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People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

washingtonpost.com

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Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#81

Post by slt2021 »

grapeskin wrote: post #53
Hydraulix989 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, I worked at two FAANG companies and with not a single Harvard or Stanford graduate. I hosted an intern from Stanford once who received a top of band return offer and rejected it for a "better option." I had one coworker from MIT who admitted he should have gone in finance instead. He later left for a prestigious hedge fund and 7 figure compensation. Most of my coworkers ended up here on H1-B visas from top scho…

> Most of my coworkers ended up here on H1-B visas from top schools in their home countries, but no network or strong family wealth here in the US. That's an interesting matter on its own. Americans are jumping through 12 stage interviews at a chance for a job and getting ghosted while somehow people from other countries are quickly filling up corporations. It's also weird that so many people with no local connection…

it says more about your skill that someone from 3rd world country, whose parents earn $10/mo is more skilled and smart to pass interview.

Keep in mind it is more expensive for company to hire foreigners as there are 12 hoops to bring foreigner in board, they just desperate for any talent that can do the job (at high bar though)

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#82

Post by formerkrogemp »

denimnerd42 wrote: post #27
Hydraulix989 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody cares where you graduate from school in engineering. It's all about what you can do, and in larger corporations, also how politically savvy you are. Most of middle and upper management (VP / SVP) also has degrees from no-name schools. If anything, they'll have degrees from worker bee / nerd schools like CMU, Caltech, and UC Berkeley, not Ivy degrees (except for Cornell, which is basically a public school). Upw…

come on you can't make blanket statements like that. Plenty of my Ivy friends who took the tech path are senior ICs at big tech, startups (not founders), etc. Same as the stanford, caltech, MIT kids.. some are managers now of course. they're just normal people who happens to be extremely smart and also from wealthy backgrounds. maybe some day they'll be C-suite but they're only mid 30s right now. I would say only a h…

"Normal people" aren't afforded the same opportunity or even half the chances in that just so happens from "being from wealthy backgrounds.". I think that's the issue.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#83

Post by davesque »

If anything, I think this just goes to show again how much of a scam higher education is. The demographic of those seeking a better education wouldn't have changed as much if the availability of those services hadn't been made artificially scarce. I think we have a combination of greedy businesses practices by university administrations and the weird culture of ivy league worship to thank for this.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#84

Post by abeppu »

frognumber wrote: post #55
usednet wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And all of this contributes to extremely low intellectual diversity at Ivy Leagues. I have the pleasure of frequently interacting with Harvard students and it is consistently true that they are always unremarkable individuals. These schools simply breed a managerial class that is capable of grinding hard and following orders.

I've been affiliated with MIT in one way or another for more than a quarter-century. What's been astounding is the change in faculty. Historically, MIT faculty were nerds into neat tech problems. New MIT faculty are slick politicians with an increasing sleazy Enron-style vibe. That's true of MIT leadership as well.

Can you elaborate on what "Enron-style vibe" means when describing university faculty?

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#85

Post by Hydraulix989 »

jollybean wrote: post #54
Hydraulix989 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody cares where you graduate from school in engineering. It's all about what you can do, and in larger corporations, also how politically savvy you are. Most of middle and upper management (VP / SVP) also has degrees from no-name schools. If anything, they'll have degrees from worker bee / nerd schools like CMU, Caltech, and UC Berkeley, not Ivy degrees (except for Cornell, which is basically a public school). Upw…

"Nobody cares where you graduate from school in engineering." Oh yes they do. It definitely opens doors. After that, depending on the role, it can have subtle effects. For mid-level management, right in the grinder, probably no as you say. For externally facing things, yes. They also might have more opportunities for lateral moves, into BD/Sales etc..

Regardless of school, I would be hard pressed to find someone in my engineering organization who is an extroverted native English speaker with the very high EQ needed to hack it in sales. We're all better at working with computers than people.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#86

Post by thrown_22 »

brutusborn wrote: post #76
lutorm wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't scale like that, though. If the % of people with college degrees had increased by 6x, to 24%, would you expect 6/5 of students to have parents with a college degree?

Not exactly like that, but close. As % of people with college degrees approaches 100%, all students will have parents with a college degree, so it will approach 5/5. The logic in the parent comment still stands.

What you care about is how much more likely a person with parents who had degrees is to have a degree over one who doesn't.

In 1970 4% of people had degrees and 20% of degree holders had parents with degrees. That means that children of degree holders got 5 times as many degrees as children of non-degree holders.

In 2020 14% of people have degrees and 66% of degree holders have parents with degrees. That means that children of degree holders got 4.7 times as many degrees as children of non-degree holders.

Which is the opposite of what the article assumes.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#87

Post by grapeskin »

slt2021 wrote: post #81
grapeskin wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most of my coworkers ended up here on H1-B visas from top schools in their home countries, but no network or strong family wealth here in the US. That's an interesting matter on its own. Americans are jumping through 12 stage interviews at a chance for a job and getting ghosted while somehow people from other countries are quickly filling up corporations. It's also weird that so many people with no local connection…

it says more about your skill that someone from 3rd world country, whose parents earn $10/mo is more skilled and smart to pass interview. Keep in mind it is more expensive for company to hire foreigners as there are 12 hoops to bring foreigner in board, they just desperate for any talent that can do the job (at high bar though)

Nah. H1B sponsor mills are a well documented issue that the US government has been trying to handle for a while now. These organizations go as far as filing multiple applications so they can more easily push one through. [1] It's nothing to do with "skill level" but everything to do with employers pushing down wages and wanting employees that are easily churned when necessary and kept obedient with the threat of their contract and thus visa and livelihood being cut at any time.

The "Americans just aren't good enough!" excuse hasn't been bought by anybody for years now. It's boring and desperate sounding.

There's nothing wrong with hiring workers from other countries. The H1B system just promotes abuse.

[1] https://content.techgig.com/us-govt-to-end-h1b-visa-abuse-he...

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#88

Post by DocTomoe »

thrown_22 wrote: post #86
brutusborn wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not exactly like that, but close. As % of people with college degrees approaches 100%, all students will have parents with a college degree, so it will approach 5/5. The logic in the parent comment still stands.

What you care about is how much more likely a person with parents who had degrees is to have a degree over one who doesn't. In 1970 4% of people had degrees and 20% of degree holders had parents with degrees. That means that children of degree holders got 5 times as many degrees as children of non-degree holders. In 2020 14% of people have degrees and 66% of degree holders have parents with degrees. That means that c…

You don't create outrage, and thus clicks, with honest reporting of facts or by applying elementary-school-level math.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#90

Post by DocTomoe »

wenc wrote: post #48
metadat wrote: post #3

Isn't this to be expected with any similarly weighted network? Guess who private sector loves to promote to executive positions like VP and SVP? Harvard and ivy grads. Even in engineering, where it's supposed to be more of a meritocracy, you can see this at every bigco. Human idiosyncrasies lead to branding pedigree consistently being selected over pure skill and / or superior experience in favor of an abstract perce…

> Guess who private sector loves to promote to executive positions like VP and SVP? Harvard and ivy grads. Even in engineering, where it's supposed to be more of an meritocracy, you can see this at every bigco. No. This has not been my experience working at bigcos -- the opposite is true. This isn't even hard to disprove -- just take a look at any large company (outside of those with Ivy funnels like management consu…

Given that many managers/executives are horrid when it comes to people, I think the Peter Principle explains that a lot better: People who can do (and won't get promoted because their productivity is needed where they are). People who can't will get promoted out of the way.
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