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Who cares about the Ivy League?

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Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#141

Post by opportune »

_fat_santa wrote: post #9

I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Even if say you have someone that went to MIT and then went to work for Google, as a hiring manager I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. I can really only think of two professions where your school matters: law and medicine. With Law I think it's the most i…

I think this is both true and not true, especially as Facebook/Google/similar get less selective. Having Ivy + Google has a stronger halo effect compared to other colleges, speaking from personal experience compared to peers who went to less selective colleges.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#142

Post by user_named »

alephnerd wrote: post #128
user_named wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's true that companies disregard the ivies and instead look for leadership recruits at no name schools. Source?

Not Ivy =/= No Name School CMC has no reputation out East, but has a massive west coast PE/IB alumni network. Danaher's GM Development Program (leadership track program) targets Carnegie Mellon You need to attend an elite university to succeed, but an elite university doesn't have to be an Ivy. Selective public schools like Cal, Mich, UVA, UT Austin, UCLA, etc are feeders as well as Selective Privates like Tufts, UCh…

CMU is close to am elite school so that goes against the argument

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#143

Post by uneekname »

majesticglue wrote: post #119
jbullock35 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most Ivy League students weren't born smart. They're exceptional because they were given access to what they needed to succeed. That must be part of the answer, but it can’t be the whole answer, or close to the whole. There’s huge variation in educational outcomes among those who get the access that you describe. What explains why some people in this group have such good outcomes, while most have relatively lacklus…

A lot of the comments here come from a place of ignorance... I've had the unique experience of private tutoring many "elite" students in high school for math and physics for nearly a decade in Los Angeles a while back. Basically both rich kids and less fortunate kids who can only afford my tutoring rate every once in a while vs rich kids who can if they wanted to afford my help every day. It's not simply "better text…

I vouched for this comment and brought it back from being flagged/dead/whatever because I think you're making a great point, and not calling anyone specific out. I would caution you from calling folks ignorant, even indirectly, as it can be taken the wrong way and can cause your comment to be flagged.

I saw that you copied this comment and replied to another comment below with it. I'm concerned that folks might see that as against HN guidelines. Again, I agree with what you're saying, and I just don't want you to be seen as a spammer.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#144

Post by randomdata »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #123
api wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that toxic elitism isn’t new, but I do also agree with the author that it has intensified. Only a few colleges matter. A degree from the others is “actually a dunce cap” according to Peter Thiel. Absolutely everything happens in only a few cities, which of course have developed completely ludicrous property prices. Nothing happens anywhere else, so if you want a good career you have to at least spend time in…

"Actually a dunce cap"? Let's see. Bill Gates dropped out. So did Mark Zuckerberg. Steve Jobs went to Reed College (where?) and didn't graduate. Maybe Peter Thiel's perspective is a bit distorted? > Absolutely everything happens in only a few cities... Maybe Peter Thiel isn't the only one with a bit of a distorted perspective?

Gates, Zuckerberg, and Jobs all recognized that the value proposition was not there and moved on. They did not stick it out to receive the graduate/dunce cap just to sooth their sunk cost pangs. Indeed, had they continued with it just because they started, that would be dunce-worthy.

Thiel suggests that the "colleges that matter" offer more, e.g. research labs, that bring more to the table. That may justify greater investment. Certainly researchers at Harvard have done a lot of ground breaking things. The role it played in those discoveries is why it is considered a college that matters. Can Reed College say the same?

Thiel's perspective may very well be distorted, but I am not sure these examples show that. More telling, if we want to play with anecdotes, would be to look at a graduate of Reed College, not someone who ran away as fast as possible because he felt the college was not offering him much.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#145

Post by nearbuy »

zehaeva wrote: post #137
nearbuy wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Srinivasa Ramanujan would be a counterexample. He grew up poor with no formal training in mathematics but was nonetheless one of the world's greatest math geniuses.

He certainly was brilliant. But compared to his contemporaries he died really young, at age 32. He did also go to school and even tried to go to college, he even got a scholarship! He had a lot of issues with the non math coursework however and did not finish any degree that I am aware of. The reality of his life is a bit more complex than "oh a poor boy found a basic math text book and taught himself to be one of th…

What Ramanujan's potential could have been is a different question than whether Einstein's equals are dying undiscovered in cotton fields.

By definition, we know of zero examples of geniuses who were never discovered due to poverty, which makes it hard to extrapolate the rate at which this happens. But we do have examples of geniuses who grew up poor but were discovered nonetheless, which gives us hope that exceptional people in similar situations will be discovered. Especially today with global primary school enrollment rates close to 90% [1], and secondary school rates around 76%.

