
|1893
|45 games
|22–16–8
|-
|Yale–[[UConn Huskies football|Connecticut]]
|None
|None
|1948
|49 games
|32–17
|}

==Championships==

===NCAA team championships===

This list, which is current through January 8, 2018,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/champs_records_book/Overall.pdf|title=CHAMPIONSHIPS SUMMARY THROUGH JAN. 8, 2018|access-date=February 13, 2018|archive-date=March 20, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140320185655/http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/champs_records_book/Overall.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> includes NCAA championships and women's [[Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women championships|AIAW championships]] (one each for Yale and Dartmouth and five for Cornell). Excluded from this list are all other national championships earned [[List of college athletics championship game outcomes|outside the scope of NCAA competition]], including football titles and retroactive [[Helms Athletic Foundation|Helms Foundation titles]].

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center"
|-
!width=180| School
!width=45| Total
!width=45| Men
!width=45| Women
!width=45| Co-ed
!width=90| Nickname
|-
|[[Yale University]]
|[[Yale Bulldogs#NCAA team championships|29]]{{efn|name=fn1|The NCAA started sponsoring the intercollegiate golf championship in 1939, but it retained the titles from the 41 championships previously conferred by the National Intercollegiate Golf Association in its records. Of these pre-NCAA titles, Yale, Princeton, Harvard and Dartmouth won 20, 11, 6 and 1, respectively.}}
|26
|3
|0
|[[Yale Bulldogs|Bulldogs]]
|-
|[[Princeton University]]
|[[Princeton Tigers#NCAA team championships|24]]{{efn|name=fn1}}
|19
|4
|1
|[[Princeton Tigers|Tigers]]
|-
|[[Columbia University]]
|[[Columbia Lions#NCAA team championships|14]]
|11
|0
|3
|[[Columbia Lions|Lions]]
|-
|[[Harvard University]]
|[[Harvard Crimson#NCAA team championships|10]]{{efn|name=fn1}}
|7
|2
|1
|[[Harvard Crimson|Crimson]]
|-
|[[Brown University]]
|[[Brown Bears#NCAA team championships|7]]
|0
|7
|0
|[[Brown Bears|Bears]]
|-
|[[Cornell University]]
|[[Cornell Big Red#NCAA team championships|10]]
|5
|5
|0
|[[Cornell Big Red|Big Red]]
|-
|[[Dartmouth College]]
|[[Dartmouth Big Green#NCAA team championships|5]]{{efn|name=fn1}}
|1
|1
|3
|[[Dartmouth Big Green|Big Green]]
|-
|[[University of Pennsylvania]]
|[[Penn Quakers#NCAA team championships|4]]
|3
|1
|0
|[[Penn Quakers|Quakers]]
|-
|}
{{See also|List of NCAA schools with the most NCAA Division I championships|List of NCAA schools with the most Division I national championships}}

