Undergrad education and "prestige"

I know plenty of state school people that make tons more than the average Ive League grad.

I haven't seen anything to tell me that the Ivy League and "prestige" is anything but a farce.

Then again, the only thing that matters at the end of the day is your net worth. If you don't believe that, you might care where you went to school.

You sound like you're suffering from a John O'Hara-esque inferiority complex.

By mid-career, where you went to school means squat in your life and earnings. The richest physician I know went to Brooklyn Medical College. The richest businessman I know never went to grad school and graduated from the University of Hartford.

I graduated from the University of Lethbridge. A tiny school in the middle of nowhere. I now work in politics.

My dad was kicked out of university and is now worth several million.

people grow up and realize that personality has more real world application than academic achievement. status is important with asian cultures, hence the obsession with harvard, stanford, M.I.T., et al.

It's all marketing. I give more cred to those who attend decent public schools than to Ivy league schools.

I think the education is probably better on average at Ivy League schools than your average state schools. I would think it makes a fairly small difference in the average graduate's success. Depending on the profession, all things being equal, the school you graduate from can make a difference in how much you make right out of college. That being said, nearly all the top ranking employees (and likely the top earners) at my company all graduated from non-Ivy League institutions, thought a small few of them have graduate degrees from Penn or Stanford or Princeton or some such university.

i'm thinking that it's certainly not going to hurt that you've got that Harvard, Princeton, Yale degree on your resume.

but that being said, i read an article about how schooling doesn't matter for individuals that know how to apply what they've learned. they'll end up making similar money whether they've gone to State U. or USNews-Top-10 U.

-Jeff

Yay Uha!

It just depends on what industry you are in. In certain fields, your undergrad institution makes a bigger difference than in others. I would say the vast majority of resumes that come across my desk that get a second look are from Top 25 universities with a disproportionate amount from the Ivies and equivalents.

From my experience quality of education has nothing to do with where you have been to school. I've taken classes all over the country and do research with professors from Duke, Northwestern, and other schools of that sort. I'm still in school at Clemson (have been already to UNC and Vandy) and my father who is happier and more succesful than 90+% of college grads didn't even go to school until he was already very succesful. It is all with how you use your education the school does not matter whatsoever except for getting interviews and getting into certain graduate programs. I know several of my peers here at Clemson who are getting ready for grad school at schools such as Harvard, Duke, Yale and others up there and most of them won't make much of themselves because their people skills suck and they are only good at studying. They could be good researchers but that is about it. Bragging rights are about the only thing that is worth a shit 10-15 years after you graduate because other than that YOU are the only thing that contributes to your success not the school you went to.

You can get just as good an education at a state school as you can at any Ivy. The trite saying that you get out of an education what you put into it is really true.

IMO, the biggest benefit of an education at a school with a great reputation is the networking opportunities (e.g. Harvard grads take care of their own). Networking can help jump-start a career, but in the long run it's your own abilities that matter most.

GO QUAKERS ! ! ! ! !