Does graduating from a Top 20 school signal that you are a smart, hardworking person?

[Anonymous]

I’d say no but there are still plenty of employers who will only hire from top 20, or even top 5 schools.

[Anonymous]

Not since test optional. That will always be the question mark hanging over graduates. Did they get in through merit or to plug a hole?

[Anonymous]

I just had to Google “shibboleth” so thanks PP.

I have an undergrad and grad degree from top 20 schools so maybe it’s not the biggest arbiter of smarts after all.

[Anonymous]

Depends on the major and GPA

[Anonymous]

Not for all of them, but I think there are schools that signify this. U of Chicago, CMU, Cal Tech, for instance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not for all of them, but I think there are schools that signify this. U of Chicago, CMU, Cal Tech, for instance.

CMU is not a T20

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The answer is “no,” but 99 percent of posters want it to be “yes.”

+1

As a hiring manager, I didn’t look much at schools. I didn’t even pay attention to the “elite 20” or know what all of them were. The upper management wanted to hire people with MBAs from Ivies. Really nuts bc the people we served were not the upper crust and having the MBA would be marginally useful in 2-5 jobs there.

I looked for results on resumes more than whatever school was attended. As an employee, I focused on results. I always was able to get good jobs without a top 10 school.

[Anonymous]

No. I do take it as a sign that person almost always came from a family with parents who received a high level of education themselves, which also suggests there was some level of family money a generation or two ago. I didn’t really understand this until I started working in tech with really smart people from rural towns and who went to mid-ranked state schools and who so clearly could have gone to Stanford etc if they’d come from educated, affluent families — and public school systems where sending these kids to T20 was the norm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is “no,” but 99 percent of posters want it to be “yes.”

+1

As a hiring manager, I didn’t look much at schools. I didn’t even pay attention to the “elite 20” or know what all of them were. The upper management wanted to hire people with MBAs from Ivies. Really nuts bc the people we served were not the upper crust and having the MBA would be marginally useful in 2-5 jobs there.

I looked for results on resumes more than whatever school was attended. As an employee, I focused on results. I always was able to get good jobs without a top 10 school.

Did the upper management cared about the name of undergrad college if you have an MBA from brand name college?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is “no,” but 99 percent of posters want it to be “yes.”

+1

As a hiring manager, I didn’t look much at schools. I didn’t even pay attention to the “elite 20” or know what all of them were. The upper management wanted to hire people with MBAs from Ivies. Really nuts bc the people we served were not the upper crust and having the MBA would be marginally useful in 2-5 jobs there.

I looked for results on resumes more than whatever school was attended. As an employee, I focused on results. I always was able to get good jobs without a top 10 school.

Did the upper management cared about the name of undergrad college if you have an MBA from brand name college?

I don’t think so. The President wanted the “brand” on the resume. She seemed out of touch to me on that and other topics. It was a nonprofit, which often has to serve “the people” and also sort of serve the donors. Two very different audiences. In her defense, maybe she thought bragging about Ivy-MBAs would appeal to donors.

In political campaigns, people dressed a certain way to talk with “the people” and another way to talk with the wealthy. No surprise there. Jeans one day. Fancy suit the next. No surprise at all, I suppose.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is “no,” but 99 percent of posters want it to be “yes.”

+1

As a hiring manager, I didn’t look much at schools. I didn’t even pay attention to the “elite 20” or know what all of them were. The upper management wanted to hire people with MBAs from Ivies. Really nuts bc the people we served were not the upper crust and having the MBA would be marginally useful in 2-5 jobs there.

I looked for results on resumes more than whatever school was attended. As an employee, I focused on results. I always was able to get good jobs without a top 10 school.

Did the upper management cared about the name of undergrad college if you have an MBA from brand name college?

My firm cares a lot, but only really care about the last degree earned. An Appalachian State BA plus a Harvard MBA would have them salivating, a Penn BA would get be great, but a Yale BA paired with an Appalachian State MBA would get tossed unless they had a lot of subsequent experience

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is this signaling still valid today, if it ever was to employers, future life partners etc, or has it been severely diluted because of how these elite colleges admit their undergraduate classes today

Of course! Even if a student benefited from one of the college admissions preferences, the colleges chose from the best among those preference groups. And it is silly to say it is easy to graduate from these schools. Maybe excluding the bottom of the class of the top 20s? And perhaps it varies by major, I assume an engineering type major has worked hard to graduate. I'm less sure when I see an "American Studies" type major. But that may be my own bias. I'm not good at math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No. I do take it as a sign that person almost always came from a family with parents who received a high level of education themselves, which also suggests there was some level of family money a generation or two ago. I didn’t really understand this until I started working in tech with really smart people from rural towns and who went to mid-ranked state schools and who so clearly could have gone to Stanford etc if they’d come from educated, affluent families — and public school systems where sending these kids to T20 was the norm.

I really don't think top 20 schools are "the norm" at any public school system. They aren't taking the bottom two thirds of the graduating class of any school, are they? But I assume you know this is an exaggeration?

[Anonymous]

I graduated from a top ten school and no. I knew some people who really squeaked through because their parents intervened in everything and got them tutors and "help" with essays.

I also think it's a huge mistake to judge someone based in how they were at 16. I was basically Hermione as a kid, over extended and highly focused in grades. Then I had a kid and realized I was burned out. I took a mommy track lawyer job and took a step back and it was a lot healthier.

I wish I'd taken more time to.enjoy being a kid instead of my laser focus on college and law school.

[Anonymous]

Depends how much weight you put on external indicators of status/value.

I know many people who could not go to a T20 school because of their families of origin. Plus, academic success does not always equate to career success. So, I would take it as ONE factor along with many others (work experience, letter of reference, interview performance).