schools w/ no merit aid

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I did my undergrad at a mediocre school in another country, worked and moved to the US for grad school (at an average state school), eventually switching over to IT management. I do find kids coming out of these 'hoity toity' schools to be smart, well spoken and present themselves very well but for any work needing experience, I could care less about their educational pedigree.

My kids will likely end up in CS or adjacent fields (I'm shepherding them in that direction unless they show strong interest in something else) where a good chunk of the hiring managers would be like me, foreigners who 'grew up' in corporate America. They only care about performance and wouldn't care two hoots about a top school.

What I keep hearing is that there are certain opportunities (e.g. Investment banking) that are more open to kids from top schools than to other kids. For example, will Goldman Sachs or a boutique wall street firm be more willing to hire a student from, say Williams, who's an average student vs. say a student at the 75th percentile from Virginia Tech, assuming the same degree and resume profile?

You have to think differently. The "average" kid from Williams is more likely to have a parent or parent friend that works at GS and/or can tap a bunch of alumni that work at GS. The Virginia Tech kid is unlikely to have much of either.

Yup, so it's not as much the degree from Williams as it is the parental connections.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

This works for some professions and not others. Sometimes a network is crucial. Also there are weird market distortions, as an example, right now, the incredible inflation of tech salaries driven by low interest rates and hedge funds/VCs paying wildly inflated prices for companies/equity. I sure hope you're not patting yourself on the back for your incredible talents at coding when we all know it's a house built on sand as we approach the new dot com bubble burst.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get this is not everyone, but if you’ve done a major kitchen and bathroom remodel when those rooms were totally functional but just outdated, and you are driving two fully loaded 50k vehicles and you have a lawn service and cleaning service and your average athlete kids play travel hockey etc etc, you threw yourself right into that donut hole yourself.

In a high COL area, the donut hole hits families who could never afford a 50k car or major renovations. Around here, a teacher married to a cop can earn enough to hit donut hole status

This is true. Our closest friends are a teacher and a non-profit grants manager with a HHI of <180k. They live in a tiny, dated, starter house in Silver Spring, drive 10 year old cars (which they bought used) and have only been on one long-weekend trip to Europe, paid for by her parents. All other years they spend a week in Ocean City. They qualified for zero financial aid.

So - an AGI of 150k or less let’s you attend Columbia at no cost. Most top schools (the ones OP is complaining about) do give financial aid at that income level absent significant non-retirement assets. At a state school perhaps no financial aid but at private schools yes financial aid at a HHI of 180K (with an obviously lower AGI).

I just rank 180k with no savings, a 400k house with a 100k remaining mortgage balance through Wellesley's calculator and the expected parent contribution was 43k a year in addition to a loan. To me that's a fairly crushing amount of money for a 180k hhi.

Agree. However, colleges seem to expect you to have saved for the kid's education over the past 18 years.

It's funny how they all act charitable with their 'we meet your full "demonstrated need"' BS when they get to define what that "demonstrated need" is, regardless of where you live! And we, the people, fund their huge tax breaks! Pathetic.

Amazing how that works. Colleges expect you to save for your kid's education, or at least top ones do. If it's so important for your family and you make $180K, then perhaps you should save. Maybe you wont get to 80K/year, but you might save $160K, which means you could take loans/cash flow the rest if it's truly that important to you. Or better yet, you now can attend a school just below T25 with minimal to no debt

The assume that you've had those salaries long enough to save. A teacher married to a cop may have a 180k HHI, but that's once both of them accrue years of service. Starting out they'll make half that which makes saving much in somewhere like DC impossible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

+1 DH and I went to regional public universities but have had solid careers and now have plenty of contacts through our work and friend networks to build our own careers and help our kids get internships. No, not IB/consulting type contacts but neither kid is interested in that anyway. I don't know why people think only people who go to elite universities have "contacts". My son had an internship last summer with a firm headed by an HYP grad who I know through my social network. He's interviewing this week with another firm I work with -- I referred him to the president (elite LAC undergrad/Harvard MBA) because we work together regularly. Shockingly, once you are out of college, elite-school grads actually work with people from lots of kinds of colleges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

This works for some professions and not others. Sometimes a network is crucial. Also there are weird market distortions, as an example, right now, the incredible inflation of tech salaries driven by low interest rates and hedge funds/VCs paying wildly inflated prices for companies/equity. I sure hope you're not patting yourself on the back for your incredible talents at coding when we all know it's a house built on sand as we approach the new dot com bubble burst.

