<p>Ok, 5 years after graduation, is the school you attended having a large impact on your success? This isn't personal, i'm just wondering in general.</p>
<p>It may or may not.. depends on how you are doing in the work force...It may kind of help you with a second job if your first one didn't fit, however after that it depends on how well you do on the job..</p>
<p>There is no simple answer to this. However, I do know from direct experience the following:</p>
<p>1) Your college matters less if you are in a science or engineering field. Regardless of where you went, your bosses and colleagues will judge you much more on your knowledge and competence (and they will be able to do that rather quickly in the hard sciences). And, your initial hiring will depend more on how you interview, your grades, and your undergraduate experiences (internships always help) than on the name of your school.</p>
<p>2) If you are in a field that encourages an advanced degree, and you get one, then your undergrad degree institution will not matter at all.</p>
<p>3) After your first or second job, your school also will tend not to matter at all; if your performance on the job is excellent, then your grades in school will not even matter.</p>
<p>4) In spite of the above, you may always run into somebody, boss or colleague, who cares about where you went. However, the advantage often doesn't fall to the person from the most prestigious college! If a hiring manager went to Podunk State U., and his #1 assistant went to Podunk U., and half of his best employees did the same (probably because it is a popular local University) then your degree from Harvard may very well be a drawback!</p>
<p>5) Moral of the story: don't shy away from going to a prestigious school that you really like, but don't think life has ended, either, if you end up going someplace else.</p>
<p>5 years out, 10 years out -- is it something that is going to "make or break" your career? Of course not. Your performance in any given job is what will make or break your career.</p>
<p>But if you are lucky enough to have graduated from, say, HYPSM, it is certainly something that does get brought up from time to time (from more casual situations to more important career situations such as promotion time) - it an unwritten validation that goes with you where ever you go.</p>
<p>For instance, when working in i-banking out in Asia (a region particularly name/brand driven), there was a colleague of mine who was a Harvard grad, almost without fail when we went to client meetings, there was always an obligatory passing remark that somehow mentioned this fact ("Harvard" this, "Harvard" that, here is so-and-so he went to "Harvard")... he was given this automatic "seal of approval" -- he "must" be smart -- that halo effect pretty much followed him around... of course it didn't hurt that he actually was a very bright guy, but the fact that he went to Harvard was no secret. Now some say this can be a double-edged sword (to the extent that the pressure to live up to such high expectations can be burdensome and unrealistic vs. the automatic goodwill one receives for doing nothing other than being a Harvard grad).</p>
<p>YMMV of course depending upon the situation, the region, the industry, etc... but I'd say that this "halo effect" is pretty strong for all of the elite schools (HYPSM + Ivies).</p>
<p>But, as I said from the outset, is this going to be a deciding factor in any given situation? No. But it certainly doesn't hurt.</p>
<p>i work in a prestigious medical environment (both applied and research), and dont have a clue where 99% of my colleagues did their undergrad.</p>
<p>^^^ but i'm sure you prolly know where some of them did their graduate studies (Doctoral or otherwise)</p>
<p>My answer would be that, in a professional environment, it does not matter after 5 years where you went to undergraduate. However, an undergraduate degree may have relevance to your social life throughout your life. For example, moving to a new city often prompts efforts to contact others from your school so that contacts and connections can be made. Or in a social scene, if you went to Amherst and your new cocktail friend went to Williams, then you could argue about that hockey game over Winter Carnival weekend. Or if you went to U Florida 5 or 25 years ago, I am sure that you are exploiting every opportunity available to brag about your degree and the fact that the school won both the football and basketball championships in the same year. :) Social capital? Yes. Professional capital? Little to none.</p>
<p>It matters a lot. It comes up much more often than I would have ever thought. Maybe its just my chosen career, but some way or another (esp in meetings) it comes up.</p>
<p>This varies a lot. Professionally it may not matter but it will come up, people will ask you where you went to school. It depends on your profession among other things. </p>
