Displaying diplomas?

<p>I’m moving to a new classroom and busy getting everything where it goes. My college diploma and Phi Betta Kappa certificate (framed decades ago by Mom) are sitting in my car’s trunk.<br>
Just trying to decide if I really want to bother putting them up.
As a parent, have you ever noticed or cared? Does a summa cum laude BS in my field matter vs another degree all these years later? Does anybody even know what PBK is any more? (should I just frame my sorority initiation certificate, which would be much more recognizable to moms I meet with?). I attended a far-away state flagship.<br>
I had them on a wall behind my desk previously, and if I hang them up again that’s where they will go.
Do you read the diplomas or certificates on the walls of -say, your health care team?, your child’s teachers?, whoever?<br>
Do you think it helps kids to think about college to see diplomas?
Do you have yours, display it?</p>

<p>I would never put up my diploma anywhere (office, house, etc). To me, it kind of seems like bragging. I don’t care where or if anybody went to college. If the doctor is a good doctor, I don’t care where he went to school. If somebody is a good person, I don’t care if they went to college.</p>

<p>IMO–the walls of the classroom are to be adorned with the accomplishments of the students. I have never seen college diplomas or certificates earned by teachers framed and mounted on classroom walls. I feel it’s tacky. The classroom should be a place for the students and their work to shine.</p>

<p>My husband and I have our degrees displayed in what most would consider a rather odd location…our guest bathroom!</p>

<p>Its actually all part of the design scheme. So many people refer to the bathroom as “the library”…so we took that idea and used it as the room’s theme!</p>

<p>I did a leather-look on the walls with paint and glaze. Found a great border of old books on a shelf for the walls. Found a cool wrought-iron magazine rack that hangs on the wall, and some very cool metal accessories. Changed out the mirror over the sink from framless to one with a fat antique gold frame. Our college degrees hang on the wall, but we didn’t leave the kids out. We hung their hospital birth certificates there (we did the room before they graduated from high school).</p>

<p>Everyone who sees it thinks it was a very unique and cool idea.</p>

<p>Msmayor, that’s where ours have lived before, with lots of lovely framed photos of ancestors. In this house it’s only the photos. At any party I get people dragging me into the bathroom to explain who is who…</p>

<p>Ours are framed only because my father was a photographer and wanted to give us the gift of framing them. They certainly look nice stacked in a corner of the basement.</p>

<p>I do enjoy reading all the plaques and certificates and diplomas my dentist has displayed on the wall of the room where he does root canal work. I like to think that my current procedure will be paying for his next trip to a workshop in some exotic destination.</p>

<p>I guess it depends on the norm in whatever field you are in - if others are displaying their hard-won paperwork, why not? :)</p>

<p>Other than doctors/lawyer offices, I’ve never seen anyone else display their academic diplomas in their workplaces…including most Profs. </p>

<p>Among friends, those who their college/grad school diplomas in their bedrooms or their home offices. However, most tend to keep their diplomas in storage somewhere.</p>

<p>My diplomas are in a drawer somewhere. At one point I had them hanging in my laundry room. At my previous school, we were asked to have our teaching certification and licensure (I was also licensed by the board of health) in our classrooms. Mine were on a small bulletin board above my desk. To be honest, that was an area where others didn’t go…so parents really couldn’t see them.</p>

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<p>I do check out the diplomas of my lawyers or accountants just because I am curious where they went to school. I would also check a doctor or dentist if I saw one but typically they are not hanging in the examining rooms. My high-end diplomas are unframed in a box in a closet, but I do like the idea of hanging them in a bathroom.</p>

<p>Yes, Thumper, that’s where I had them before as per previous administrative suggestion. If I do put them back up, it will be behind my desk, over the file cabinet and with the photos of my kids and previous students. Certainly not in the areas that will be used for displaying student work, I just made an 18’ long fabric-backed area for student work along the one wall where staples will work.
I certainly didn’t mean that my diplomas would be in a prominent place -yuck. Just if anyone ever noticed, cared, or read them.</p>

<p>my mom paid a decent price go get me a nice frame and I have it hanging on the wall in my bedroom. That being said, I just bought a new piece of art work and i want it in my bedroom. The diploma will be coming down. That being said, i am about to set up a home office some time in the next month or two and I’m debating if I want to put it in there or not.</p>

<p>My diploma is in a folder with my transcripts, state license, and national certification. But I do have a plaque with a national certification certificate hanging in my bedroom. When the time comes that I actually have an office, that plaque will go into it. My diploma(s) probably not…</p>

<p>My dad actually paid to have mine framed (one with a print of IU and one without), so mine are hanging on a wall in my bedroom. Once I move to a permanent house, they’ll go in my home office. I worked for my M.S., I want to see it!</p>

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Post it next to the kids spelling papers?? :smiley: :smiley: Sorry, JK, but it made me laugh this morning. I know it was a typo, and I am the queen of typos, but the unintentional irony made me LOL. ;)</p>

<p>If they are displayed, I read them. I’m always interested to know where a professional earned their degree.</p>

<p>My MIL had all my H’s diploma’s and licensy things framed after he finished Med school. We’ve been raiding them for frames ever since. Not sure where the actual papers are anymore. (he didn’t have an office for most of his doctor days, besides the van he traveled around on.)</p>

<p>Is this a regional thing?
Every doctor’s office I got to here in NJ has the Doctor’s undergrad, residency, specialty docs hanging in their offices.</p>

<p>I like seeing my doc’s diplomas on his office wall. One day I asked him what he did between UG and med school. (There was a noticable gap in the dates.) He said he was in Viet Nam, and nobody had ever asked him that before. </p>

<p>Was I out of line?</p>

<p>Back to the OP, if you’re a K-12 teacher, I’d leave the diplomas out of the school. If you’re in higher ed, I don’t see the harm in displaying them in your office. Office, that is; not classroom.</p>

<p>DD2’s HS guidance counselor had his NMF certificate in a frame on his desk. We thought it was soooo wierd. Especially since he was later let go for incompitence. Proves that past performance is no measure of future success.</p>

<p>We keep all certifications, diplomas and awards in folders in a lock box, along with original SS cards, passports, marriage and birth certificates, etc. If they are needed they can be retrieved easily.</p>

<p>I will throw out a different thought here, adopted from my sister who has taught almost 30 years and is an outstanding teacher! She works very hard and has always struggled with the lack of respect shown toward teachers in general. </p>

<p>She believes that professionals, as some have mentioned here about doctors/lawyers/dentists, etc., should display credentials that make them qualified to do their job. She has both of her diplomas (BS and MS) as well as her state’s teaching certificate displayed very tastefully in her classroom. She has gotten positive feedback from parents and students alike and several of her colleagues have done the same. Her attitude is that she is a professional educator and these pieces of paper speak to her qualifications. …Just another POV.</p>