See above, our worth is not tied to equity in a company anymore, it's cashed out and invested as we see fit---we don't need to work--our kids and grandkids will be well taken care of (they still have to work or they won't get much). We work because we want to. We are both well beyond "coding" in our careers.

Point is you can be extremely successful without elite university connections. Stop lamenting you don't have those (or your kid wont have those) and focus on what you can do with your life. Your kid can go very far if they just try

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get this is not everyone, but if you’ve done a major kitchen and bathroom remodel when those rooms were totally functional but just outdated, and you are driving two fully loaded 50k vehicles and you have a lawn service and cleaning service and your average athlete kids play travel hockey etc etc, you threw yourself right into that donut hole yourself.

In a high COL area, the donut hole hits families who could never afford a 50k car or major renovations. Around here, a teacher married to a cop can earn enough to hit donut hole status

This is true. Our closest friends are a teacher and a non-profit grants manager with a HHI of <180k. They live in a tiny, dated, starter house in Silver Spring, drive 10 year old cars (which they bought used) and have only been on one long-weekend trip to Europe, paid for by her parents. All other years they spend a week in Ocean City. They qualified for zero financial aid.

So - an AGI of 150k or less let’s you attend Columbia at no cost. Most top schools (the ones OP is complaining about) do give financial aid at that income level absent significant non-retirement assets. At a state school perhaps no financial aid but at private schools yes financial aid at a HHI of 180K (with an obviously lower AGI).

I just rank 180k with no savings, a 400k house with a 100k remaining mortgage balance through Wellesley's calculator and the expected parent contribution was 43k a year in addition to a loan. To me that's a fairly crushing amount of money for a 180k hhi.

Agree. However, colleges seem to expect you to have saved for the kid's education over the past 18 years.

It's funny how they all act charitable with their 'we meet your full "demonstrated need"' BS when they get to define what that "demonstrated need" is, regardless of where you live! And we, the people, fund their huge tax breaks! Pathetic.

Amazing how that works. Colleges expect you to save for your kid's education, or at least top ones do. If it's so important for your family and you make $180K, then perhaps you should save. Maybe you wont get to 80K/year, but you might save $160K, which means you could take loans/cash flow the rest if it's truly that important to you. Or better yet, you now can attend a school just below T25 with minimal to no debt

The assume that you've had those salaries long enough to save. A teacher married to a cop may have a 180k HHI, but that's once both of them accrue years of service. Starting out they'll make half that which makes saving much in somewhere like DC impossible.

Top schools take assets into account too when making these determinations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

This works for some professions and not others. Sometimes a network is crucial. Also there are weird market distortions, as an example, right now, the incredible inflation of tech salaries driven by low interest rates and hedge funds/VCs paying wildly inflated prices for companies/equity. I sure hope you're not patting yourself on the back for your incredible talents at coding when we all know it's a house built on sand as we approach the new dot com bubble burst.

See above, our worth is not tied to equity in a company anymore, it's cashed out and invested as we see fit---we don't need to work--our kids and grandkids will be well taken care of (they still have to work or they won't get much). We work because we want to. We are both well beyond "coding" in our careers.

Point is you can be extremely successful without elite university connections. Stop lamenting you don't have those (or your kid wont have those) and focus on what you can do with your life. Your kid can go very far if they just try

You won the lottery and think you flew to the moon, lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get this is not everyone, but if you’ve done a major kitchen and bathroom remodel when those rooms were totally functional but just outdated, and you are driving two fully loaded 50k vehicles and you have a lawn service and cleaning service and your average athlete kids play travel hockey etc etc, you threw yourself right into that donut hole yourself.

In a high COL area, the donut hole hits families who could never afford a 50k car or major renovations. Around here, a teacher married to a cop can earn enough to hit donut hole status

This is true. Our closest friends are a teacher and a non-profit grants manager with a HHI of <180k. They live in a tiny, dated, starter house in Silver Spring, drive 10 year old cars (which they bought used) and have only been on one long-weekend trip to Europe, paid for by her parents. All other years they spend a week in Ocean City. They qualified for zero financial aid.

So - an AGI of 150k or less let’s you attend Columbia at no cost. Most top schools (the ones OP is complaining about) do give financial aid at that income level absent significant non-retirement assets. At a state school perhaps no financial aid but at private schools yes financial aid at a HHI of 180K (with an obviously lower AGI).

