<p>Judging from how political campaigns are going nowadays, I think the best qualification for high political office is to be rich or be able to raise money like crazy. Running political campaigns costs lots of money and candidates who can loan their campaigns lots of money have an advantage. [Didn’t take Meg Whitman all the way to the CA governor’s seat, though…]</p>
<p>Howdypal, I have taught at both JHU and at Princeton (though not in the fields that you plan to major in). There is no difference in the quality of the faculty or in the aptitude of the students. The Hopkins students were willing to work harder in my humanities classes, mainly I think because many were science students and were used to busting their butts. Both are very elite schools and offer a superb educational experience.</p>
<p>This is one of the most ignorant conversations ever.
Excuse me? Here is a list of Presidents and their university education; many did not go Ivy. Admittedly in the early days there was nothing called the Ivy League.</p>
<p>Did not attend and/or graduate from college
• George Washington
• Andrew Jackson
• Martin Van Buren
• William Henry Harrison (attended college but never received a degree)
• Zachary Taylor
• Millard Fillmore
• Abraham Lincoln (had only about a year of formal schooling of any kind)
• Andrew Johnson
• Grover Cleveland
• Harry S. Truman</p>
<p>The rest of them</p>
<p>Keep in mind that in the very early days there were very few universities at all, so attending an “Ivy” was far more likely for anyone that went to college. Also back then I would call William and Mary Ivy-like status.</p>
<p>John Adams - Harvard University
Thomas Jefferson - The College of William and Mary
James Madison - Princeton University
James Monroe - The College of William and Mary
John Quincy - Adams Leiden University (transferred to Harvard University)
John Tyler - The College of William and Mary
James K. Polk - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Franklin Pierce - Bowdoin College
James Buchanan - Dickinson College
Ulysses S. Grant - United States Military Academy
Rutherford B. Hayes - Kenyon College, Harvard Law School
James Garfield - Hiram College (transferred to Williams College)
Chester A. Arthur - Union College
Benjamin Harrison - Miami University
William McKinley - Allegheny College, Albany Law School
Theodore Roosevelt - Harvard University
William Howard Taft - Yale University, University of Cincinnati College of Law
Woodrow Wilson - Davidson College (transferred to Princeton University), Johns Hopkins University (Ph.D.)
Warren G. Harding - Ohio Central College
Calvin Coolidge - Amherst College
Herbert Hoover - Stanford University
Franklin D. Roosevelt - Harvard University
Dwight D. Eisenhower - United States Military Academy
John F. Kennedy - London School of Economics (transferred to Princeton University), Princeton University (transferred to Harvard University)
Lyndon B. Johnson - Texas State University-San Marcos
Richard Nixon - Whittier College, Duke University School of Law
Gerald Ford - University of Michigan, Yale Law School
Jimmy Carter - Georgia Southwestern College (transferred to the Georgia Institute of Technology), Georgia Institute of Technology (transferred to the United States Naval Academy)
Ronald Reagan - Eureka College
George H. W. Bush - Yale University
Bill Clinton - Georgetown University, University of Oxford (Rhodes Scholar), Yale Law School
George W. Bush - Yale University, Harvard Business School
Barack Obama- Occidental College (transferred to Columbia University), Harvard Law School</p>
<p>Note that Wilson got his Ph.D. at JHU, btw.</p>
<p>So I am a bit mystified that no one challenged this statement by POIH, who regularly purports that only an Ivy degree is worth anything. I see many that did not go to an Ivy at any level, some that went Ivy undergrad but elsewhere for law (see Taft, who also served on the Supreme Court) which is backwards for what she said you had to do to be President, and a number that didn’t go to college at all, including Lincoln who many consider our greatest President.</p>
<p>The entire line of thinking is inane. OP, just don’t look at CC anymore. Enjoy JHU, work hard, and do what makes you happy. That will get you quite far.</p>
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<p>Eh…It’s hard for me to say since I am not in politics but it’s polar opposite (science.)