[1] https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SE.PRM.NENR

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#146

Post by scruple »

_fat_santa wrote: post #9

I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Even if say you have someone that went to MIT and then went to work for Google, as a hiring manager I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. I can really only think of two professions where your school matters: law and medicine. With Law I think it's the most i…

> I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career.

Anecdotally that isn't true. I am not trying to come off like a dick here but hiring manager is (probably) rarely on the level where people care about this stuff.

I was well over a decade into my career as a software engineer before HR types and executives stopped (openly, outwardly) giving a shit about the fact that I didn't have a degree. I made it through the front door based on my network, which I sincerely lucked into.

I absolutely believe (based on analyzing conversations and remarks made with these HR types and executives but also managers over the years) that I was passed over for promotions and given smaller starting salaries and pay bumps because of this. Yes, that did eventually stop. Where I am today, I know for a fact (if you can trust Blind, levels.fyi, and personal anecdotes, etc.) that I out earn some of my peers with equal education and tenure because of my specific experiences and skills, but it came at a cost for a long, long time.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#147

Post by scruple »

wpietri wrote: post #40
_fat_santa wrote: post #9

I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Even if say you have someone that went to MIT and then went to work for Google, as a hiring manager I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. I can really only think of two professions where your school matters: law and medicine. With Law I think it's the most i…

>I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point. And then do the same thing with name-brand companies, without inquiring much as to what a given developer did at, say, one of the FAANGs. When I've ask…

> I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point.

I have seen executives (in startups and small, private companies) effectively stable PhDs and others with graduate degrees because of where their degree was printed. They pay these people a lot of money to keep them on payroll because it is, whether true or supposed, a strong signal to potential investors, etc.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#148

Post by alephnerd »

ericmay wrote: post #139
alephnerd wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not denying that, but you are ignoring the fact that Google would open that booth at a LOT of public schools as well. Just off the top of my head - UC Berkeley, UCLA, Mich, Iowa State, UIUC, UW, UW Madison, UCSB, Oregon State, UMass Amherst, etc. And honestly, I really don't think you understand how hiring whas changed at a traditional corporation. For management track roles, these companies (eg. Danaher, Abbvie,…

Berkely, UCLA, Michigan, Washington, are some of the best universities in the country. They exceed Ivy League schools in some fields and compete across the board. These aren't great examples in this context. UIUC, Wisconsin (CMU as well for example) have really strong engineering programs and "fit the mold". UCSB (UCI too for example) and Oregon State are based on the west coast. You can get the kids who didn't get i…

It's a non-exhaustive list.

Iowa State has a strong STEM program because of Ames National Lab.

They also have on campus recruiting at UTD, UMinn, Purdue, BYU, ASU, and Stony Brook.

And when did you attend college?

And, to be fair, if it wasn't Ohio State I doubt they would have been there.

> (just to be clear, I'm not picking on Google specifically and these comments can be applied generally to all the top hedge funds, tech companies, non-profits, etc.)

What school you go to does matter, but it's doable for most students to attend a semi-selective program and still have plenty of doors open. Indiana Tech or Wright State aren't one of those and probably won't be.

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#149

Post by nineplay »

adamsmith143 wrote: post #121
nineplay wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming that people who are admitted to Ivy League schools a) have higher IQs than average and b) have parents with higher IQs than average. Neither of these need to be true. It's a incestuous system where it's easy to believe that people of average IQ have been born into privilege for generations and succeeded only because of their family wealth and connections.

Are you saying that say MIT and Caltech students don't have higher than average IQ? It's almost a certainty that they do and I'm sure it extends to the Ivy league and other elite schools.

I'll bet that most students with good grades who are applying to elite colleges have higher than average IQs.

MIT and Caltech are not Ivy League but even then I'm sure they have a lot of students who benefit from private schools, private tutors, and pricy college prep programs. What differentiates the ones who get accepted from the ones who don't?

Re: Who cares about the Ivy League?

#150

Post by alephnerd »

user_named wrote: post #142
alephnerd wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not Ivy =/= No Name School CMC has no reputation out East, but has a massive west coast PE/IB alumni network. Danaher's GM Development Program (leadership track program) targets Carnegie Mellon You need to attend an elite university to succeed, but an elite university doesn't have to be an Ivy. Selective public schools like Cal, Mich, UVA, UT Austin, UCLA, etc are feeders as well as Selective Privates like Tufts, UCh…

CMU is close to am elite school so that goes against the argument

Yes, but it's not an Ivy, as you mentioned in your comment. Unless you are using Ivy to represent the 50+ top universities in the US which are a mix of public and private schools.
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