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<p>What makes you think that you have the market cornered on good decision-making? What makes you suspect that most of the parents on CC, at least, didn’t apply similar criteria to choosing which colleges would be best and most appropriate for their children? </p>
<p>Sure seems like the moment you hear someone’s kid goes to (insert elite school of your choosing), you conclude that they must not have used any criteria other than “prestige.”</p>
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<p>Just wanted to say that I loved this.</p>
<p>Personally, I think Ivies are best suited for the areas of academia and the job industries where there are more applicants/candidates for jobs (like investment banking, etc).</p>
<p>I don’t know about certain tech industries like say the software development world where you see a mix of workers from Ivies and state schools. In some cases, the Ivy grad has a better starting salary but usually that translates to a $10-$15K extra. All it takes in the software industry is mastering the “latest” and after a couple of job hops, one has made up the difference in initial salary.</p>
<p>I won’t get into doing things like being an independent and/or security clearance defense work.</p>
<p>Just quoted from the conclusion Section of the abstract you provided link for. <a href=“U-M Web Hosting”>U-M Web Hosting; what do you think of this?</p>
<p>Messed up the above link. AD what do you think of this …</p>
<p><a href=“U-M Web Hosting”>U-M Web Hosting;
<p>The 2011 Hershbein paper linked by jym626 in post #393 ^^^ is interesting and bears directly on the discussion on this thread. </p>
<p>Hershbein concludes that the earnings premium that comes from attending a selective college is due mostly to “ability signaling,” i.e., that admission to a selective college simply operates as a handy screen for employers who can be pretty confident if they hire someone from Harvard or Amherst they’re getting someone of high ability–and there’s less variability within that pool than at “less selective” schools, which in his sample are Central Michigan, Alabama A&M, Florida Atlantic, and Appalachian State. His main evidence for this is that there’s almost no earnings premium for a high undergrad GPA at his Tier III (most selective, in his sample Harvard and Amherst) and Tier II (highly selective, in his sample Michigan, UC Berkeley, and Emory) schools; on average, kids in the bottom of the class at these schools will earn about as much as kids at the top of the class. At the “less selective” schools, however, there’s a large earnings premium for a high GPA, which is consistent with employers needing to use some signal other than admission to the school to signal the applicant’s ability; so they hire the kids from Appalachian State with high GPAs.</p>
<p>He also argues this result is broadly inconsistent with the “human capital” model, which attempts to explain the earnings differential between schools on the basis of, for lack of a better term, superior educational outcomes at the most selective schools due to the availability of better and more abundant resources. He says if that were the case, you’d expect a higher earnings premium for a high GPA at a highly selective school, because presumably the most capable students would get the most out of the superior resources at those schools and come out better prepared than their less educationally successful classmates, and employers would notice that and pay a premium for the top GPAs. But the data say there’s little or no earnings premium, on average, for a high GPA at a highly selective school, which means employers are essentially treating it as irrelevant. A Harvard grad is a Harvard grad, apparently, whether her undergrad GPA is 2.5 or 4.0. He finds essentially that same result at Michigan, UC Berkeley, and Emory, his next-most-selective group. It’s at the “less selective” schools–Appalachian State, Florida Atlantic, Central Michigan, Alabama A&M–that GPA matters most to employers.</p>
<p>A further implication is that the medium-ability kid who manages to get into a selective college will be the one who benefits most from going to that college—again, not because of superior educational outcomes, but because employers will be using admission to the selective college as the primary signal of ability, and won’t pay as much (if any) attention to that student’s mediocre undergrad GPA. If that same kid went to a less selective college, undergrad GPA would matter more. </p>
<p>This is actually broadly consistent with the points annasdad has been making here. I certainly wouldn’t take this paper as the last word on the subject. There’s a lot of technical stuff in it I don’t understand, and even if his methodology is impeccable, his ultimate conclusions rest on a lot of interpretation and extrapolation from the empirical results that others might quibble with. But it’s a pretty interesting contribution to the debate.</p>