I suspect for politics that HYP undergrad will get you as far as HY Law, as long as you have one of the two. But POIH is way overestimating what influence that HYP degree holds, and btw, no disrespect to POIH but you should take what he says with a grain of salt since he’s foreign and may not have the best grasp of what’s important to get ahead in politics in the U.S… But again, since I am not in politics I can’t assess the factors which HYP contributes to the career. </p>
<p>I know enough to say that any internship you can get with a Harvard degree, you can also get with a Johns Hopkins degree.</p>
<p>You are who you are no matter what name is stamped on your diploma… Your college experience (not the educational side of it mind you) will have an influence on you though.</p>
<p>In short the OP isn’t going to be any smarter if he goes to H or JHU</p>
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<p>Yes, that’s all you hear about on the news these days - whether our elected leaders went to one of a handful of schools. It’s not like anyone focuses on the economy, or how to react to the situation in Egypt, or health care, or gun control, or the wars in Iraq/Afgh, or any of the many other issues facing this country. Indeed, I hear that when congressmen are debating issues, they have them speak in order of their college rankings, so they know how much weight to put on each person’s opinions. Because, you know, if someone from HYP says something, I know I must take it more seriously and trust that it’s all pearls of wisdom.</p>
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<p>Not necessarily. It entirely depends upon what type of graduate school and what field. It might be for your goals (I don’t profess to know the rank of law schools), but not necessarily for other graduate programs or PhDs in particular areas. </p>
<p>Although what is true is that while undergrad school seems like the end-all be-all when you are in highschool, once you get your other degrees, it’s a little thing on your resume. Those with multiple degrees or who assume their kids will get multiple degrees, really are not very hung up on ‘Ivies’. I think those worried about their kid’s success (that they can’t make it without that perceived ‘edge’), or who expect their kids to only attain an undergrad degree, might think this particular degree is crucial.</p>
<p>I’m a professor, surrounded in my life by people with PhDs, from all range of schools from Ivy to ones of all ranks. No one ever talks about their undergraduate school and no one cares. I can also tell you that it would be impossible for people to guess the ‘tier’ of one’s undergrad school based upon one’s current career success, status, and academic position. </p>
<p>I can also share that in my graduate program which was a tippy top school (esp for my field), we had 5 of us in the same cohort from a range of schools- 2 from HYPS, and 3 from state schools (one with a directional name in the title). If I look at the larger PhD program of 4-5 cohorts there together, the same thing repeated itself in each cohort. We performed about the same, all got academic jobs in top, top calibre schools and our undergraduate training across a wide spectrum of colleges made us on par.</p>
<p>Because most people didn’t get into a selective undergrad institution, most of them will CHOOSE not to care about it so as not to advantage those who DID get into a top undergraduate institution. If you go to graduate school though (for a PhD), it’s hard for institutions looking to hire you to overlook your grad degree as well. The name does matter. In PhD admissions, generally the better the name of the school, the better the program. </p>
<p>I would argue though the benefits of HYP should NOT be measured by its prestige or what it can do in terms of jobs but rather what they did to you as a person. What kinds of opportunities (unique programs, phenomenal scholars, connections, etc.) were you exposed to as a result of being there and how did you grow intellectually and personally from those opportunities? Those are what should matter the most.</p>
<p>I would prefer people in positions of power (in the government) to not be wildly ambitious and after power. As a manager, you do direct people but it’s also a major position of service to your employees.</p>
<p>But nychomie, all elite institutions offer more opportunities than any one student could ever hope to take advantage of. And anyway, you’re a college freshman from a sheltered background. How can you possibly have any clue what people respond to in the real world? You’ve never run a business, you’ve never hired, you’ve never fired.</p>
<p>Howdypal,this is what you said in your OP:</p>
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<p>So I will be honest and not sugar coat things. You have the wrong attitude. Right now you should focus on what you need and want to learn in college. Ask yourself- will you be able to learn it at Hopkins? If yes, then it is the right place for you. If not, then you made the wrong selection.</p>
<p>It is great that you are interested in getting a job high up in government (even the Presidency). But what you need to do now is to <em>prepare yoursef</em> for that job, so that <em>when</em> (not if) you have that job, you will be able to do it well.</p>
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<p>Actually, I’m not sheltered. </p>
<p>I have taken advantage of the many of the resources available to me here and though I can’t take advantage of them all, the ones I do choose are topnotch and that’s what matters.</p>
<p>I don’t care about how people will see Princeton in the real world. What matters to me more is the education I’m getting here in and out of the classroom. So far, it’s been nothing short of phenomenal. If we’re talking about grad admissions, I heard a Princeton undergraduate degree is highly highly respected.</p>
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<p>You don’t have to put up the list as I can lookup the wiki’s too. The point I was trying to put forth is that we’ve not picked up any non HYP President in the last 20 years. Let’s first do that before telling OP it’s doesn’t make any difference.</p>
<p>So let’s work together towards electing Sarah Palin. It’ll prove multiple points.