==Athletic facilities==
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="font-size:90%"
|-
{{CollegePrimaryHeader|border=2|col2span=3|col3span=3|col4span=3|col5span=3|col6span=3|team=Ivy League|  | Football stadium | Basketball arena | Baseball field | Hockey rink | Soccer stadium }}
|-
{{CollegePrimaryHeader|border=2|team=Ivy League| School<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/WhatIsIvy/facilities.asp | title = Ivy Facilities | access-date = June 10, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060318001423/http://www.ivyleaguesports.com/WhatIsIvy/facilities.asp |archive-date = March 18, 2006}}</ref> | Name | Capacity | Year | Name | Capacity | Year | Name | Capacity | Year | Name | Capacity | Year | Name | Capacity | Year }}
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Brown Bears}}"| [[Brown Bears|{{white|'''Brown'''}}]]
|[[Richard Gouse Field at Brown Stadium]]          ||{{nts|20000}}||1925
|[[Pizzitola Sports Center]]||{{nts|2800}}||1989
|[[Murray Stadium]]         ||{{nts|1000}}||1959
|[[Meehan Auditorium]]      ||{{nts|3100}}||1961
|[[Stevenson Field]]        ||{{nts|3500}}||1979
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Columbia Lions}}"| {{CollegeSecondaryColorLink|Columbia Lions|Columbia Lions|'''Columbia'''}}
|[[Robert K. Kraft Field at Lawrence A. Wien Stadium]]||{{nts|17000}}||1984
|[[Levien Gymnasium]]                                              ||{{nts|3408}}||1974
|[[Robertson Field at Satow Stadium]]||{{nts|1500}}||1923
|colspan=3 {{N/A|''Non-hockey school''}}
|[[Commisso Soccer Stadium]]                                       ||{{nts|3500}}||1985
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Cornell Big Red}}"| [[Cornell Big Red|{{white|'''Cornell'''}}]]
|[[Schoellkopf Field]]      ||{{nts|25597}}||1915
|[[Newman Arena]]           ||{{nts|4472}}||1990
|Booth Field                ||{{nts|500}}||2023
|[[Lynah Rink]]             ||{{nts|4267}}||1957
|[[Charles F. Berman Field]]||{{nts|1000}}||2000
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Dartmouth Big Green}}"| [[Dartmouth Big Green|{{white|'''Dartmouth'''}}]]
|[[Memorial Field (Dartmouth)|Buddy Teevens Stadium at Memorial Field]]||{{nts|15600}}||1923
|[[Leede Arena]]                              ||{{nts|2100}}||1986
|[[Red Rolfe Field at Biondi Park]]           ||{{nts|2000}}||2008
|[[Thompson Arena]]                           ||{{nts|4500}}||1975
|[[Burnham Field]]                            ||{{nts|1600}}||2007
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Harvard Crimson}}"| [[Harvard Crimson|{{white|'''Harvard'''}}]]
|[[Harvard Stadium]]              ||{{nts|30898}}||1903
|[[Lavietes Pavilion]]            ||{{nts|2195}}||1926
|[[Joseph J. O'Donnell Field]]    ||{{nts|1600}}||1898
|[[Bright Hockey Center]]         ||{{nts|2850}}||1956
|[[Jordan Field]] ||{{nts|2500}}||2010
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Penn Quakers}}"| [[Penn Quakers|{{white|'''Penn'''}}]]
|[[Franklin Field]]         ||{{nts|52593}}||1895
|[[The Palestra]]           ||{{nts|8722}}||1927
|[[Meiklejohn Stadium]]     ||{{nts|850}}||2000
|[[Class of 1923 Arena]]    ||{{nts|2500}}||1972
|Rhodes Field||{{nts|1700}}||2002<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.pennathletics.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=1700&ATCLID=66189 |title=Rhodes Field – PennAthletics.com—The Official Website of University of Pennsylvania Athletics |publisher=Pennathletics.com |access-date=March 10, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120208202817/http://www.pennathletics.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=1700&ATCLID=66189 |archive-date=February 8, 2012 }}</ref>
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{CollegePrimaryStyle|Princeton Tigers}}"| {{CollegeSecondaryColorLink|Princeton Tigers|Princeton Tigers|'''Princeton'''}}
|[[Powers Field at Princeton Stadium]]                               ||{{nts|27800}}||1998
|[[Jadwin Gymnasium]]                                ||{{nts|6854}}||1969
|[[Bill Clarke Field]]                               ||{{nts|850}}||1961
|[[Hobey Baker Memorial Rink]]                       ||{{nts|2094}}||1923
|[[Roberts Stadium (Soccer stadium)|Roberts Stadium]]||{{nts|3000}}||2008
|-
| style="text-align:center; {{NCAA color cell|Yale Bulldogs}}"| [[Yale Bulldogs|{{white|'''Yale'''}}]]
|[[Yale Bowl]]              ||{{nts|61446}}||1914
|[[Payne Whitney Gymnasium|John J. Lee Amphitheater]]||{{nts|3100}}||1932
|[[Yale Field]]             ||{{nts|6200}}||1927
|[[Ingalls Rink]]           ||{{nts|3486}}||1958
|[[Reese Stadium]]          ||{{nts|3000}}||1981
|}

== Other Ivies ==
The term ''Ivy'' is sometimes used to connote a positive comparison to or an association with the Ivy League, often along academic lines. The term has been used to describe the [[Little Ivies]], a grouping of small liberal arts colleges in the Northeastern United States.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.nescac.com/about/about|title=NESCAC|website=www.nescac.com|access-date=February 9, 2016|archive-date=February 6, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160206110733/http://www.nescac.com/about/about|url-status=dead}}</ref> Other common uses include the [[Public Ivy|Public Ivies]], the [[Hidden Ivies]], the [[Southern Ivy|Southern Ivies]], and the [[Black Ivy League|Black Ivies]].<ref>{{cite web |title=About the Ivy League |url=http://www.ivyleague.com/sports/2017/8/13/HISTORY_0813173057.aspx |access-date=August 26, 2023}}</ref>

