Are you pursuing “prestige” in your college hunt? Dave Berry investigates the most common reasons, which even include “Vicarious Parent Syndrome.” But his article also dispels a common myth: That going to an elite school guarantees promising job opportunities. New research shows that 90% of employers don’t focus on college ranking in their hiring decisions.
https://www.collegeconfidential.com/articles/the-pursuit-of-prestige/
It is the other 10% that people here obsess about.
Can confirm. I am a hiring manager for STEM careers and what college a candidate went to is of little importance. What’s most important is whether or not I feel the candidate can fit into the team and be productive, and that comes down to personality and demeanor. Being a good team player is critical. Having relevant research experience can help. Having a BS from an accredited college is the minimum requirement and just assures that they probably have the basic intelligence required.
Ivy grads (and we have a few) don’t get special treatment in this process and may actually be scrutinized by some managers, who expect more from them. For me, it all comes down to having the right attitude. You can’t teach attitude. State flagships are perfectly fine. We have some team members who got their start at county college, fighting against adversity, and working hard to prove themselves. They often make good employees.
By definition the most elite (and lucrative) employers will focus on prestige. These employers have a short list of “target” schools for recruiting. See Professor Lauren Rivera’s book “Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs” for more detail.
No amount of reporting could refute the fact that elite schools have added values in addition to good education, such as peer/alum network, esp for the first job.
Certain law firms would only go to certain law schools, period.
That is ridiculous I have also hired and I know the difference when I start asking questions of an MIT grad vs a second tier state university, it’s like night and day. I wouldn’t care which one they graduated from if they showed the same proficiency, but that is not the case. The reality is that top schools start with a much better product so they get a MUCH better finished product. @ekdad212 Feel free to hire all the second tier state university grads you want, MIT grads are hard to get.
I don’t think these 90% employers can afford to be picky about the colleges the job applicants go to. That small manufacturing company in the rust belt would be lucky if it could land a graduate from a local flagship.
I’m more curious about those 10% employers. My guess is they consist mostly of investment firms, high profile law firms, Silicon Valley tech firms, etc. that almost exclusively recruit students from top ranked colleges.
The conventional wisdom is that the types of work where college-elitism matters most in recruiting and/or hiring include:
We have historically low unemployment. What happens when the economy has a downturn, and employers can be more desriminating (i.e they can pick the cream of the crop).
In addition, the experience the student receives at top schools is also very important, regardless whether it gives applicants a bump in employment or not.
@ucbalumnus : Prestigious law firms recruit grads of elite LACS & National Universities for 2 year paralegal positions. Although the base salary is in the forties additional overtime pay occasionally yields well over double that amount–especially if involved in an active litigation matter.
The paralegals typically are headed to law school & make great connections with other recent grads at these firms.
For students who want a PhD and to become academic research professors in their field, the elite schools help with THAT career path more than any other. If you look we have a LOT of college professors in the USA so its a COMMON CAREER PATH. Highly ranked colleges will pave the way for MORE career options. The alumni groups for the top ranked colleges are strong in all 50 states too. That helps with jobs down the line. Its not just about your first job at all. Also what kind of people do you want to meet? Who do you want to marry? That comes into play too.
Finally do you want to DROP OUT? Thats the most common outcome at many public schools across the USA, not because they have worse professors or any different coursework but because the admit some students who are undecided and cannot settle down, some who are unprepared, and because they are inexpensive and students simply run out of money.
If you attend any well ranked private college, the drop out rate will be lower, so you are more likely to graduate !
Look at the first year drop out rate at public schools. Its astoundingly high, like more than 50% at Kansas
and Missouri public programs. The programs are fine, but the student preparation and mentoring are lacking at these public schools. At U of Colorado its really a very high drop out rate too, and our flagship has a top 100 rank!
Those are really good reasons to attend a RANKED COLLEGE. So you finish any degree at all.
its just more likely at a better ranked private school, than any public school, but look at the drop out rates
and decide the odds.
Its not about some hiring manager, its about, do you get a good education, can you learn to solve hard problems, can you learn to get along with your peers, do you gain leadership skills and people skills?
If you drop out, you probably do not gain anything and you lose some amount of money.
A top-end student attending a less selective (public or private) college has a low risk of dropping out for academic reasons, since the high drop out rate at less selective colleges is due to weaker students. Since a top-end student is not a weaker student, his/her risk of dropping out for academic reasons is unlikely to vary that much between colleges.
Also, the most common reasons for dropping out of college are financial ones. The most selective private colleges have generally wealthier students (usually around half paying list price, which probably means from families with $200,000+ income) than less selective public and private colleges. So far fewer of the students at the most selective private colleges have to worry about money to finish college. Of course, for an individual student, s/he can compare the net price after financial and scholarships at each school to see which offers the lowest risk of dropping out for financial reasons.
Note that the tendency of students at the most selective private colleges to come from wealthy backgrounds means that employers choosing employees by college-elitism will be selecting for such – which may be desired or intended by employers in some cases: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-03-22/wall-streets-lacrosse-mafia
I work for a well known Fortune 500 company, and I’ve hired many employees over the years. Can confirm that I pay relatively little attention to where the person received their undergrad degree. I focus more on relevant experience, job growth, and graduate degrees.
Sounds to me like you didn’t interview any recent college grads if those were your criteria…
When it comes to hiring new grads, they may not consider rankings (btw, many do), but if they are considering coursework (and rigor), project experience, research experience, and internships, they are indirectly considering rankings.
The boundaries for this thread is for hires for new graduates. Obviously once you’ve been out in the work force for a while, the college doesn’t matter that much.
Yeah the school matters. Most of the heavyweights are going to have a hierarchy of what schools of candidates they are going to go after.
Project experience, research experience, and internships are available at 100s of universities across the country.
@Coloradomama Are you saying that getting professorships is determined by UG institutions?
@Rivet2000 “When it comes to hiring new grads, they may not consider rankings (btw, many do), but if they are considering coursework (and rigor), project experience, research experience, and internships, they are indirectly considering rankings.”
Excellent point. I mentioned it before but at my Big 4 firm located in a large city we only recruited summer interns from certain select colleges (mainly USC & UCLA). If you were a student at say CSU Fullerton, it was highly unlikely you would be offered an internship as we didn’t recruit on campus there.
Of those that did get an internship, 95%+ were offered a job the following year. Where you went to college, at least for internships, was critical to getting a job offer with this firm and was a huge advantage for employment.
Can you be successful going to CSU Fullerton as an undergrad, of course, but some colleges (e.g. USC) have a reputation of producing excellent candidates in the field of accounting that is/was known by all of the Big 4 firms.
Compare on campus recruiting at top public/private schools versus regional Us. Night and day overall.