<p>csdad, I’ll defer to bclintonk’s response.</p>
<p>Thanks for posting the link, csdad. The article , or what little I could read, says that there are higher earnings for those from the most selective schools. So if that matters to some then there is data to support it, along with the hiring company’s awareness of better resources at those schools.</p>
<p>PizzaGirl, don’t you ever tire of raising straw men, only to be made to look foolish when they’re so easily knocked down. </p>
<p>I haven’t said, nor do I believe, that I have the “market cornered” on rational decision making when it comes to college matters. Straw man up - straw man down. </p>
<p>I haven’t said, nor do I believe, that a family that chooses to send a child to a high-prestige college is necessarily making that call based only on prestige. Straw man up - straw man down. </p>
<p>I do believe, based on reading many CC posts, that some families make a college decision based solely on prestige. And I have said I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. Just be aware that you’re buying prestige, not necessarily educational quality.</p>
<p>Re: #408 and the “earnings premium” for GPA</p>
<p>Perhaps it may be that the “earnings premium” for GPA is smaller or nonexistent at more selective schools due to greater grade inflation there. From [National</a> Trends in Grade Inflation, American Colleges and Universities](<a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com%5DNational”>http://www.gradeinflation.com) , the average GPAs are:</p>
<p>Amherst: 3.48 (2006)
Harvard: 3.45 (2005)</p>
<p>Berkeley: 3.27 (2006)
Emory: 3.38 (2008)
Michigan: 3.27 (2008)</p>
<p>Alabama A&M: N/A
Appalachian State: 2.93 (2006-2007)
Central Michigan: 2.94 (2006)
Florida Atlantic: 2.83 (2008)</p>
<p>Some have commented elsewhere in these forums that 3.0 is a common cutoff GPA that employers commonly use to screen intern and new college graduate candidates. If that is the case, it would appear that such a cutoff GPA will have a significant effect on the employment prospects of the bottom half (and slightly more) of the class at the less selective universities listed here, but affect only a much smaller portion of the class at the more selective universities listed here.</p>
<p>“This is actually broadly consistent with the points annasdad has been making here. I certainly wouldn’t take this paper as the last word on the subject. There’s a lot of technical stuff in it I don’t understand, and even if his methodology is impeccable, his ultimate conclusions rest on a lot of interpretation and extrapolation from the empirical results that others might quibble with. But it’s a pretty interesting contribution to the debate”</p>
<p>…but the part that is inconsistent is that the study concludes that students with “average” GPA’s from selective colleges have an advantage over students with higher GPA’s from less selective colleges, when it comes to employment.</p>
<p>tk21769, I want to comment on that summary you referenced from Academically Adrift. I don’t know the provenance of the summary. I do know that the authors of Academically Adrift explicitly (pp. 114-117) say that based on their limited sample size (24 schools, a little over 2,000 students), they can’t draw conclusions about what institutional characteristics lead to better performance on the CLA, over and above those measured by the NSSE. </p>
<p>They do say (ibid.) that they can conclude:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Students at institutions with the highest measures of “behaviors that are beneficial for learning” outperform on the CLA those at schools with the lowest such measures - by a substantial margin. </p></li>
<li><p>There is more variation (in CLA improvement) within institutions than between institutions</p></li>
<li><p>students in the top 10% of the CLA improvement distribution can be found at every institution. Students in the top 10% “are experiencing 1.5 standard deviation of growth… which is more than eight times the average growth.”</p></li>
<li><p>Even at the highest-performing schools, there are students who fall below the norm</p></li>
</ul>
<p>…I really wouldn’t call it grade inflation. Grades at the most selective schools can’t be based on the Bell Curve because their population isn’t based on the Bell Curve. Everything must be pushed up the curve to fit the “typical student”.</p>
<p>The paper jym cited examines the “signaling” effect on employers of attending selective colleges. For purposes of this discussion, I’m more interested in the relationship between the characteristics of various colleges (selectivity, rigor, academic engagement) and observable learning outcomes (not earnings outcomes). A key question for me is this: absent good data directly related to rigor and academic engagement, is selectivity a reasonable proxy? Are highly selective colleges very likely to offer higher levels of academic rigor & engagement than much less selective colleges (for similar subject matter)? Is selectivity correlated to academic excellence? </p>
