Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#81

Post by srn » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 3:56 PM UTC

gambling8nt wrote: post #77

vomjom wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rarely do most people who go to top schools pay full price. Only those from extremely wealthy families do. All (yes, all) the top schools are need-blind, meaning they don't look at your financial situation when deciding whether to accept you. A few of them (Stanford, Harvard I think) are offering completely free tuition if your parents make less than $100k. For other situations, you typically would get around 75% of…

Most of these pro-rated tuition policies are very, very new; until very recently, even students at top schools were expected to take out loans to cover some medium-sized fraction of the tuition costs. By comparison, going to a rather good state school, I got paid a net of around $8k per year to go to college. The financial equation is different for every person, but the value add of a name-brand school over a state s…

About financial aid: the previous year my parents had made at least 80k, and that's generally how people judge your need. The year I picked schools one of them had lost their job and my family was at below sustainability levels.

That being said, I got an excellent scholarship for the college I went to. But I still regret not going to a "name-brand" school independent of the educational quality of the college. The kind of people you're around and the contacts you make are really different. That can be useful on an ongoing basis, not just right after you graduate.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#82

Post by philwelch » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 4:03 PM UTC

johnnybgoode wrote: post #60

philwelch wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The words may be the same, but the meaning is significantly different, and I have little interest in whatever sophistry you intend to pursue in order to support your crankish opinion that university degrees are unconstitutional. Incidentally, "nominate to an order of persons" is probably the operative text there, and is something that you probably neglected to include in your earlier definition. I do not think that A…

I never even mentioned the Constitution, so that's not my argument. You probably assumed I was talking about the Constitution when I said titles of nobility were supposed to have been abolished. In fact, I was referring to the idea that our society is supposed to be an egalitarian one (in a legal sense). As for the rest of your post, it no longer seems relevant.

http://xkcd.com/169/

Communicating badly and then acting smug when you're misunderstood is not cleverness.

Or, in other words (since you are no doubt preparing to quibble that you weren't acting particularly smug), the onus is on you to clearly communicate your argument, and using phrases like "titles of nobility were supposed to be abolished" and then not answering my objections about the Constitutional text that did, in fact, abolish titles of nobility impeded getting your point across, rather than helping. You give the distinct impression that you're blaming me for misunderstanding what you so poorly communicated in the first place.

If your argument is simply that college degrees are anti-egalitarian, I will happily agree with you. But our society wasn't meant to be legally egalitarian in the first place. It had slavery. I'm also happy to point out that it's not possible to even have pure egalitarianism, which is one reason why meritocracy is so much better. (You will undoubtedly counter that reliance upon college degrees is not efficiently meritocratic, but see? Now we've got ourselves a truly interesting and worthwhile discussion.)

There is also the alternate hypothesis that whenever I debunk your argument, you start pretending you meant something entirely different from the outset. But I am choosing to be charitable and assuming you simply miscommunicated what you meant in the first place.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#83

Post by jamesbritt » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 4:39 PM UTC

What do people find when they Google your name?

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#84

Post by stonemetal » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 4:44 PM UTC

anamax wrote: post #80

stonemetal wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teachers have degree requirements for licensing. I am sure there are others.

How about some more? Adding "teacher" to my list leaves us closer to "few" than "many". Note that the vast majority of engineers aren't licensed....

going back to the original statement of "Examples include credential requirements for many different occupations, licensing laws, and job eligibility."

Licensing laws cover plumbers, electricians, massage therapists,barbers, air conditioning contractors, auctioneers, boxing (judges, promoter, referees, boxers themselves, managers), cosmetologist(and their schools), tow truck drivers, moving companies, temp agencies, elevator contractors and inspectors.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#85

Post by joeyo » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 4:44 PM UTC

johnnybgoode wrote: post #42

joeyo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an interesting argument. Do you have an alternative method in mind for aiding people to figure out who might be qualified to perform certain types of skilled labor? For example, imagine that universities can no longer confer the noble title of medical doctor. How shall I determine who to select to remove my gallbladder?