<p>Weldon hit the nail on the head, the only thing I'd add are that some companies hire directly from certain schools that they trust. Either because they attended or for some other reason. My friend's father attended Villanova and currently only hires VN graduates.</p>
<p>I work in business, I think it matters a lot more in this environment than in medicine...</p>
<p>Slipper I think you're right. It does make the field sound rather shallow to me, that someone would go gaga just because of the school attended.</p>
<p>I'm also in nthe medical field. I stopped asking where so and so went to school years ago, since so often I've seen the State U grad bury the ivy grad.</p>
<p>A very interesting observation:</p>
<p>I'm a grad student at a top (the top?) Ivy, and, on average, the strongest students did NOT attend the Ivies for undergrad.</p>
<p>^^^ yeah, </p>
<p>at the same time, there are many a "State U" overachiever who loves to try and "show up" the Ivy guy -- typically this kind of person has a massive chip on his shoulder about the size of Mt. Everest. I've met folks like that, they've got way too much to "prove"...</p>
<p>My experience has been similar to 2331clk and see some/many Ivy grads get outworked and outthought in the business environment by the State U grads. </p>
<p>prestige may be right that the State U grads have a "chip on their shoulder" when they compete with Ivy grads, but if that "chip" gives them the extra motivation to achieve at a higher level, then why criticize that. And while we all know State U types with that "chip," they are probably less common than the Ivy grad with the huge ego and a superiorist attitude. It's a competitive world and frankly, one'e personal ability and drive are far more important to individual success than one's undergraduate college. Give me the intelligent, overachieving driven State U grad any day over the Ivy grad with the enormous sense of entitlement and a narcissistic personality.</p>
<p>IMO - for business, the school you attended makes a difference in only a few prestige-oriented areas (like investment banking and consulting). The big IBanks and Consulting Houses recruit only from certain (top) schools. But I've worked for multiple Fortune 500s over the years and the school you attended is NOT that important - and in fact - is rarely discussed (other than perhaps rooting for teams during NCAA and Football season).</p>
<p>I have been involved in law firm recruiting, and I have noticed that between two candidates with the same law school credentials, the one who went to the really superior undergrad school tends to get a leg up. This is pretty much limited to the upper echelon ivies and a couple of the very top LACs. There is no difference between a candidate who went to a third tier undergrad school and a fifth tier undergrad school.</p>
<p>
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Give me the intelligent, overachieving driven State U grad any day over the Ivy grad with the enormous sense of entitlement and a narcissistic personality.
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<p>Well, not all State U grads are super overachievers, and similarly, not all Ivy grads are narcissists with enormous senses of entitlement. </p>
<p>Not only is this an incredibly broad and unfair brush to paint, it is frankly, flat out wrong. The situation in which hawkette describes tend to be the exceptions rather than the rule. Otherwise, why would top corporations, i-banks and consulting firms continue recruiting from the Ivies if they were churning out self-entitled, lazy, under-achievers year in and year out? Not to mention this belies the fact that a good majority of those Ivy grads have always been high achievers their entire lives, so it follows that this would continue well into their post-grad careers.</p>
<p>If you viewed the world from hawkette's eyes, State U. grads are all destined to become phenomenal successes and all Ivy grads are destined to be standing in a welfare line. Absolute rubbish.</p>
<p>This is the kind of blatant Ivy-bashing which prompted me to sign up on CC in the first place.</p>
<p>prestige,
I agree with most of your sentiments and actually have a very high regard for the Ivy schools generally and their students in particular. Ivy grads are going to do just fine and we both know that. My admittedly heavy-handed point was about the Ivy grad who rests on his/her laurels and constantly refers to their Ivy degree as somehow showing that they are the smartest one in the room. I think that this description fortunately applies to only a small (but all too easily identified) group of graduates. </p>
<p>As for state universities, there is a group at many of these schools that has great talent and this talent is often underrated by these boards, by the public, and by the media. I respect them and many of the lower profile colleges around the country. Some of their graduates are very bright, very driven, work well with others, achieve great things...and don't spend much time telling you what college they attended. That is the student that I am looking for, whether they come from an Ivy school or a State U.</p>