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I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Even if say you have someone

I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Even if say you have someone that went to MIT and then went to work for Google, as a hiring manager I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. I can really only think of two professions where your school matters: law and medicine. With Law I think it's the most important as it's crucial to your "personal brand" (A "Harvard trained" lawyer). With doctors it seems less important and with most other professions it seems almost irrelevant.

heliodor 3y ago
You forgot politics!
tneely 3y ago
While I agree it doesn’t matter much 1-2 jobs into your career, Ivies are really good at getting you through that first door. I wouldn’t be surprised if that MIT degree got someone to their first technical screen at Google, or gave them the right resources they needed to pass the interview.
thathndude 3y ago
Am a lawyer. Completely agree. For a person who strongly believes in meritocracy, I really picked a stupid career.
- te_chris 3y ago
  I wouldn't worry too much. Meritocracy was a satirical idea from conception.
hackyhacky 3y ago
Academia itself is probably the field that is most particular about these things.
- thathndude 3y ago
  Yeah. For many of the same reasons. Schools want to be able to market “all of our professors are ivy-league grads”
  - _yb2s 3y ago
    “we would never hire someone that went to a shitty school like this one”
ericmay 3y ago
> I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. Yes but for many the reason they were at Google was because of the MIT degree. So not only do you get a great education, but then you go on to do solid work (hopefully) and get good experience. It's acceleration on ROI of the degree.
- alephnerd 3y ago
  It doesn't necessarily work like that anymore. I have 4 close friends of mine who did EECS@MIT who didn't get recruited at Google.
  - ericmay 3y ago
    Overall it does work like that though. Google (or other tech companies/elite institutions) attends MIT engineering career fairs, it doesn't attend others. Corporations are not good at identifying promising talent outside of their traditional (Ivy League, etc.) recruiting grounds so they stick with their traditional recruiting grounds and then they'll favor "diverse" students from their traditional recruiting grounds. That's why they (corps) haven't made any substantial progress in "diverse hires" IMO. For example if "Google" wanted to make a difference it would actually ban hiring from Ivy League or top-20/30 universities (wiggle room on details here) and instead focus on universities that have higher admission rates (50% or so), large public universities, big time diverse populations relatively speaking.
    - alephnerd 3y ago
      I'm not denying that, but you are ignoring the fact that Google would open that booth at a LOT of public schools as well. Just off the top of my head - UC Berkeley, UCLA, Mich, Iowa State, UIUC, UW, UW Madison, UCSB, Oregon State, UMass Amherst, etc. And honestly, I really don't think you understand how hiring whas changed at a traditional corporation. For management track roles, these companies (eg. Danaher, Abbvie, P&G, Coca Cola) would hire undergrads from regional schools for management track LDP programs. Traditionally (aka the 70s and 80s) they would recruit from Ivies only, but that basically ended by the 2000s when they saw they couldn't compete on the package.
slothtrop 3y ago
Ostensibly the value of Ivy league as it pertains to tech is in making connections and partnerships with people who have cash-flow and ambition to match. Maybe this is overstated or tech entrepreneurs are more likely to find investment some other way. If the goal is just to get in at FANG, well, better show some astounding grades, a grab-bag of portfolio items, a knack for communication, among other things. That isn't contingent on Ivy league.
wpietri 3y ago
>I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point. And then do the same thing with name-brand companies, without inquiring much as to what a given developer did at, say, one of the FAANGs. When I've asked, the stated theory was that those places were good at filtering for smart people, so we didn't really have to evaluate actual competence. And that is one of the theoretical functions of things like degrees, so I get what they're saying, however horrifying I find it personally.
- daniel_reetz 3y ago
  It also strongly selects for people who excel at jumping hoops/working within institutions. We make it all about smarts, but smarts aren't everything in the corporate grind.
  - hotpotamus 3y ago
    It makes sense that the best teacher-pleasers would go on to be the best executive-pleasers.
- scruple 3y ago
  > I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point. I have seen executives (in startups and small, private companies) effectively stable PhDs and others with graduate degrees because of where their degree was printed. They pay these people a lot of money to keep them on payroll because it is, whether true or supposed, a strong signal to potential investors, etc.
tyre 3y ago
> the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. but it does matter for a first job, which then has trickle down effects. If you have a better shot at a high-paying company with a good brand name and/or a better shot at "prestige" teams on those companies, that influences the next few years. Nothing is guaranteed, but these marginal gains snowball.
SilverBirch 3y ago
This is path dependency though. They got into Google because they went to MIT and they'll get their next job because they were at Google and so on. Sure, you could have gone to some terrible college and then ended up at Google, but that's a much more difficult path to break into.
crazygringo 3y ago
No, I don't think this is true. Because Google is similarly valuable to MIT in your scenario. But if you worked at a random startup after college, or three in a row, it's very likely that MIT on your resume will still be the thing that gets you in the door for an interview for your next job.
opportune 3y ago
I think this is both true and not true, especially as Facebook/Google/similar get less selective. Having Ivy + Google has a stronger halo effect compared to other colleges, speaking from personal experience compared to peers who went to less selective colleges.
scruple 3y ago
> I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Anecdotally that isn't true. I am not trying to come off like a dick here but hiring manager is (probably) rarely on the level where people care about this stuff. I was well over a decade into my career as a software engineer before HR types and executives stopped (openly, outwardly) giving a shit about the fact that I didn't have a degree. I made it through the front door based on my network, which I sincerely lucked into. I absolutely believe (based on analyzing conversations and remarks made with these HR types and executives but also managers over the years) that I was passed over for promotions and given smaller starting salaries and pay bumps because of this. Yes, that did eventually stop. Where I am today, I know for a fact (if you can trust Blind, levels.fyi, and personal anecdotes, etc.) that I out earn some of my peers with equal education and tenure because of my specific experiences and skills, but it came at a cost for a long, long time.