- We (USA citizens) can elect a female President
- We (USA citizens) can elect a non HYP du*b person (we’ve already elected one from HYP in the last 20 years).</p>
<p>We’ve only elected three Presidents in the last 20 years.</p>
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<p>You’d be wrong about that as there are foreign countries who do actually scrutinize the educational credentials of their government bureaucrats and politicians. </p>
<p>The last 3 Presidents of the ROC(Taiwan), for instance, all graduated from what is considered their nation’s best university and obtained graduate degrees from Cornell, NYU, Berkeley, and Harvard. To serve in the best bureaucratic ministries, there is a similar bias favoring graduates not only from top schools, but also top academic departments…and everyone else is effectively shut out unless some form of political cronyism is involved. In Japan and South Korea, there is a similar mentality in the government bureaucracies. </p>
<p>In contrast, while going to HYP may garner you some respect from certain quarters of the US if you’re running for public office or going into civil service, most Americans/hiring managers/examiners could care less unless you’re going for really elitist jobs like ibanking, management consulting, etc. </p>
<p>In fact, considering the recent American political discourse, sometimes having an Ivy degree…especially an HYP one could be detrimental judging by how politicians here have had some success in tarring political opponents with Ivy degree(s) as “out-of-touch elitists” while portraying themselves as “salt of the earth” “Real Americans”. Note the popularity of Sarah Palin as one good example. </p>
<p>Amazingly…and with some sad commentary on US society, it even works when the politician doing the tarring is himself an Ivy graduate and from a highly elitist background as the 2000 presidential election has shown.</p>
<p>OP: a lot of good advice above for you. I’ll add, find a mentor at jhu. for almost every great person you’ll find a mentor behind them. Guidance, advice and encouragement come from good mentors. Maybe one of IR profs at jhu.</p>
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<p>Yeah, and George W. was the son of a president and George H. W. was the son of a senator. They both would have gone as far with a state school degree. It’s absurd to think otherwise. And I suspect Georgetown experience was more important to Clinton than Yale Law (although I think the Rhodes trumped both of those.) Still you look at another former Boys State governor, Mike Huckabee, and I have to think that Clinton would have been governor in his early to mid-30’s regardless of his degrees. Huckabee and Clinton both were elected to Boy’s State, kind of like the USAMO of politics, and both were elected governors when they were very young. Huckabee, however, did not have any educational credential close to Johns Hopkins. Even when you are talking about Clinton, it’s arguable whether the Rhodes Scholarship itself helped more than impressing Senator Fulbright, which helped him get the Rhodes Scholarship.</p>
<p>People are way oversimplifying things on this thread.</p>
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Wow. And if I had had been trying to prove the opposite in January of 1985, I could have said we had not “picked up” any HYP president for the last 20. Lyndon Johnson 1964 - No. Richard Nixon 1988, 1972 - No. Gerald Ford - Not elected and lost the election when he did try. Jimmy Carter 1976 - No. Ronald Reagan 1980, 1984 - No. Does that prove how specious your trying to prove something using less than 10% of the data is?</p>
<p>collegealum - yeah, it is hard to say how important being at Oxford and not inhaling was to his becoming President. LOL. Just a small joke, folks.</p>
<p>More seriously, I would hope you meant that a few people are way oversimplifying things on this thread. Some have it exactly right.</p>
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<p>They certainly do in Mexico. They especially value Mexican politicians who have a degree from a prestigeous American university. The last five consecutive presidents of Mexico all have Ivy League graduate degrees:</p>
<p>Calderon - Harvard
Fox - Harvard
Zedillo - Yale
Salinas - Harvard
de la Madrid - Harvard</p>