Top feeder schools for tech and Silicon Valley

[Anonymous]

The importance of going to a good school to break into the top tech companies.

https://www.collegetransitions.com/dataverse/top-feeders-tech

Rank (Total) Institution # Employed Top Employer (Total) Top Employer (Share)
1 Carnegie Mellon University 1,356 Google Dropbox
2 University of Southern California 1,252 Google Snap
3 University of California, Berkeley 1,212 Google Stripe
4 Georgia Institute of Technology 1,094 Microsoft Twitter
5 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 877 Google Drppbox
6 University of Washington 876 Microsoft DocuSign
7 University of California, San Diego 795 Google Twitter
8 University of Waterloo 793 Google Stripe
9 University of California, Los Angeles 704 Google Snap
10 Stanford University 661 Google Airbnb
11 Columbia University 651 Google LinkedIn
12 University of Michigan 632 Google Meta
13 Cornell University 612 Google Stripe
14 Northeastern University 604 Google HubSpot
15 University of Texas at Austin 578 Google Meta
16 University of California, Irvine 482 Google Snap
17 San Jose State University 470 Google LinkedIn
18 Purdue University 469 Microsoft Salesforce
19 University of Toronto 466 Google Stripe
20 New York University 464 Google Snap


Adjusted for enrollment size

Rank (Adjusted) Institution # Employed Top Employer (Total) Top Employer (Share)
1 Carnegie Mellon University 1,356 Google Dropbox
2 Columbia University 651 Google LinkedIn
3 Stanford University 661 Google Airbnb
4 Massachusetts Institute of Technology 405 Google Stripe
5 California Institute of Technology 78 Google Airbnb
6 Harvey Mudd College 72 Google Twilio
7 Georgia Institute of Technology 1,094 Microsoft Twitter
8 University of Southern California 1,252 Google Snap
9 Rice University 235 Google Airbnb
10 Harvard University 260 Google Meta
11 Duke University 304 Google Dropbox
12 Cornell University 612 Google Stripe
13 Northeastern University 604 Google HubSpot
14 University of California, Berkeley 1,212 Google Stripe
15 University of Pennsylvania 352 Google Snap
16 Princeton University 170 Google Dropbox
17 Brown University 236 Google Stripe
18 Santa Clara University 180 Google Airbnb
19 Northwestern University 226 Google DocuSign
20 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

[Anonymous]

You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

[Anonymous]

Stanford, MIT and UC Berkeley.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Stanford, MIT and UC Berkeley.

Columbia and CMU

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The importance of going to a good school to break into the top tech companies.

Also, "the importance of certain majors to break into the top tech companies, and the the prevalence of those majors at certain schools."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

Not all schools are located in the bay area. Out of top 20, only 7 are located on the west coast. That is for the ranking that adjusts for student enrollment So for most students, the school matters, not the location.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

Not all schools are located in the bay area. Out of top 20, only 7 are located on the west coast. That is for the ranking that adjusts for student enrollment So for most students, the school matters, not the location.

Only two schools in the south, Rice and Duke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

Not all schools are located in the bay area. Out of top 20, only 7 are located on the west coast. That is for the ranking that adjusts for student enrollment So for most students, the school matters, not the location.

Yeah, but many of those schools don’t show up in top 20 lists though most are top 50…except SJSU which is over 100.

All the others are top 20 for STEM. Prominently, no UMD or VT on these lists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

Not all schools are located in the bay area. Out of top 20, only 7 are located on the west coast. That is for the ranking that adjusts for student enrollment So for most students, the school matters, not the location.

Only two schools in the south, Rice and Duke.

Well to a certain degree recruiting is still geographical. So it makes sense that tech jobs that are centered on the west coast and northeast draw more heavily from colleges in that region. But as with most things DCUM there is an unwarranted focus on household name companies. Those are not the kinds of companies that are growth companies. I know from first hand experience graduates at Clemson and Auburn and VT and dozens of other schools get tech and engineering jobs in “other” metro areas and become quite wealthy as those markets grow and attract more investment. There thousands of middle market firms that will pay just as much as FAANG and can be more strategic about their operations because there’re private and not answering to quarterly expectations of The Street. I don’t know why any young grad would want to work for a Fortune 1000 company. They’ll get more hands on experience and greater promotion opportunities outside that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You could also argue the greater benefit of location which is why Santa Clara and SJSU are on the list, as well as Berkeley, Irvine, UCLA, USC, Stanford and UCSD.

Google has a large Pittsburgh office as well after hiring a bunch of CMU profs to start their self-driving efforts (and growing it substantially from there).

Not all schools are located in the bay area. Out of top 20, only 7 are located on the west coast. That is for the ranking that adjusts for student enrollment So for most students, the school matters, not the location.

Only two schools in the south, Rice and Duke.

Well to a certain degree recruiting is still geographical. So it makes sense that tech jobs that are centered on the west coast and northeast draw more heavily from colleges in that region. But as with most things DCUM there is an unwarranted focus on household name companies. Those are not the kinds of companies that are growth companies. I know from first hand experience graduates at Clemson and Auburn and VT and dozens of other schools get tech and engineering jobs in “other” metro areas and become quite wealthy as those markets grow and attract more investment. There thousands of middle market firms that will pay just as much as FAANG and can be more strategic about their operations because there’re private and not answering to quarterly expectations of The Street. I don’t know why any young grad would want to work for a Fortune 1000 company. They’ll get more hands on experience and greater promotion opportunities outside that.

Except there are literally more startups and more VC in Silicon Valley than nearly the entire rest of the country combined. So the logic and geography still holds.

90% of the generative AI industry is in SFO and SV.

[Anonymous]

Everyone knows it is University of Waterloo.

Not sure why they are not on the list.

[Anonymous]

No UMD? I'm a bit surprised.

[Anonymous]

Graduates of other Universities can still apply and yes, UMD Computer Science graduates make it to the FAANG companies. The key is to be so skilled they have to hire you when you interview. Keep up with the technologies and think/work like a software architect even as a new graduate.

[Anonymous]

boston has an extremely broad based and robust tech community - Harvard MIT,
obviously - and Northeastern is closely tied with tech community with coop programs - Northeastern a hidden gem amongst tech schools..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:boston has an extremely broad based and robust tech community - Harvard MIT,
obviously - and Northeastern is closely tied with tech community with coop programs - Northeastern a hidden gem amongst tech schools..

Northeastern is not a feeder to Silicon Valley.