Which professions require a Top 20, 30, 50, or 100 undergrad education?

Parents Forum
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<p>Which professions or grad/med/law/business schools essentially require a Top 20, Top 30, Top 50, or Top 100 undergrad education? </p>

<p>Re: grad/med/law/business schools - My question also asks which level of undergrad would be needed in order to have a good chance of acceptance as long as grades are high and LSAT/MCAT/GRE/etc are also high.</p>

<p>What professions does it not matter if the school is 3rd tier, 4th tier, or unranked (but are accredited)?</p>

<p>It has been debated many times on CC that certain professions - such as working in Finance on Wall Street - require an Ivy league/elite undergrad education. I’m not interested in arguing that point, since that field seems to be filled with people who won’t hire those who aren’t from the “right schools.” </p>

<p>However, what about other professions? What professions or grad/business/law/med schools essentially require an **undergrad **education from a school that is…</p>

<p>At least a Top 20?</p>

<p>At least a Top 30?</p>

<p>At least a Top 50?</p>

<p>At least a Top 100?</p>

<p>At least a 3rd tier (assuming a good program in the major)</p>

<p>At least a 4th tier (assuming a decent program in the major)</p>

<p>I’m curious about this because many students will soon be receiving acceptances and FA packages from their reaches, matches, and safeties. If a student’s intended profession doesn’t require a Top 30 while a **desirable and acceptable **top 50 or a top 100 would certainly suffice for less money, how wise would it be for the student to incur largish student loans in order to go to - say - a top 30 school?</p>

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<p>Although people interested in such fields make up a very tiny percentage indeed, most of the ancient fields - Celtic Studies, classical archaeology, Assyriology, Egyptology, and so on - require a top 25 education. All of the programs are at top 25 universities, and they usually admit undergraduates majoring in that program at another top university. </p>

<p>It is exceedingly difficult to break into the art market if one doesn’t come from NYU, Columbia, Harvard, or Williams.</p>

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<p>I went to college and grad school in top 200 schools. I knew plenty of undergrads at both places who got good grades and got into the best grad schools in many different fields.</p>

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<p>There is no profession which requires a degree from a top 20 or 30 university.</p>

<p>There are many professions where your entry and subsequent success will be easier coming from one of their “feeder” colleges. But this is for a variety of reasons. For example, Williams was the home of today’s “Art Mafia”. If you graduate from Williams with a degree in Art History, you will find a strong alumni base at the auction houses, museums, publications, conservation labs, appraisal services, etc. Those people will be very helpful to you in both your first and later jobs. But there are grad programs in the decorative arts (Bard), Museum studies (U Delaware), etc. so not going to Williams doesn’t mean that you’ll never get a job- there are other, non-top 20 entry points. Or Yale, which at one point had a very strong network into the CIA-- or Georgetown into the Foreign Service. Some of these networks are from a previous generation and some are current.</p>

<p>But you can go anywhere from anyplace. And no grad school/med school is going to ding you from having a degree from a school ranked 31 vs 30, all things being equal. But in general, strong grad departments admit students who attended strong undergrad departments. It will be hard to get into a PhD program in applied math if you studied math at a college with a weak or unknown math department.</p>

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<p>Meanwhile, a RL friend of mine just linked me to a mutual acquaintance of ours, who has won numerous awards in his field, runs a major innovative company, is a philanthropic leader in his community – and his background? Southern Illinois University - Edwardsville. Sometimes “smarts” come out in different ways from book-learning. I agree with blossom.</p>

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<p>I doubt it is really that important to go to an elite school. And medicine is a profession that does not require an elite undergrad to get into, but from looking at the GPAs of students admitted from Yale to my states med schools they were significantly lower than the other students. Like a 3.41 could get in from Yale, but a 3.8 was required for the average student, which in all honesty is slightly ridiculous. But hey, it helps me :)</p>

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<p>*And medicine is a profession that does not require an elite undergrad to get into, *</p>