=== IvyPlus ===
{{main|IvyPlus}}
The informal term ''IvyPlus'' refers to the original eight Ivy league institutions along with four other institutions including the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]], [[Stanford University]], [[Duke University]], and [[University of Chicago]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Whitford |first=Emma |title=The New Ivies: As Employers Sour On The Super-Elite, These 20 Colleges Shine |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/emmawhitford/2024/04/29/the-new-ivies-as-employers-sour-on-the-super-elite-these-20-colleges-shine/ |access-date=2024-07-05 |website=Forbes |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Untangling">{{cite book|last=Zawel|first=Marc|title=Untangling the Ivy League|publisher=College Prowler|date=September 1, 2005|page=[https://archive.org/details/untanglingivylea00marc/page/9 9]|chapter=Defining the Ivy League|isbn=1-59658-500-5|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/untanglingivylea00marc/page/9}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last1=Aisch |first1=Gregor |last2=Buchanan |first2=Larry |last3=Cox |first3=Amanda |last4=Quealy |first4=Kevin |title=Some Colleges Have More Students From the Top 1 Percent Than the Bottom 60. Find Yours. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/18/upshot/some-colleges-have-more-students-from-the-top-1-percent-than-the-bottom-60.html |access-date=2025-02-13 |website=New York Times |date=January 18, 2017 |language=en}}</ref> [[Johns Hopkins University]] is sometimes included as well. Beyond rankings and prestige,<ref>{{Cite web |last=Groth |first=Alex |title=Does Wisconsin have any Ivy League schools? It does now, according to Forbes |url=https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/local/2024/05/08/uw-madison-named-among-top-10-public-ivy-league-schools-by-forbes/73597473007/ |access-date=2024-07-05 |website=Journal Sentinel |language=en-US |archive-date=July 9, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240709130544/https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/local/2024/05/08/uw-madison-named-among-top-10-public-ivy-league-schools-by-forbes/73597473007/ |url-status=live }}</ref> the four schools are included in the grouping given their formal participation in academic exchange programs,<ref>{{Cite web |title=IvyPlus Exchange Scholar Program {{!}} Graduate School |url=https://gradschool.princeton.edu/academics/opportunities-resources-support/partnerships-exchanges-cross-registration/ivyplus |access-date=2024-12-10 |website=gradschool.princeton.edu |language=en}}</ref> university consortia,<ref name="sustain">{{cite web |title=Ivy Plus Sustainability Working Group |url=http://www.yale.edu/sustainability/ivyplus.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080101140116/http://www.yale.edu/sustainability/ivyplus.htm |archive-date=January 1, 2008 |access-date=November 24, 2008 |publisher=Yale}}</ref> shared academic resources,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ivy Plus Libraries |url=https://ivpluslibraries.org/ |access-date=2024-07-05 |website=ivpluslibraries.org}}</ref> collaborative alumni associations,<ref name="BluePrint">{{cite web |last=Babbit |first=Nory |date=Fall 2005 |title=Yale Hosts Ivy Plus Conference |url=http://alumni.yale.edu/aya/blueprint/article.php?id=93 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100610124852/http://alumni.yale.edu/aya/blueprint/article.php?id=93 |archive-date=June 10, 2010 |access-date=March 25, 2009 |publisher=The Blue Print}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Ivy + Alumni Relations Conference |url=https://www.princeton.edu/ivyplusalumni/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090126203009/http://www.princeton.edu/ivyplusalumni/ |archive-date=January 26, 2009 |access-date=November 24, 2008 |publisher=Princeton}}</ref> or endowment comparisons.<ref>{{cite news |last=Weisman |first=Robert |date=November 2, 2007 |title=Risk pays off for endowments |url=http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/11/02/risk_pays_off_for_endowments/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090823014139/http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/11/02/risk_pays_off_for_endowments/ |archive-date=August 23, 2009 |access-date=November 24, 2008 |newspaper=The Boston Globe}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Perloff-Giles |first=Alexandra |date=March 11, 2008 |title=Columbia, MIT Fall Into Line on Aid |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=522468 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090817212307/http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=522468 |archive-date=August 17, 2009 |access-date=November 24, 2008 |newspaper=The Harvard Crimson}}</ref><ref name="DangerousWealth">{{cite magazine |last=Bianco |first=Anthony |date=November 29, 2007 |title=The Dangerous Wealth of the Ivy League |url=http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_50/b4062038784589.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071202184726/http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_50/b4062038784589.htm |archive-date=December 2, 2007 |access-date=March 24, 2009 |magazine=Businessweek}}</ref><ref name="Lerner">{{cite journal |last1=Lerner |first1=Josh |last2=Schoar |first2=Antoinette |last3=Wang |first3=Jialan |date=Summer 2008 |title=Secrets of the Academy: The Drivers of University Endowment Success |url=http://www.nber.org/papers/w14341.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Economic Perspectives |location=Nashville, TN |publisher=The American Economic Association |volume=22 |issue=3 |pages=207–22 |doi=10.1257/jep.22.3.207 |issn=0895-3309 |oclc=16474127 |s2cid=17968423 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191211234418/https://www.nber.org/papers/w14341.pdf |archive-date=December 11, 2019 |access-date=July 29, 2019}}</ref>

