Smartest person I know who had the most prestigious job (edited a key section for major newspaper) - no college at all. A relation of mine.
Met Jerry Brown while I was working as a precinct leader so:
UC Berkeley
Yale Law School
Whenever a thread like this gets going, I always wonder if the person’s age shouldn’t be factored in before any conclusions are drawn about the correlation, or lack thereof, between success and an elite school education. Back when we parents went off to college, most kids did not travel very far from home and FA at the top schools wasn’t what it is now. In my parents’ generation, just going to any college period was plenty good enough.
Didn’t know him personally, but know of him and he went to the University of Zurich. That was a long time ago though.
A person I went to high school with is a wildly successful, famous and most likely very rich musician.
He has a BM from Indiana University.
Don’t know this person but she made one star general as a pilot for the US Army, Metro State University. I know you are asking where is that. A commuter school in downtown Denver.
@TheGFG just a quick look at several sites with stats on this shows that at least 70% of colleges students go to colleges in their own state. So I don’t think it matter if the people listed in this thread are 70, 40 or just out of college. MOST students today do not go out of state or go to elite colleges. Fwiw, the person I listed as one of the smartest I know who attended Elmira College is 30. It was one state over and less than a day’s drive form her home. I know several local brilliant recent HS grads who are attending one of our state flagships. It’s more common than not.
Two people whom I know personally: University of Chicago, and California Institute of Technology.
I’m not sure what’s meant by “prestigious” as a description of an individual rather than an institution. But both of these people have serious bios about them in Wikipedia.
A friend is having a second career that involves teaching at one of the oldest universities in Europe…and occasionally presenting papers at the EU in Brussels. Started with a bachelor’s from Ohio University. Not Ohio State, plain ol’ Ohio.
My paternal grandfather was responsible, either partly or solely, for multiple patents during his time as a top civil engineer for Kimberly-Clark. He went to UW-Madison.
The most interesting (and very smart) person that I know graduated from Upper Iowa University (undergrad) and University of Oregon (grad.). He is an amazing man who has life experiences I could only imagine. Not sure if I know anyone more prestigious. Our richest family member (and probably any person that we personally know) went to 3 years at our state directional and dropped out to start his own business – extremely successful but not what I would call prestigious.
Ah! prezbucky’s comment reminded me of someone! A family friend was Ralph Baer, the “Father of Video Games”, He had many patents and inventions. By all accounts, a brilliant man, largely self-taught or learned through his military service or on the job, though he did take a course in electronics. Different times, but still.
One thing to keep in mind (if anyone is doing a running count) is that even if you count 30 colleges as Ivies/equivalents (I count 14 LACs among them), in total, they offer less than 1% of all college slots in the US. Expand to include the Near-Ivies (which I have including some publics that range from big to gigantic including Cal, UMich, UVa, UCLA, UW-Madison, as well as big NYU), and that’s still about 2% of all college slots in the US. Expand to “good schools” (anything that might be construed as at least somewhat elite, and including big/gigantic schools UNC, USC, UT_Austin, UIUC, and IU), and you’re looking at still maybe 5% of all college slots in the US.
So I certainly don’t expect the majority of most prestigious/richest people to come from the Ivies/equivalents (they will be over-represented, but not that over-represented). I daresay not even a majority from near-Ivy or above or even “Good School” and above.
SUNY Plattsburgh (successful in the entertainment industry) and Pomona College (well known writer)
Prestige, as distinct from intelligence or wealth, for instance people seen as at the top of their field or otherwise extremely accomplished. I can’t calculate equivalences across fields, so here are several.
Law: I’m a former NYC big firm lawyer, so I have known a fair number of highly respected lawyers, but in NYC, probably the highest prestige lawyers I knew went to NYU undergrad. The other high prestige lawyers I know went to Wesleyan, but I know them because they’re college friends.
Academia: Yale. HYPS dean and first woman to head her department. Tied or beat out by a former president of a prestigious music school who went to Harvard.
Medicine: Columbia. Very big deal in his very specialized area of practice.
Television: Emmy winning producer. Wesleyan.
Business: Met my husband’s boss’s boss once, so if that counts as knowing him, CEO of major multinational company, the biggest in its field. Cambridge.
George Washington University
A minister. His uncle, a US senator, was a leading opponent of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He joined a group of southern ministers in support of the act, despite widespread protests by extended family. Because of his high profile, he received death threats (terrifying to a father with a brand new baby), but continued in pushing for what’s right. And while no longer high profile, he presses for full civil rights for LGBTQ folks now.
The most prestigious person I knew (at least in his own field of medical research) was my late father. He went to undergrad at Goshen College, a small Mennonite college in Indiana, and then to medical school at Northwestern.
One of the most successful (smart) people I know now went to Harvey Mudd, but didn’t get his degree. However, he worked his way up to the top of a government consulting company.
Williams.
My parents’ generation (roughly):
Legendary founder of very successful company: Wesleyan, NYU Law
CEO of very successful company: Princeton, Harvard MBA
Legendary founder of even more successful company: Penn (Wharton)
President of Ivy League university: Harvard, Harvard Law
Smartest people ever: 1. Haverford, Penn Law; 2. Cornell, Yale PhD, 3. Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Harvard PhD; 4. Columbia, Harvard Law
Supreme Court Justices: 1. Penn (Wharton), Harvard Law, 2. Stanford, Stanford Law, 3. UChicago, Northwestern Law, 4. Cornell, Harvard/Columbia Law
Famous academic MD: Amherst, Johns Hopkins Med
Federal Reserve governor: Harvard, Harvard PhD
Ambassador (several times): Harvard, Harvard PhD
Governor: Penn (CAS), Villanova Law
My generation (roughly):
Nobel Prize winner: Harvard, Berkeley PhD
CEO of huge company: Penn (Wharton)
ex-CEO of huge company: Penn (CAS), Harvard Law
ex-CEO of large bank, ex-CFO of ginormous bank: Princeton, UVa Law
Famous writer-producers: 1. Bennington, 2. Yale, Yale ABD
Famous artist-entrepreneur: Yale
High government officials: 1. Yale, Columbia Law, 2. Princeton, Stanford Law; 3. University of New Hampshire, Stanford Law
ex-President of Ivy League university: Cornell, Michigan Law
Smartest people ever: 1. Yale, Oxford MA, Yale Law; 2. Butler, UVa PhD
Single person most responsible for marriage equality: Yale, Harvard Law
Head of state/martyr: Harvard, Oxford MA
–University of Dayton undergrad, then Case Law
–Steubenville