[shantly]

I can't speak to the quality of STEM education at top-tier universities, but having experienced humanities at a mid-level state school and watched a fair number of lectures for similar courses from Ivies, the main differences seemed to be:

1) The professor might be someone you've heard of,

2) Guest speakers/lecturers are both A Thing and are usually very important people (highly placed in government, NGOs, or corporations),

3) The students are way more engaged, which I think is a result both of actual higher levels of student interest in the material and more of the students having come through a K-12 education that was participation and discussion heavy (see: how most major prep high schools run their classes) so being used to behaving that way, because that's just what one does.

The actual material wasn't really different.