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Is that _really_ that big of a problem? As a non-American, I did not do my undergrad at a school as prestigious as the top ones in the USA. And yet, I am very h

by mb7733 3y ago

Is that _really_ that big of a problem? As a non-American, I did not do my undergrad at a school as prestigious as the top ones in the USA. And yet, I am very happy with both my education and my career. (Probably more so than the average hacker news commenter, based on what I read here!) To put this in American terms, is it really the end of the world to just earn your bachelor's at a solid but not necessarily elite public university? Thereby avoiding the need to "grind" so hard throughout your youth and adolescence? What are the stakes really? The way I see it, if elite academics is the goal, graduate school is the time to be more selective because at that point one knows where to go based on one's research interests. If entrepreneurship is the dream, then the choice of school doesn't matter much at all! Otherwise, I think there are plenty of great jobs out there that don't require you to have gone to the #1 school in the country. To be clear, I'm not American so I may just be completely misjudging the apparent importance of choice in school. Also, I likely have different personal priorities than you, so I'm not trying to deny your experience. I just question whether it is _really_ necessary "these days" to optimize childhood around getting into an elite university. I think it's really just a matter of priority.

dhfbshfbu4u3 3y ago
30+ years ago, when I was just starting out, I thought the way you did. The environment was different too. You could just be a good programmer and pretty much write your own ticket. A lot of things have changed since then. Requirements and competition for positions have increased exponentially just as salaries have skyrocketed in the more technical fields. No surprise there, but that competitive pedigree system has filtered all the way down to primary and secondary education (to say nothing of college systems). So it is the end of the world? No. But it will cost you tens of thousands of dollars in the near term and perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime in lost potential earnings. Slipping out of the higher level schools can also make it extremely difficult to get into specific companies. As for entrepreneurship, that’s also subject to the same issues. Sure, anyone can start a company if they want, but if you want to fund that company the path is much easier if you went to Stanford than say Oklahoma State.

by mb7733 3y ago

dhfbshfbu4u3 3y ago

30+ years ago, when I was just starting out, I thought the way you did. The environment was different too. You could just be a good programmer and pretty much write your own ticket. A lot of things have changed since then. Requirements and competition for positions have increased exponentially just as salaries have skyrocketed in the more technical fields. No surprise there, but that competitive pedigree system has filtered all the way down to primary and secondary education (to say nothing of college systems). So it is the end of the world? No. But it will cost you tens of thousands of dollars in the near term and perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime in lost potential earnings. Slipping out of the higher level schools can also make it extremely difficult to get into specific companies. As for entrepreneurship, that’s also subject to the same issues. Sure, anyone can start a company if they want, but if you want to fund that company the path is much easier if you went to Stanford than say Oklahoma State.