==See also==
<!-- Please add entries here only if they have a direct connection of some kind, by name or by history, to the Ivy League (and are not already linked in the article). This is not the place to assert that other universities or groups are comparable or equivalent. See discussion on this article's Talk page. -->
* [[Big Three (colleges)|Big Three]] - an athletic rivalry between Harvard, Yale, and Princeton.
* [[List of Ivy League medical schools]] - schools of the Ivy League universities that offer medical education.
* [[List of Ivy League law schools]] - schools of the Ivy League universities that offer various law degrees.
* [[List of Ivy League business schools]] - schools of the Ivy League universities that offer various business degrees, especially the MBA.
* [[List of Ivy League public policy schools]] - schools of the Ivy League universities that offer [[Master of Public Policy|public policy]] or [[Master of Public Administration|public administration]] degrees.
* [[Black Ivy League]] - informal list of private [[historically black colleges and universities]] that have historically been seen as the African American equivalent to the Ivy League
* [[Little Ivies]] - private liberal arts colleges that historically have had the same social prestige and similar large financial endowments as the Ivy league.
* [[Public Ivy]] - public colleges & universities that are perceived to provide an education equal to the Ivy League.
* [[Seven Sisters (colleges)|Seven Sisters]] - seven liberal arts colleges previously open to only women with historical affiliations to the Ivy League.

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
<references>
<ref name=":2">{{cite news |last=Schiff |first=Judith |title=The life of Richard Henry Green |url=https://yalealumnimagazine.org/articles/3875-the-life-of-richard-henry-green |website=Yale Alumni Magazine |access-date=November 19, 2022 |archive-date=October 28, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221028161103/https://yalealumnimagazine.org/articles/3875-the-life-of-richard-henry-green |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Association of American Universities">{{cite web |title=Our Members |url=https://www.aau.edu/who-we-are/our-members |publisher=Association of American Universities |access-date=20 August 2021 |archive-date=June 5, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210605095215/https://www.aau.edu/who-we-are/our-members |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Bradley-2021">{{cite book |last=Bradley |first=Stefan M. |title=Upending the Ivory Tower : Civil Rights, Black Power, and the Ivy League |date=2021 |publisher=New York University Press |isbn=978-1-4798-0602-7 |location= |oclc=1153072254}}</ref>

<ref name="Brown's Slavery & Justice Report, Digital 2nd Edition | Brown University">{{cite web |title=Slavery & Brown |url=https://slaveryandjusticereport.brown.edu/sections/slavery-the-slave-trade-and-brown/ |website=Brown's Slavery & Justice Report, Digital 2nd Edition {{!}} Brown University |language=en |access-date=2022-12-01 |archive-date=December 9, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221209080031/https://slaveryandjusticereport.brown.edu/sections/slavery-the-slave-trade-and-brown/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Dartmouth and Cornell respectively">[[Dartmouth College|Dartmouth]] and [[Cornell University|Cornell]] respectively</ref>

<ref name="Gladwell">{{cite magazine |title=Getting In |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2005/10/10/getting-in |last=Gladwell |first=Malcolm |magazine=The New Yorker |language=en |access-date=May 7, 2020 |archive-date=February 16, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200216021140/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2005/10/10/getting-in |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Princeton">{{cite web |title=IvyPlus Exchange Scholar Program |url=https://gradschool.princeton.edu/academics/opportunities-resources-support/partnerships-exchanges-cross-registration/ivyplus |website=Princeton University |access-date=November 14, 2022 |archive-date=November 14, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221114172839/https://gradschool.princeton.edu/academics/opportunities-resources-support/partnerships-exchanges-cross-registration/ivyplus |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Princeton Campus Guide">{{cite web |url=http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/ivy_league.html |title=Princeton Campus Guide – Ivy League |archive-date=March 22, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100322232720/http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/ivy_league.html |url-status=dead |access-date=April 26, 2007}}</ref>