heliodor 3y ago

You forgot politics!

tneely 3y ago

While I agree it doesn’t matter much 1-2 jobs into your career, Ivies are really good at getting you through that first door. I wouldn’t be surprised if that MIT degree got someone to their first technical screen at Google, or gave them the right resources they needed to pass the interview.

thathndude 3y ago

Am a lawyer. Completely agree. For a person who strongly believes in meritocracy, I really picked a stupid career.

te_chris 3y ago
I wouldn't worry too much. Meritocracy was a satirical idea from conception.

hackyhacky 3y ago

Academia itself is probably the field that is most particular about these things.

thathndude 3y ago
Yeah. For many of the same reasons. Schools want to be able to market “all of our professors are ivy-league grads”
- _yb2s 3y ago
  “we would never hire someone that went to a shitty school like this one”

ericmay 3y ago

> I would want to know more about what they did at Google than at MIT. Yes but for many the reason they were at Google was because of the MIT degree. So not only do you get a great education, but then you go on to do solid work (hopefully) and get good experience. It's acceleration on ROI of the degree.

alephnerd 3y ago
It doesn't necessarily work like that anymore. I have 4 close friends of mine who did EECS@MIT who didn't get recruited at Google.
- ericmay 3y ago
  Overall it does work like that though. Google (or other tech companies/elite institutions) attends MIT engineering career fairs, it doesn't attend others. Corporations are not good at identifying promising talent outside of their traditional (Ivy League, etc.) recruiting grounds so they stick with their traditional recruiting grounds and then they'll favor "diverse" students from their traditional recruiting grounds. That's why they (corps) haven't made any substantial progress in "diverse hires" IMO. For example if "Google" wanted to make a difference it would actually ban hiring from Ivy League or top-20/30 universities (wiggle room on details here) and instead focus on universities that have higher admission rates (50% or so), large public universities, big time diverse populations relatively speaking.
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    I'm not denying that, but you are ignoring the fact that Google would open that booth at a LOT of public schools as well. Just off the top of my head - UC Berkeley, UCLA, Mich, Iowa State, UIUC, UW, UW Madison, UCSB, Oregon State, UMass Amherst, etc. And honestly, I really don't think you understand how hiring whas changed at a traditional corporation. For management track roles, these companies (eg. Danaher, Abbvie, P&G, Coca Cola) would hire undergrads from regional schools for management track LDP programs. Traditionally (aka the 70s and 80s) they would recruit from Ivies only, but that basically ended by the 2000s when they saw they couldn't compete on the package.

slothtrop 3y ago

Ostensibly the value of Ivy league as it pertains to tech is in making connections and partnerships with people who have cash-flow and ambition to match. Maybe this is overstated or tech entrepreneurs are more likely to find investment some other way. If the goal is just to get in at FANG, well, better show some astounding grades, a grab-bag of portfolio items, a knack for communication, among other things. That isn't contingent on Ivy league.

wpietri 3y ago

>I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point. And then do the same thing with name-brand companies, without inquiring much as to what a given developer did at, say, one of the FAANGs. When I've asked, the stated theory was that those places were good at filtering for smart people, so we didn't really have to evaluate actual competence. And that is one of the theoretical functions of things like degrees, so I get what they're saying, however horrifying I find it personally.

daniel_reetz 3y ago
It also strongly selects for people who excel at jumping hoops/working within institutions. We make it all about smarts, but smarts aren't everything in the corporate grind.
- hotpotamus 3y ago
  It makes sense that the best teacher-pleasers would go on to be the best executive-pleasers.
scruple 3y ago
> I would like this to be true, but I think it varies a lot. I have seen execs be very excited by name-brand degrees well past that point. I have seen executives (in startups and small, private companies) effectively stable PhDs and others with graduate degrees because of where their degree was printed. They pay these people a lot of money to keep them on payroll because it is, whether true or supposed, a strong signal to potential investors, etc.

tyre 3y ago

> the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. but it does matter for a first job, which then has trickle down effects. If you have a better shot at a high-paying company with a good brand name and/or a better shot at "prestige" teams on those companies, that influences the next few years. Nothing is guaranteed, but these marginal gains snowball.

SilverBirch 3y ago

This is path dependency though. They got into Google because they went to MIT and they'll get their next job because they were at Google and so on. Sure, you could have gone to some terrible college and then ended up at Google, but that's a much more difficult path to break into.

crazygringo 3y ago

No, I don't think this is true. Because Google is similarly valuable to MIT in your scenario. But if you worked at a random startup after college, or three in a row, it's very likely that MIT on your resume will still be the thing that gets you in the door for an interview for your next job.

opportune 3y ago

I think this is both true and not true, especially as Facebook/Google/similar get less selective. Having Ivy + Google has a stronger halo effect compared to other colleges, speaking from personal experience compared to peers who went to less selective colleges.

scruple 3y ago

> I can't speak for other industries but I know in tech, the college you went to is basically irrelevant 1-2 years into your career. Anecdotally that isn't true. I am not trying to come off like a dick here but hiring manager is (probably) rarely on the level where people care about this stuff. I was well over a decade into my career as a software engineer before HR types and executives stopped (openly, outwardly) giving a shit about the fact that I didn't have a degree. I made it through the front door based on my network, which I sincerely lucked into. I absolutely believe (based on analyzing conversations and remarks made with these HR types and executives but also managers over the years) that I was passed over for promotions and given smaller starting salaries and pay bumps because of this. Yes, that did eventually stop. Where I am today, I know for a fact (if you can trust Blind, levels.fyi, and personal anecdotes, etc.) that I out earn some of my peers with equal education and tenure because of my specific experiences and skills, but it came at a cost for a long, long time.