Sounds like you need a serious adjustment on your world view if you currently believe you don't have anything to hope for simply because you and your 1500 SAT score didn't get into an elite school.
This isn't what the rest of these comments would indicate (which say that people that get into top schools are fundamentally more qualified and intelligent than people that do not)
Your comment is the only one in this thread that uses the word "fundamentally." The other comments I've read suggested that school can be an indicator of talent/diligence/etc. especially in the absence of a lot of other signal. It's also true that Big Law and Big Management Consulting are pretty educational pedigree focused especially for new grads but that's not everyone.
OK, but it's a pretty big indicator, and apparently justified in being so because the people at top schools are just that much better than people like me.
I don't think so? I think I'm just surfacing the implication. Perhaps I'm wrong, but it appears like the pretty clear implication of defending Harvard and elite schools is to believe that the rest of us should remain in a lower social caste, forever, and that we deserve it because of meritocracy.
I have very little direct experience with Harvard but do have a lot of experience with grads from other East Coast Ivies and related schools--other liberal arts colleges, seven sisters--and have rarely encountered that type of school-centric snobbery except maybe in jest or football rivalry.
Telling people who are experiencing dread at the classist social prospects available to them to just "adjust your world view" isn't exactly a refutation of their cause for that dread.