If you want to work for prestigious firms, you (usually) have to go to a prestigious school. That's not to say people from other schools don't work at those firms, but you're right that connections and alumni network are the main reasons to attend those schools. 

Architecture is a service profession for the rich, so no surprise that rich and well connected kids do well out of GSD, Sci-Arc, etc. I would look for cheap European schools to get your masters. Same education for drastically lower prices.

Well what you can do is send applications to all the prestigious schools like Harvard and when they accept you then you can turn them down.

because millennials still believe that spending (or borrowing) 100k+ for a March is a good investment. 

Spoiler alert. It’s not. 

What makes you think a prestigious school would want you?

Aside from the tuition fees.

because your first consideration is that you want to marry well

I think you hit the nail on the head.  It's about the connections.  I have a friend who was hellbent on working for a starchitect.  He spent $180k on his MArch from an Ivy, and now he works for a very good firm.  But makes peanuts compared to how much his loan debt is.

If you want to do something specific within architecture or work in a specific region, then find out how to get in that community of people.  Otherwise, just find the best school you can reasonably afford and you'll be fine.

People who didn't go there will most likely tell you it isn't worth it.

Ivy degrees are required for starchitect firm jobs at minimum wage.  It costs a lot of money to be poor in this profession.

If you can go to top school you should.

You will make good connections and start off on a higher plane than those who don't go . But that does not guarantee any success. 

You will meet many stupid people everywhere, but less of them at the top.

if you just finished undergrad, it would be in your best interest to work for a couple of years before going to grad school just to make sure this is what you want to do...you would be an idiot not to and some real world work might give you a more realistic view of this amazing skill set you claim to have. 

we hired a Ivy League kid. Kid has crazy credentials... and can do a lot of pretty pictures. Cluessless in how a building gets put together Tried to explain door jambs within a wall assembly and I We have a kid that graduated at a community college that out performs him 5 to 1. 

for the prestige. use your brain

Marketing, sales, and branding.  To clientele, a Ivy League degree is worth more.  Hence why starchitects snatch them up; its simply easier to negotiate ridiculous fees when you show them the resumes of the project team.  A Ferrari is worth more than a Porsche and massively more than a Ford, even though it's more likely to break down getting from A to B.... the value is the name, the brand, and how they've sold it to the public.

connections, ladder rungs, std's, not much else

Would you rather have a doctor perform surgery on you that graduated top of the class at Johns Hopkins or one that barely scratched through some 3rd rate Tijuana medical school? 

some of my co-workers came from SCI-arch and they get the "plum" design assignments, same with those from GSD and Cornell

What is this the 1980's??? Sounds like a discussion from Bonfire of the Vanities and no I didn't go to an Ivy League School and everyone I have every met who did certainly made a point of letting me know where they went to school.  My impression of them has always been the same.... douchebag!

The work should speak for itself, simple as that.  Good work is good work, regardless of where you studied, or who you worked for. Name dropping and connections may get your toe in the door ( which is great,  I agree ) but the work has to stand up.

Call me crazy, but — you should try to attend the best school that you can reasonably afford. Wow, doesn’t that sound like a novel idea?

I want to go to Princeton and watch the Spaniard that was bumped down to make room for the token woman Dean do a slow burn in the corner. Then I could learn a lot from Brad Pitt's squeeze pontificating on ephemeral  fabric structures. Worth 60k a year easy. Where's my checkbook...

Going to a top school is aligned with ambition and goals.  It is much different than rolling off the couch to the local community college cause it's close to home and cheap.  Yes there are exceptions to this on both sides...but in general more ambitious people go to top schools because they made the cut in a selective process and are typically exposed to higher level classmates, professors, and practitioners because of it.

This is like watching the Indians stampede a herd of buffalo off the cliff.

I've worked with a lot of "ivies" they are more sophisticated than us "state school" types - its us that do all the production though.

I've also noticed that Ivy league grads are more astute in office politics and can maneuver better into the more higher level design situations - 

Is it worth all the extra tuition? - then a recession comes along and how can the Ivy league folks pay their high priced loans?

It's a battle between pragmatism and idealism

the type of ability, drive and ambition that it takes to get into an ivy, is what it takes to really succeed in architecture as opposed to just getting by busting out retail malls

The people at the office where I work that did attend the  "top" schools, are all H1-B from China

Cornell, SCI-Arch, Harvard, U of Penn, U of Mich, Columbia