<p>Very true. But, many don’t realize that. There are a lot of kids borrowing lots of money for undergrad when they will also have to borrow $200k+ for med school.</p>

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<p>Medicine is just one of those areas that no matter how many times it gets repeated - if you just want to be an everyday doctor treating patients, it makes absolutely no difference if you went to Elite Undergrad or State Undergrad, or Elite Med School or State Med School. As I’ve said before, Blue Cross doesn’t reimburse you extra because you went to a fancy undergrad!</p>

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<p>Some investment banks only recruit at certain colleges, and will not accept applications from schools they do not visit.</p>

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<p>Baelor, the OP pointed out that she wasn’t interested in talking about that.

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<p>To listen to CC, you’d think investment banking was the only profession in town. It is one of about 1,000,000 different possible professions. It’s not the only way to make money. Yawn.</p>

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<p>Oops. I apologize for not re-reading before I posted.</p>

<p>Outside of IBing and other similar jobs, I have not actually heard the alma mater of anyone mentioned in relation to career choice.</p>

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<p>If you tour the parking lot of the State Department’s Foreign Service Institute you may perhaps find one Yale decal, and perhaps a couple Georgetown stickers. That entire Ivy entry system at State and CIA is long time gone…</p>

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<p>Exactly! Med schools accept students from the Cal States, for example, but not as many as from the UCs. Harvard med and law accepts students from all over the world, but not as many as from Cambridge (on a % basis). (Of course those kids in Cambridge have a built-in advantage, high test scorers.)</p>

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<p>It was interesting to hear how people felt certain undergraduate institutions affected graduate school admissions, especially in the arts. Out of curiosity, how could one judge approximately how strong a school’s department in their field is? Would one check graduate rankings, graduate schools the undergraduates later attended, or something else entirely?</p>

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<p>*As I’ve said before, Blue Cross doesn’t reimburse you extra because you went to a fancy undergrad! *</p>

<p>LOL…When I was pregnant and people used to say, “you aren’t going to use drugs during labor are you?” And, I would say, “you don’t get an extra present on Mothers Day for delivering your baby without drugs.” ;)</p>

<p>Back to topic… :)</p>

<p>My son had foot surgery yesterday. His surgeon went to a “regular college” for undergrad; he went to Duke for Med school, and he did his residency at the Mayo Clinic.</p>

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<p>The only profession I can think of where it’s a requirement is to be a Justice on the US Supreme Court. Pretty much all nine of them went to top law schools and/or colleges. Even then it’s a defacto requirement and not an official requirment.</p>

<p>However, there are many professions where it helps to have gone to a top school. Helps to get into grad or med school. Helps to get that first job, etc. But there are many in those fields who succeed without a degree from a top school and sometimes without a degree at all.</p>

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<p>Since I started researching the whole college process for my senior son, I have been asking around about people’s undergrad programs. My colonoscopy doctor refuses to send her kids to an elite undergrad because she says it does not matter. My husband just had a physical at the Mayo clinic and he got the same answer from 3 or 4 doctors. My husbands law firm has many attorneys making over a million a year and not one of them went to an Ivy League undergrad or grad program. The general consensus seems to be “spend your money wisely”. So maybe if a kid is going on Fed grants and scholarship $$$ then go for it, otherwise invest the money and save it for your S/D’s grad school tuition.</p>

<p>I know there are different accrediations for undergrad business schools and I think these make a huge difference in Grad school admissions.</p>

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<p>I wish the prestige-obsessed could understand this.</p>

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<p>^^I think many do understand this. But the prestige-obsessed often desire prestige for its own sake rather than solely for the money they imagine they will earn.</p>

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<p>If you son or daughter desparately needs a doctor and there are only 2 doctors available. One graduated from HMS with 5 years of experience. The other one graduated from Ross University in Cayman Islands with 7 years of experience. Which one would you choose?</p>