I agree. I do feel inadequate sometimes and unseen other times. We did our MA together, and he applied to one PhD program and got in. I applied to 12 and was rejected from all of them. I reapplied the following year to 18 and was accepted into just one, the private R2 I’m at. I’m doing well, and unlike many PhD students, I love it! I love my research, and I love teaching. But I still recognize the fact that many think the Ivy League and other top schools are, by default, “better,” and the students at those schools assume they are getting better educations and, thus, their ideas are better by default. And because I participate in a graduate group made up of students from several local schools, I see it regularly. I feel intellectually bullied sometimes and like no amount of work will measure up to others’ school names, and I know it’s silly and not actually true. My school, for instance, has a higher TT job placement rate. Those are teaching-intensive, but I don’t mind that.