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<p>No, I don’t think that’s what I said. I think what I said was that there are times when it is advantageous to not be instantly pidgeon-holed as a “snooty pointed-headed snob” based on your college. What is advantageous, in many situations, is not having your college instantly recognized as a “snooty, pointy-headed snob school”.</p>
<p>Let me give you an example. Suppose that you land a job as the managing director of a sales force. You not only have to develop a repoire with your salespeople, but also interact with customers, most of whom will not be Ivy-league grads. The instant you identify yourself as a Harvard grad, you are pegged accordingly. That’s why many Harvard grads say they went to college “in Boston”. </p>
<p>The beneficial thing about my Williams degree, in those settings, is that groups who would pidgeon-hole me have almost never heard of Williams. What is advantageous is not going to Williams over Harvard (although that may be true for other reasons), but the fact that naming your college doesn’t trigger negative stereotype responses. In other words, sometimes there are benefits to not advertising the fact that you are brainiac who went to a $45,000 a year “rich kids” college.</p>
<p>It has also been my experience that people who will be impressed by an elite college degree have generally heard of the top LACs or they have heard of similar schools so that it has been easy to position the school in an interview situation with a quick reference.</p>
<p>Of course, if your primary motivation in selecting a college is designer brand name recognition, then you would be nuts to choose a Swarthmore or a Williams over a Columbia or Yale. I’m just trying to point out that the well-known designer label can cut both ways.</p>