get over name brand / prestige obsession

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking back, one of my biggest regrets/missteps as a parent was putting way too much pressure on my kids to excel in school with the goal of getting into top colleges. The pressure worked, and they did do well and go "name brand," but fast forward a few years and it really didn't make much of a difference. They're all happy and successful, but so are their friends who didn't do as well as they did and didn't end up at top schools. Time is proving to be the great equalizer.

Just something for parents to keep in mind when they're still in the midst of things. I realize I'm probably preaching to the wrong crowd.

Yep. Smart motivated kids are fine no matter where they go. Parents are obsessed with elite colleges because of the "elite" dating pool. Nobody wants to admit that but it's the truth. It's just human nature. You don't want your daughter falling for some frat boy idiot who takes 5 years to graduate with a communications degree. You want your daughter at an Ivy and falling for some rich well-mannered super motivated pre-med or Wall Street boy.

That said, the top end of the dating pool at state flagships is just an impressive as the overall pool at an elite college.

DCUM, circa 1954

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am telling my kids to steer clear of people who care about where you went to school or what job you have. Find people who care about work ethic, creativity, kindness, and growth as a human. They'll be fine and I'm guessing less stressed than people who put their self worth on whether they got a certain degree or make a certain amount of money.

I was not offered a job b/c the boss didn't feel comfortable offering it to someone who attended a LAC she had never heard of even though I had more direct experience than the person hired for the post. I was subsequently offered a job in another division and the person who was hired for the other role told me what her boss said.

There are, of course, some people like this (refer to DCUM). But they are not necessarily the majority, nor do they come across as confident, well adjusted colleagues.

What does that mean? I'm the PP. FWIW, I ended up with a grad degree from an Ivy because I got the best financial aid package out of the five schools to which I applied. After grad school, I ended up working in DC at a place with a pretty robust summer intern program. The state school interns were nearly always the hardest working ones, though many HYPSM also put in long hours. One Yale kid came into my office one day and told me that I was really the only person there with whom we had anything in common. Clearly he could tell I was perplexed by the look on my face, so he said, "we are both Ivy people." I nearly spit out my coffee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking back, one of my biggest regrets/missteps as a parent was putting way too much pressure on my kids to excel in school with the goal of getting into top colleges. The pressure worked, and they did do well and go "name brand," but fast forward a few years and it really didn't make much of a difference. They're all happy and successful, but so are their friends who didn't do as well as they did and didn't end up at top schools. Time is proving to be the great equalizer.

Just something for parents to keep in mind when they're still in the midst of things. I realize I'm probably preaching to the wrong crowd.

Yep. Smart motivated kids are fine no matter where they go. Parents are obsessed with elite colleges because of the "elite" dating pool. Nobody wants to admit that but it's the truth. It's just human nature. You don't want your daughter falling for some frat boy idiot who takes 5 years to graduate with a communications degree. You want your daughter at an Ivy and falling for some rich well-mannered super motivated pre-med or Wall Street boy.

That said, the top end of the dating pool at state flagships is just an impressive as the overall pool at an elite college.

DCUM, circa 1954

So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

This is news to me. So, thanks for the heads up, I guess? The only young adults I know who got married right out of college are those whose parents did something similar, and they tend to stay local. It feels like they skipped a life stage, the young adult adventure of moving to different cities across the US, taking career risks, expanding horizons.

What makes much more sense to me is meeting someone during grad/professional school. Hopefully both people are more mature than college kids and closer to a stable financial future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

No it is not. In fact the opposite is true. Here are the "hard numbers", which took me 15 seconds with google to get:

https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/time-series/demo/families-and-households/ms-2.pdf

And even if it is true in the micro-economy of your personal circle, it is irrelevant, and gross.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Looking back, one of my biggest regrets/missteps as a parent was putting way too much pressure on my kids to excel in school with the goal of getting into top colleges. The pressure worked, and they did do well and go "name brand," but fast forward a few years and it really didn't make much of a difference. They're all happy and successful, but so are their friends who didn't do as well as they did and didn't end up at top schools. Time is proving to be the great equalizer.

Just something for parents to keep in mind when they're still in the midst of things. I realize I'm probably preaching to the wrong crowd.

Yep. Smart motivated kids are fine no matter where they go. Parents are obsessed with elite colleges because of the "elite" dating pool. Nobody wants to admit that but it's the truth. It's just human nature. You don't want your daughter falling for some frat boy idiot who takes 5 years to graduate with a communications degree. You want your daughter at an Ivy and falling for some rich well-mannered super motivated pre-med or Wall Street boy.

That said, the top end of the dating pool at state flagships is just an impressive as the overall pool at an elite college.

Speak for yourself. You post strikes me as utterly sexist and dated. My DC is going to be a scientist. The last thing I considered when I helped her choose her college is who she would marry. We were looking at acceptance rates for grad school.

PS-if I gave this subject a thought, I would shudder at the thought of her marrying a Wall Street type/investment banker. We value family and contributing to society.
Not underwriting a McMansion and beach house!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

No it is not. In fact the opposite is true. Here are the "hard numbers", which took me 15 seconds with google to get:

https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/time-series/demo/families-and-households/ms-2.pdf

And even if it is true in the micro-economy of your personal circle, it is irrelevant, and gross.

Damn you and your pesky facts...

[Anonymous]

Only ones of my daughter's friends that I know of who got married in their early twenties are one who was pregnant and another who was a born again Christian. Extenuating circumstances, not a trend.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
are you saying that prestigious banking and consulting firms recruit at longwood like they do at Priceton or even UVA?

