If you look at the lists of schools with highest starting salaries, many are in NYC, Boston and Silicon Valley areas, where there is a high cost of living. Note that in NYC, we recruit from Columbia, NYU, Cornell, Rensselaer, Stevens, Stony Brook and many other fine schools here in-state, and nearby states such as Penn. We welcome kids from further but more difficult for them to attend recruiting events. Boston firms can recruit from MIT, WPI, Olin … So while RHIT may have a great education, very few of those kids end up on NYC, Boston or Silicon Valley for logistical (and personal ) reasons, so they may well have lower starting salaries as a result (but maybe better standard of living).
So as a kid even in a Boston, NYC college, you are competing for those highest paid jobs with MIT, Columbia etc grads. Sorry but yes the higher paying jobs will get first crack at those kids, and lower paying jobs may hire from other local schools, dragging down their avg starting salaries.
I think your school matters alot, along with geography. If you go to a top college and/or get As at another college, and are willing to travel for interviews/recruiting events to NYC, Boston or Silicon Valley, you too can get those high paying jobs, but your college’s averages will not be so high. Who cares, you should care about YOUR salary, not that of your school avg. I made well above my school avg salary years ago, because of my field chosen and my skills.
So I agree MIT does not mean higher pay for the same job at the same company, but it may mean
you have that job at that company, and someone else does not !
Quote from a major tech regional sales office manager in Boston area many years ago.
He asked me if I wanted to do pre-sales engineering or sales. I said engineering, and he said
“we go to MIT for engineers and Boston U for salesmen with personalities”. Stereotypes do persist.