I just rank 180k with no savings, a 400k house with a 100k remaining mortgage balance through Wellesley's calculator and the expected parent contribution was 43k a year in addition to a loan. To me that's a fairly crushing amount of money for a 180k hhi.

If you make 180K and only have 100K in mortgage debt I would say you should be able to cashflow a lot. Their taxable income is 154,100, their federal tax is about $17500. Their mortgage is likely less than $1000/month and they take home over $100,000/year. Just sayin.

STOP telling people what they should have saved. You have NO idea what their personal situation aside from salary in the door (before taxes) is.

This is a fake family that the PP (maybe you) made up. There is no personal situation, but if they were real and these were the real facts they would have had plenty of money to make choices with and if their circumstances were unusual they could appeal. You are mad that the simple calculation meant to show that a very good income leaves no room to contribute to a child’s education shows no such thing.

You appear to want the government to price regulate private colleges or make all private colleges public, I am not sure which. Maybe you are mad something expensive to provide is expensive for the purchaser and the standard of “need” isn’t one you agree with. I am not sure how you think you were wronged by the “merit aid” system, which is what we are discussing here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

+1 DH and I went to regional public universities but have had solid careers and now have plenty of contacts through our work and friend networks to build our own careers and help our kids get internships. No, not IB/consulting type contacts but neither kid is interested in that anyway. I don't know why people think only people who go to elite universities have "contacts". My son had an internship last summer with a firm headed by an HYP grad who I know through my social network. He's interviewing this week with another firm I work with -- I referred him to the president (elite LAC undergrad/Harvard MBA) because we work together regularly. Shockingly, once you are out of college, elite-school grads actually work with people from lots of kinds of colleges.

Shocking, yes, shocking.

More than half the executives at companies we have worked for (both large, small and mid sized) are "shockingly" not elite school grads. I know Mary Washington, Towson, Oregon state, Xavier, etc grads who are successful executives---working alongside Elite-school grads along the way and in the E-suite. But it's not like anyone cares---only reason I know where they went to school is because majority of companies include that in their executives public online profile. Otherwise nobody knows or cares

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

This works for some professions and not others. Sometimes a network is crucial. Also there are weird market distortions, as an example, right now, the incredible inflation of tech salaries driven by low interest rates and hedge funds/VCs paying wildly inflated prices for companies/equity. I sure hope you're not patting yourself on the back for your incredible talents at coding when we all know it's a house built on sand as we approach the new dot com bubble burst.

See above, our worth is not tied to equity in a company anymore, it's cashed out and invested as we see fit---we don't need to work--our kids and grandkids will be well taken care of (they still have to work or they won't get much). We work because we want to. We are both well beyond "coding" in our careers.

Point is you can be extremely successful without elite university connections. Stop lamenting you don't have those (or your kid wont have those) and focus on what you can do with your life. Your kid can go very far if they just try

You won the lottery and think you flew to the moon, lol

Won the lottery? Yes, we are lucky to be so successful but luck is only a small part of this. It's about choices, dedication and hard work---we both grew up poor and had no connections. If you don't produce, you don't advance.
Our kids still have to work hard to get what they want in life---if they stop doing that, we won't be helping them so they can sit aside and be lazy. Thankfully, we raised them well and they want to work hard. They didn't know our true family worth until they were well into college, because we still functioned like normal financially well off family, but not "rich"--drove 10 yo cars, didn't give our kids 50%+ of what they wanted (want concert tickets: for your birthday perhaps but otherwise, go get a job if you want to spend $500 on concert tickets), didn't buy them new sports cars for their 16 bday (10% of kids at their school get this).

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

+1 DH and I went to regional public universities but have had solid careers and now have plenty of contacts through our work and friend networks to build our own careers and help our kids get internships. No, not IB/consulting type contacts but neither kid is interested in that anyway. I don't know why people think only people who go to elite universities have "contacts". My son had an internship last summer with a firm headed by an HYP grad who I know through my social network. He's interviewing this week with another firm I work with -- I referred him to the president (elite LAC undergrad/Harvard MBA) because we work together regularly. Shockingly, once you are out of college, elite-school grads actually work with people from lots of kinds of colleges.

Shocking, yes, shocking.