I got degrees from two top name brand schools (BA and MBA) and got hired at one of those prestigious consulting firms. I stayed just long enough that I woudn't be required to repay my relocation benefit, then bailed for a small startup.

The values I saw demonstrated at the consulting firm were nothing that I'd ever want to be associated with (e.g consultants who weren't being monitored at a client site logging in at 8:00 then locking their PCs and going to play golf for the day; a lady who let her cat -- probably the most meaningful relationship in her life -- die because should wouldn't interrupt her 5 day a week travel schedule to take it to the vet; my immediate supervisor on a client project having a very public extramarital affair while he also talked to his wife constantly on a speakerphone about how busy he was and how he couldn't make it home for the weekend to see his kids; bookshelves full of printed deliverables at a client site that were really just boilerplate templates with zero actual information added; partners getting on a conference call with prospective clients then after all clients said they had dropped off proceeding to trash everything about the client, not knowing that the client had just muted their line).

Basically in my experience name brand consulting firms are like name brand schools -- for many people, they are a crutch for people unable to excel on their own merits. That's not to say that there aren't brilliant people at both, but there are a lot of hangers-on who hope the luster of the name will attach to them and obsure their own mediocrity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Only ones of my daughter's friends that I know of who got married in their early twenties are one who was pregnant and another who was a born again Christian. Extenuating circumstances, not a trend.

Same.

I know born again Christians who do this...and I suspect it is their only (perceived) avenue to sex.

PS-One came to me a few months later wanting ANY sort of information about birth control. Somewhere along the way, no one had provided the poor young woman with a shred of information on that. But she "knew" that evolution was just a theory.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
are you saying that prestigious banking and consulting firms recruit at longwood like they do at Priceton or even UVA?

I got degrees from two top name brand schools (BA and MBA) and got hired at one of those prestigious consulting firms. I stayed just long enough that I woudn't be required to repay my relocation benefit, then bailed for a small startup.

The values I saw demonstrated at the consulting firm were nothing that I'd ever want to be associated with (e.g consultants who weren't being monitored at a client site logging in at 8:00 then locking their PCs and going to play golf for the day; a lady who let her cat -- probably the most meaningful relationship in her life -- die because should wouldn't interrupt her 5 day a week travel schedule to take it to the vet; my immediate supervisor on a client project having a very public extramarital affair while he also talked to his wife constantly on a speakerphone about how busy he was and how he couldn't make it home for the weekend to see his kids; bookshelves full of printed deliverables at a client site that were really just boilerplate templates with zero actual information added; partners getting on a conference call with prospective clients then after all clients said they had dropped off proceeding to trash everything about the client, not knowing that the client had just muted their line).

Basically in my experience name brand consulting firms are like name brand schools -- for many people, they are a crutch for people unable to excel on their own merits. That's not to say that there aren't brilliant people at both, but there are a lot of hangers-on who hope the luster of the name will attach to them and obsure their own mediocrity.

SO well stated.

And many of those people post on DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

No it is not. In fact the opposite is true. Here are the "hard numbers", which took me 15 seconds with google to get:

https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/time-series/demo/families-and-households/ms-2.pdf

And even if it is true in the micro-economy of your personal circle, it is irrelevant, and gross.

PP here. Numbers are old and kids this age wouldn't do census and you are mixing in the non-college people. This is a last year and this year thing. And I said I was just seeing this more. I am. It may be UMC or upper only. I don't know. It is relevant but may not establish this. Also not gross. It is something to watch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So before people go too crazy. There is a trend right now of college age kids getting married in or right after college. I know there has always been some but it is on the upswing. No study or hard numbers just seeing it more. It is different from parents and I don't know what is behind it but it may be a real thing. It makes no sense to me but maybe I am too old.

No it is not. In fact the opposite is true. Here are the "hard numbers", which took me 15 seconds with google to get:

https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/time-series/demo/families-and-households/ms-2.pdf

And even if it is true in the micro-economy of your personal circle, it is irrelevant, and gross.

PP here. Numbers are old and kids this age wouldn't do census and you are mixing in the non-college people. This is a last year and this year thing. And I said I was just seeing this more. I am. It may be UMC or upper only. I don't know. It is relevant but may not establish this. Also not gross. It is something to watch.

Numbers are old? They go to 2020!

You are a crazy person. And yes it is freaking gross x1000. PP out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, you’re 100% correct, but no one believes it until they see it. It’s something that people just have to experience to understand, and even then, some never do, which is how you end up with some people who wrap their entire identity around the ranking of their undergrad school and literally can’t shut up about it, even though they’re working alongside and under others who went everywhere else.

I disagree. Maybe you are correct about career outcomes, but the actual quality of education is a lot different between top schools and Southwest X State. The faculty is better, the other students are better, etc.

I will say that actual education in the humanities, though, seems to be struggling everywhere, as kids all parrot back the media narrative on many issues and professors fail to teach them how to analyze opposing viewpoints and argue a position without reverting to emotion or ad hominem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, you’re 100% correct, but no one believes it until they see it. It’s something that people just have to experience to understand, and even then, some never do, which is how you end up with some people who wrap their entire identity around the ranking of their undergrad school and literally can’t shut up about it, even though they’re working alongside and under others who went everywhere else.

I disagree. Maybe you are correct about career outcomes, but the actual quality of education is a lot different between top schools and Southwest X State. The faculty is better, the other students are better, etc.

I will say that actual education in the humanities, though, seems to be struggling everywhere, as kids all parrot back the media narrative on many issues and professors fail to teach them how to analyze opposing viewpoints and argue a position without reverting to emotion or ad hominem.

And i know this because I’ve attended every class at every college. I am not just blindly parroting talking points I hear on Fox News.