<p>The claim made by annasdad is that there is no relationship. This is the “null hypothesis” he has set up. By definition, the null hypothesis cannot be proven. This is why I think he is over-reaching when he makes statements such as,
*“Understand that decades of research have shown conclusively that for a motivated student, there is no educational advantage to attending a more prestigious or selective school”<a href=“%5Burl%5Dhttp://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1335757-help-final-decision-3.html#post14334197%5B/url%5D%20%20#32”>/i</a>.</p>
<p>More properly, he could claim that the research he has examined has NOT shown that, for a motivated student, there IS an educational advantage to attending a more prestigious or selective school. It is not unreasonable to ask to see that evidence, before deciding to attend a very expensive college, if cost is important to you and if academic excellence is a major factor in your decision.</p>
<p>It appears that the same research, and other research, has shown that there is an educational advantage to greater academic rigor & engagement. So one could examine the NSSE data ([How</a> to make NSSE college scores work for you - USATODAY.com](<a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/nsse.htm]How”>http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/nsse.htm)) to see if more selective colleges generally tend to score higher on the “level of academic challenge” factor. I’ve looked at 10 or 15 schools so far. The more selective ones (Middlebury, Claremont McKenna, Kenyon, Olin) do get higher marks on that factor than the much less selective Doctoral & Master’s universities I’ve looked at (just as I would expect).</p>
<p>I haven’t done the extensive examination of the NSSE data that you have, tk. But based on what you just provided, one could conclude that the difference is between LACs and universities, not between schools of different selectivities. </p>
<p>Before PizzaGirl and her fan club pounce, let me stress that I am asserting no such thing…</p>
<p>@414
Yes, those are the caveats/qualifications I mentioned at the end of #363.</p>
<p>As for the provenance, note the authors of the summary I cited. I believe Arum & Roksa also were among the authors of Academically Adrift.
<a href=“http://www.ssrc.org/workspace/images/crm/new_publication_3/{d06178be-3823-e011-adef-001cc477ec84}.pdf[/url]”>http://www.ssrc.org/workspace/images/crm/new_publication_3/{d06178be-3823-e011-adef-001cc477ec84}.pdf</a></p>
<p>^^ What I’m seeing (so far) is that more selective colleges within the LAC (“Baccalaureate”) group tend to be more “challenging” than less selective colleges within the same group. The Baccalaureate group also gets a higher average “challenging” score than the Doctoral/research average score, which in turn is higher than the Master’s university average score.</p>
<p>I’ve always maintained that teachers (professors) naturally teach to the mean. If the mean is higher (greater selectivity in admissions) the material presented will be more complex. This is what I see in high school. When NY state went to “everyone Regents” (basically saying the only track was college prep), the theory was that the “bottom would be pulled up”…just the opposite has happened, the top has pulled down,. I suspect that this is a result of teachers having to scale back instruction to accommodate those students who really aren’t college bound. Common sense would lead us to believe the same thing happens in college. The lower the mean ability of the class, the less complex the material taught will end up being. Professors tend to naturally adjust to the “typical student”.</p>
<p>At highly selective / elite colleges, there also tends to be a wide variety of backgrounds (ethnic, region of the country / world). That’s personally something that I like / value when looking at schools for my kids. That is one disadvantage, in <em>my</em> opinion, of even the most elite state u’s (Michigan, Berkeley, etc.) - they still will draw predominantly (and understandably) from the state. I love that 2 of my born-and-raised-in-the-midwest-daughter’s new friends, for example, are from Eritrea and Abu Dhabi. Just hanging around them will expand her horizons in ways she won’t get elsewhere. And that is part of the “experience” that I, personally, think is worth paying for. Others’ mileage may vary, of course, and that’s fine.</p>
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<p>It is also possible that some courses and majors that cannot be taught at a low level of rigor are less popular at less selective universities, resulting in reduction of offerings of courses and majors of this type.</p>
<p>For example, some less selective universities are considering eliminating physics major degree programs due to lack of student interest. On the other hand, it is easy to find business major degree programs at less selective universities.</p>