More than half the executives at companies we have worked for (both large, small and mid sized) are "shockingly" not elite school grads. I know Mary Washington, Towson, Oregon state, Xavier, etc grads who are successful executives---working alongside Elite-school grads along the way and in the E-suite. But it's not like anyone cares---only reason I know where they went to school is because majority of companies include that in their executives public online profile. Otherwise nobody knows or cares

+1 The only reason I know where the two people I referenced above went to college was because this thread made me curious so I looked them up on linkedin. Otherwise I don't know where most friends and colleagues went to college and I don't care. It's totally irrelevant. It has only started to come up in the last few years as my friends and I have kids going through college applications so we've started talking more about our own application and attendance experiences.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

+1 DH and I went to regional public universities but have had solid careers and now have plenty of contacts through our work and friend networks to build our own careers and help our kids get internships. No, not IB/consulting type contacts but neither kid is interested in that anyway. I don't know why people think only people who go to elite universities have "contacts". My son had an internship last summer with a firm headed by an HYP grad who I know through my social network. He's interviewing this week with another firm I work with -- I referred him to the president (elite LAC undergrad/Harvard MBA) because we work together regularly. Shockingly, once you are out of college, elite-school grads actually work with people from lots of kinds of colleges.

Shocking, yes, shocking.

More than half the executives at companies we have worked for (both large, small and mid sized) are "shockingly" not elite school grads. I know Mary Washington, Towson, Oregon state, Xavier, etc grads who are successful executives---working alongside Elite-school grads along the way and in the E-suite. But it's not like anyone cares---only reason I know where they went to school is because majority of companies include that in their executives public online profile. Otherwise nobody knows or cares

+1 The only reason I know where the two people I referenced above went to college was because this thread made me curious so I looked them up on linkedin. Otherwise I don't know where most friends and colleagues went to college and I don't care. It's totally irrelevant. It has only started to come up in the last few years as my friends and I have kids going through college applications so we've started talking more about our own application and attendance experiences.

+1000

My one kid attended a university in T100 (closer to 100) and the network from their university is huge and strong. My partner knows several executives who attended that school (for undergrad or MBA) or have worked in that city and know of the school's stellar reputation and they will literally do anything to help a graduate from that school find a job, they will help a kid network, and it's not just "a job in their company", they will meet with a kid figure out their interests and introduce them to executives at 5-10 other companies who might be of interest/hiring---because they know the school puts out quality talent and more importantly quality People all around. They will do this for anyone who mentions a kid from this school who is job searching.
You don't need to be in the T20 schools to have a network to access, if you need it.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I get this is not everyone, but if you’ve done a major kitchen and bathroom remodel when those rooms were totally functional but just outdated, and you are driving two fully loaded 50k vehicles and you have a lawn service and cleaning service and your average athlete kids play travel hockey etc etc, you threw yourself right into that donut hole yourself.

In a high COL area, the donut hole hits families who could never afford a 50k car or major renovations. Around here, a teacher married to a cop can earn enough to hit donut hole status

This is true. Our closest friends are a teacher and a non-profit grants manager with a HHI of <180k. They live in a tiny, dated, starter house in Silver Spring, drive 10 year old cars (which they bought used) and have only been on one long-weekend trip to Europe, paid for by her parents. All other years they spend a week in Ocean City. They qualified for zero financial aid.

So - an AGI of 150k or less let’s you attend Columbia at no cost. Most top schools (the ones OP is complaining about) do give financial aid at that income level absent significant non-retirement assets. At a state school perhaps no financial aid but at private schools yes financial aid at a HHI of 180K (with an obviously lower AGI).

I just rank 180k with no savings, a 400k house with a 100k remaining mortgage balance through Wellesley's calculator and the expected parent contribution was 43k a year in addition to a loan. To me that's a fairly crushing amount of money for a 180k hhi.

Agree. However, colleges seem to expect you to have saved for the kid's education over the past 18 years.

It's funny how they all act charitable with their 'we meet your full "demonstrated need"' BS when they get to define what that "demonstrated need" is, regardless of where you live! And we, the people, fund their huge tax breaks! Pathetic.

Amazing how that works. Colleges expect you to save for your kid's education, or at least top ones do. If it's so important for your family and you make $180K, then perhaps you should save. Maybe you wont get to 80K/year, but you might save $160K, which means you could take loans/cash flow the rest if it's truly that important to you. Or better yet, you now can attend a school just below T25 with minimal to no debt

The assume that you've had those salaries long enough to save. A teacher married to a cop may have a 180k HHI, but that's once both of them accrue years of service. Starting out they'll make half that which makes saving much in somewhere like DC impossible.

