And who are you to patronize other people because of their university choices? The university I went to didn't have a systems programming specific course either

And who are you to patronize other people because of their university choices? The university I went to didn't have a systems programming specific course either. So what's the deal here? The only good university is the University of Maryland College Park? He made a good point, people often dismiss candidates because they see some buzzword they don't like. A good programmer is a good programmer regardless of what he calls him/herself. It's more important to assess a programmers competence, desires, and fit within a company than discriminate on what "type" of programming you think he should be doing.