11 ms·

I'm not sure, but I'd bet that the best institutions actually don't care where their applicants come from. They can afford to just choose the best. It's the so-

I'm not sure, but I'd bet that the best institutions actually don't care where their applicants come from. They can afford to just choose the best. It's the so-so places that have to signal their quality by 'hiring the best'. I've seen this in graduate school applications - students with poor marks often stand a better chance of admittance in a top program than a so-so one.

gummywormsyum 12y ago
True at the graduate level. But how many faculty at Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc. did their PhD at a school outside of the top ~15 schools?
lordnacho 12y ago
I think the explanation model agrees. For instance if you're a top football club, you can tell who the cream of the crop are, and you'll get your share. If you want to, you can take a chance on a player. If he's not good enough, he's still got your stamp of approval, so he can be sold at a higher price anyway.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
ibrahima 12y ago
> I've seen this in graduate school applications - students with poor marks often stand a better chance of admittance in a top program than a so-so one. Well, that's probably deceptive, as those guys are probably exceptional in other ways (publications as an undergrad, other research, etc) which takes away from their grades, or they only cared about certain classes which were important to their field.
- jroesch 12y ago
  As a current graduate school applicant with a couple of admits to top 10 programs I can confirm this. My GPA looks "low" around a 3.3 cumulative (I have lots of C's in things I deemed unimportant) but I have a relatively high CS GPA (3.8-3.9), took many graduate classes during undergrad, worked at startups, consulted, did multiple years of research resulting in two publications with 2-3 more in the pipeline, worked on open source, gave talks at workshops and software engineering conferences, TAed, constructed two student led courses, etc. It seems the most important thing is to demonstrate your ability to work as a researcher (your primary role as a CS graduate student) trumps all in graduate admissions, but that is just my 2 cents.
  - hga 12y ago
    That's what I've heard, and it makes sense. Most specifically, to get into grad school X, you need to have one or more of the facility members in your school who are known by one or more in X recommend you with the message that you can do research.

gummywormsyum 12y ago

True at the graduate level. But how many faculty at Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc. did their PhD at a school outside of the top ~15 schools?

lordnacho 12y ago

I think the explanation model agrees. For instance if you're a top football club, you can tell who the cream of the crop are, and you'll get your share. If you want to, you can take a chance on a player. If he's not good enough, he's still got your stamp of approval, so he can be sold at a higher price anyway.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

ibrahima 12y ago

> I've seen this in graduate school applications - students with poor marks often stand a better chance of admittance in a top program than a so-so one. Well, that's probably deceptive, as those guys are probably exceptional in other ways (publications as an undergrad, other research, etc) which takes away from their grades, or they only cared about certain classes which were important to their field.

jroesch 12y ago
As a current graduate school applicant with a couple of admits to top 10 programs I can confirm this. My GPA looks "low" around a 3.3 cumulative (I have lots of C's in things I deemed unimportant) but I have a relatively high CS GPA (3.8-3.9), took many graduate classes during undergrad, worked at startups, consulted, did multiple years of research resulting in two publications with 2-3 more in the pipeline, worked on open source, gave talks at workshops and software engineering conferences, TAed, constructed two student led courses, etc. It seems the most important thing is to demonstrate your ability to work as a researcher (your primary role as a CS graduate student) trumps all in graduate admissions, but that is just my 2 cents.
- hga 12y ago
  That's what I've heard, and it makes sense. Most specifically, to get into grad school X, you need to have one or more of the facility members in your school who are known by one or more in X recommend you with the message that you can do research.