Top schools take assets into account too when making these determinations.

I ran the calculator using 0 for savings

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

That is great for you, but not sure why developing a strong social network or tapping the alumni network is somehow in your mind a negative. Sure add your career contacts to the mix. The entire network is valuable and useful.

Do you honestly think Engineering I at Top10 is any different than Engineering I at #100? I am sure the course and content are nearly identical. It begs the question of why you opted to attend a Top 10 school from the start.

If you honestly believe that Mark Zuckerberg would have met the same caliber and student wealth of his FB co-founders at Penn State (vs. Harvard), then I agree completely with you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it’s the parents who didn’t themselves go to T20 schools that overstate their importance. It’s not the golden meal ticket you think it is, the majority of students at these schools still have painfully average careers.

Both myself and my partner attending T10 schools. We have never used any connections from those schools once we graduated. Yes, I'll admit that graduating in the early 90s, we both benefited from the school, in that not as many companies were hiring but we found jobs since companies were still going to these schools. However, I went on at least 10, 2nd interviews at larger companies (including Ford, Anderson,Bell Labs etc) and at least half the interviewees at these sessions were not T20 students. At the company who ultimately hired me, our incoming group of new hires (we knew each other as we lived together for summer then went off to grad school in fall), only 30-40% were from T20 schools, rest were from T60-80 schools, and at least 20% outside of those ranges, even in a difficult time to find a job.

But after our first jobs, we have NEVER used connections/alumni networks to get jobs. All future jobs have come because of the hard work, dedication we have done. Literally nobody asks about where you went to undergrad----they want to hear about your projects, and references from people who've worked with you. And even with our first jobs, we got hired because we both had over 3.9GPA in engineering at T10 schools---we earned our jobs by doing well. And my data points indicate that we would have still found jobs even if at a T100 school, because we would have networked/used resources until we landed a job because that's our work ethic.

I don't understand why you are bragging about never using connections/alumni networks after your first jobs. The natural question is...why the heck not? To each their own, but I am aware of plenty of folks (myself included) that went on to found successful companies, became P/E partners, etc. that absolutely worked their network of fellow graduates/friends and alumni.

Your personal network and the alumni network are the most important reasons to go to a Top 10 school...why you wouldn't work them is beyond me.

Because we did not need to use work those connections. We were able to find our way in industry thru hard work, dedication and being damn good at our jobs. That's the whole point----if you are smart and work hard, you really don't need all those "connections" to succeed. You can get there without attending an elite university. Most employers care much more about your resume/recommendations from previous employers than where you went to undergrad.

Making $400K/year for one person at age 28. The other was making $150K, then became SAHP for our kids. By age 32, worth $4M+. By age 40 worth over $10M, by age 50 worth over $40M. Dont' know about you, but I'd consider that being extremely successful. Not sure what more we could have achieved by "working our connections". Now the connections we have are those we built thru our careers, not from where we attending University.

This works for some professions and not others. Sometimes a network is crucial. Also there are weird market distortions, as an example, right now, the incredible inflation of tech salaries driven by low interest rates and hedge funds/VCs paying wildly inflated prices for companies/equity. I sure hope you're not patting yourself on the back for your incredible talents at coding when we all know it's a house built on sand as we approach the new dot com bubble burst.

See above, our worth is not tied to equity in a company anymore, it's cashed out and invested as we see fit---we don't need to work--our kids and grandkids will be well taken care of (they still have to work or they won't get much). We work because we want to. We are both well beyond "coding" in our careers.

Point is you can be extremely successful without elite university connections. Stop lamenting you don't have those (or your kid wont have those) and focus on what you can do with your life. Your kid can go very far if they just try

You won the lottery and think you flew to the moon, lol

Won the lottery? Yes, we are lucky to be so successful but luck is only a small part of this. It's about choices, dedication and hard work---we both grew up poor and had no connections. If you don't produce, you don't advance.
Our kids still have to work hard to get what they want in life---if they stop doing that, we won't be helping them so they can sit aside and be lazy. Thankfully, we raised them well and they want to work hard. They didn't know our true family worth until they were well into college, because we still functioned like normal financially well off family, but not "rich"--drove 10 yo cars, didn't give our kids 50%+ of what they wanted (want concert tickets: for your birthday perhaps but otherwise, go get a job if you want to spend $500 on concert tickets), didn't buy them new sports cars for their 16 bday (10% of kids at their school get this).

Okay. How did the work you did make the world a better place?