<ref name="Princeton University Admission-2016">{{cite web |title=Joint Ivy Statement on Admission Policies |url=https://admission.princeton.edu/how-apply/joint-ivy-statement-admission-policies |date=September 2, 2016 |website=Princeton University Admission |language=en |access-date=May 7, 2020 |archive-date=March 24, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220324053757/https://admission.princeton.edu/how-apply/joint-ivy-statement-admission-policies |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="slavery.princeton.edu">{{cite web |title=Princeton and Slavery: Holding the Center |url=https://slavery.princeton.edu/stories/princeton-and-slavery-holding-the-center |website=slavery.princeton.edu |language=en |access-date=2022-12-15 |archive-date=May 26, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210526234348/https://slavery.princeton.edu/stories/princeton-and-slavery-holding-the-center |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="The Boston Globe">{{cite web |title=Brown University's endowment reaches $6.9b after generating a more than 50 percent return |url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/10/14/metro/brown-universitys-endowment-reaches-69b-after-generating-more-than-50-percent-return/ |website=The Boston Globe |language=en-US |access-date=2021-10-14 |archive-date=October 14, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211014192838/https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/10/14/metro/brown-universitys-endowment-reaches-69b-after-generating-more-than-50-percent-return/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="The Harvard Crimson-2">{{cite web |title=Harvard's Endowment Soars to $53.2 Billion, Reports 33.6% Returns |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/10/15/endowment-returns-soar-2021/ |website=The Harvard Crimson |access-date=2021-10-14 |archive-date=October 14, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211014171054/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/10/15/endowment-returns-soar-2021/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="U.S. News-2022-2023">{{cite web |date=2022 |title=2022 Best Global Universities Rankings |url=https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/rankings |website=U.S. News |access-date=August 30, 2023 |archive-date=October 28, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141028092904/http://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/rankings |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="US News history">{{cite web |title=U.S. News & World Report Historical Liberal Arts College and University Rankings |url=http://andyreiter.com/datasets/ |website=Datasets |date=July 13, 2017 |publisher=Andrew G. Reiter |access-date=26 August 2020 |archive-date=September 16, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170916095502/http://andyreiter.com/datasets/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="U.S. News & World Report">{{cite web |title=National University Rankings |url=https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities |access-date= |magazine=U.S. News & World Report |archive-date=April 17, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090417054249/http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/college/national-search |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="Vedder">{{cite web |title=Does Attending Elite Colleges Make You Happy? Lessons From The Admissions Scandal |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/richardvedder/2019/04/22/college-quality-and-lifetime-happiness-lessons-from-the-varsity-blue-admissions-scandal/ |last=Vedder |first=Richard |website=Forbes |language=en |access-date=May 7, 2020 |archive-date=February 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220212121532/https://www.forbes.com/sites/richardvedder/2019/04/22/college-quality-and-lifetime-happiness-lessons-from-the-varsity-blue-admissions-scandal/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

<ref name="World's Best Colleges">{{cite web |url=https://www.usnews.com/articles/education/worlds-best-colleges/2009/06/18/worlds-best-colleges-top-400.html |title=World's Best Colleges |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120530232922/http://www.usnews.com/education/worlds-best-universities-rankings/top-400-universities-in-the-world |archive-date=May 30, 2012 |url-status=dead |access-date=July 3, 2009}}</ref>

<ref name="www.crimsoneducation.org">{{cite web |title=The Benefits of the Ivy League – Crimson Education US |url=https://www.crimsoneducation.org/us/blog/campus-life-more/benefits-of-Ivy-League |website=www.crimsoneducation.org |language=en-us |archive-date=February 12, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220212121543/https://www.crimsoneducation.org/us/blog/campus-life-more/benefits-of-Ivy-League/ |url-status=dead |access-date=May 7, 2020}}</ref>

<ref name="Yale">{{cite web |title=Exchange Scholar Program (IvyPlus Exchange) |url=https://gsas.yale.edu/academics/exchanges/exchange-scholar-program-ivyplus-exchange |website=Yale University |access-date=August 30, 2018 |archive-date=November 2, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171102043154/http://gsas.yale.edu/academics/exchanges/exchange-scholar-program-ivyplus-exchange |url-status=dead }}</ref>
</references>

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