Yes, and I'm sure others will, too. For example, perhaps, after the barriers have been removed, a new school has popped up which has a better way of training doctors. They are allowed to teach in ways that were not allowed before. Doctors from this school go on to perform exceptionally well and have a proven track record. You hear about them from satisfied patients and ratings organizations (like Consumer Reports). T…

It seems that all that this does is shift the effective grant of title of nobility from the university to Consumer Reports or to the insurance company or to Yelp-for-doctors.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#86

Post by joeycfan » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 9:56 PM UTC

No. Do you think math is different at Yale or something?

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#87

Post by johnnybgoode » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 10:42 PM UTC

wglb wrote: post #73

johnnybgoode wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they are private in name only. They are massively funded by the state, both directly and indirectly through exclusive student funding grants. The degrees they grant have the same special status as those granted by "public" schools, and they are regulated the same way. I don't think this is an exclusively libertarian issue. Your original question could be generalized to include all titles of nobility, and that s…

Except for hillsdale college in Michigan which makes a point of taking zero government dollars for anything, including scholarships. Not huge, but truly private. http://www.hillsdale.edu/support/default.asp

That's laudable, but it looks like the college still has state-approved accreditation, so what I said still applies.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#88

Post by johnnybgoode » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 11:13 PM UTC

philwelch wrote: post #82

johnnybgoode wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never even mentioned the Constitution, so that's not my argument. You probably assumed I was talking about the Constitution when I said titles of nobility were supposed to have been abolished. In fact, I was referring to the idea that our society is supposed to be an egalitarian one (in a legal sense). As for the rest of your post, it no longer seems relevant.

http://xkcd.com/169/ Communicating badly and then acting smug when you're misunderstood is not cleverness. Or, in other words (since you are no doubt preparing to quibble that you weren't acting particularly smug), the onus is on you to clearly communicate your argument, and using phrases like "titles of nobility were supposed to be abolished" and then not answering my objections about the Constitutional text that di…

philwelch, I tried to talk with you here but it seems like you insult me at every turn, and now you're trying to blame me for your invalid, US-centric assumptions.

This seems to be a habit of yours, because even in this post, twice you claim that I'm "undoubtedly" about to respond in a certain way. Perhaps if you read what I write without jumping to conclusions about what must be in my head, this would be more productive.

"our society wasn't meant to be legally egalitarian in the first place. It had slavery."

You appear to continue with your US-centric perspective here. And even with that perspective, so what? The fact that it had slavery sounds like a good reason not to take what was "meant" as gospel.

As for legal egalitarianism being impossible, that's certainly not true. I'm not sure why you believe that.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#89

Post by zaidf » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 11:21 PM UTC

zackattack wrote: post #65

zaidf wrote: post #36

I hardly goto an inferior college(UNC-Chapel Hill). But I am studying what is considered an inferior major (communications). I love it! When I tell my friend of my major, they roll their eyes in disbelief. But then I tell them of all my classes with the basketball players and they are quickly envying me:) That aside, I am studying rhetorical studies and truly enjoy it!

You have class with Psycho T?!

Hell yeah! My first debate in speech/debate was against Tyler and Bobby. Of course I won but damn they were pretty good:)

http://zaid.posterous.com/tyler-hansborough-is-talllllllllll...

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever felt inferior for not being from a name-brand college?

#90

Post by johnnybgoode » Sun, Jun 07, 2009, 11:29 PM UTC

joeyo wrote: post #85

johnnybgoode wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and I'm sure others will, too. For example, perhaps, after the barriers have been removed, a new school has popped up which has a better way of training doctors. They are allowed to teach in ways that were not allowed before. Doctors from this school go on to perform exceptionally well and have a proven track record. You hear about them from satisfied patients and ratings organizations (like Consumer Reports). T…

It seems that all that this does is shift the effective grant of title of nobility from the university to Consumer Reports or to the insurance company or to Yelp-for-doctors.

No, there are some very significant differences. First, there isn't any reason there would only be one ratings organization, one insurance company, and one Yelp-for-doctors. You would be able to reject or accept the rating of any person or organization, and so would everyone else.

Second (but related to the first difference), the main problem with a title of nobility is that it grants legal privileges, thereby erecting legal barriers for others. That doesn't happen in this scenario.