@Chrchill I’m aware of that but does it matter? The answer is “no”. There are so many different ratings and rankings you don’t know what to make of them. I don’t know any recruiters who pay much attention to them. I’ve always found it a rather fatuous exercise to argue whether Harvard is better than Columbia, or Amherst is better than Pomona. Who cares? There are about 50-60 top universities and they are all outstanding.
You wrote, “There are some who hire at elite colleges precisely because the exceedingly selective admissions has served to ensure they can select among the “creme de la creme” as they perceive it”.
I’d say that doesn’t apply to top employers. And increasingly it is where you went to graduate school that matters.
If you want evidence of this, just visit any top employer and see where the employees went to college. You’d be surprised.
"There are people who use college admissions selectivity as a first screening point to distinguish “raw talent”. Or to form pre-conceived notions about individuals they meet…
I’m not saying that they should do this, necessarily, just that it is done, there are people who do it.
Those people might give more significance to a member of a pool that survived an 8% admissions rate, with mandatory test scores and high school grades submitted and evaluated, vs. one that survived a 30% admissions rate, without submitting test scores. (just to make up some numbers & criteria).
There are “elite” employers who do it. Employers choose where to recruit based on where they are likely to yield qualified applicants. Relying in part on the screening process used by those schools in the first place.
Back when I was paying attention, some hedge funds went beyond this, they required applicants to put their SAT scores on their resume."
@monydad , absolutely correct.
and, yes, it is quite true what others have said.
Should we be surprised that there are students who made the cut to get into the College who are irritated that the Barnard and GS people get a diploma that says “Columbia University” on it? I have no idea which is more rigorous in terms of selectivity as between Barnard or GS, though I would guess it’s Barnard. But as to the college, it’s the most selective of the bunch. I’m not saying they go around and sneer at these people and actively dislike them. But there’s more than a few there who want their degree to be super special because of the hassle of what they went through to get in. Of course, there’s also a healthy number who don’t give a damn. I’d probably rather hang out with the latter group.
I don’t think it’s an example of particularly mature behavior, but I know it’s there. How common it is, I have no clue.
But you can simply Google this topic and you’ll find articles and message board about this very issue.
@cobrat is correct. taking @exlibris97 's challenge, go visit Goldman or your local McKinsey branch office and see where most of the people went to school.
hopefully it’s the exception, but there are more than a handful of top employers who care where you went to school. none of them insist that you attended Harvard, but there is a cut that happens at some places.
the graduate school piece is a bit of a red herring. yes, there are places where your graduate school matters, but those are places where you need a graduate degree to begin with, and in those cases we’re having the same conversation about whether it does or doesn’t matter where that degree came from.
@MiddleburyDad2: “But there’s more than a few there who want their degree to be super special because of the hassle of what they went through to get in.”
In which case they shouldn’t have attended a uni like Columbia.
It’s not as if the fact that Columbia has multiple undergraduate divisions, and that GS and Barnard students (and 3-2 engineering transfers) take the same classes as the traditional Columbia undergrads (as opposed to Harvard Extension School having separate classes from Harvard College) is some super secret that was hidden from them. Getting worked up about a circumstance that youchosetoenter_ seems insane to me.
@PurpleTitan , read what I wrote, not what you think.
You’re getting carried away with this point. Nobody suggested that there were going to be protests about it. And, I don’t care; I have zero skin in the game. I even suggested that it was immature and petty. Hey, the Ivy League doesn’t weed out petty and immature students. Who woulda thought?
Look, my post merely posits that it is, not that it should be.
The 3-2 engineering kids make up a relatively small population. But the College kids know the other cohorts are there, and some take the snide view that those degrees were earned through ‘back door to Columbia’.
Again, to beat a dead horse, I didn’t say that I agree with them.
Also, just because some find it annoying doesn’t mean they’re not going to take their offer to attend Columbia. It’s one of the best universities on the planet … people are still going to go; again, not that big of a deal.
Many Columbia College alums/students back when I was an undergrad and before felt the same way about Columbia SEAS students since up until the late '90s, SEAS had notably lower GPA/SAT requirements than the College or Barnard so long as one was heavily lopsided in math.
This fact combined with the fact transferring between SEAS and the College and vice-versa used to only require being in good academic standing for a year(easily done by taking Gen-ED courses) and filing pro-forma paperwork. As a result, many STEM-lopsided kids exploited this to gain admission to SEAS, spend a year there, file pro-forma paperwork to do an internal transfer to the College, and graduate from the College. Plenty of HS classmates in my year and earlier did precisely that and ended up graduating with Columbia College degrees despite starting out at SEAS with its much easier admission policies at the time.
This was practically an open secret among STEM-centered public magnet high schools like BxSci, TJSST, or other high schools such as Hunter College HS so it wasn’t limited to only STEM-centered public magnets. This was likely a factor in why Columbia U stopped allowing this so now one has to file a full transfer application if one wants to transfer divisions.
@cobrat: Well, I believe that Columbia is combining CC and SEAS.
@MiddleburyDad2: I know your position, but my point is that it’s silly to gripe about a situation that you chose to enter. And yes, there are many good reasons to choose Columbia, but if you then make the choice to enroll there, griping about the way the uni is set up or bearing a grudge against people who are getting a Columbia degree through some other entry method is illogical.
Honestly, there are few elite private unis (so not counting LACs) who don’t offer some degree program that is far easier to enter than their flagship undergraduate program.
@PurpleTitan , I would score it as immature, but not illogical.
It would be like Berkeley kids being confused with Santa Cruz kids. Trust me; they don’t want that confusion.
A somewhat debated issue here in PNW when the UW Bothell and Tacoma branches opened was “what’s the degree gonna say?” Again, the Seattle kids didn’t think the UW Bothell and Tacoma campuses should confer the same degree and wanted a clear distinction. The Seattle campus is relatively difficult to get into; the branch campuses are not - basically junior college admissions.
It’s not just Columbia.
@MiddleburyDad2: For sure. This snobbery/immaturity takes place all up and down the spectrum.
Though I doubt there is much confusion about the various UC’s. It more common with a school like UMich where there is one gigantic main campus and 2 smaller newish branches that few people OOS know of.
^ Agreed. The UC campuses have such a long history of distinction and “separateness” for lack of a better word.
Most large universities, including the UC’s, have multiple undergraduate school where there may be significant differences in admission standards (or, more important in the long run, differences in requirements for graduation). It’s part of the nature of the concept of “university”.
re#30:
"Regardless, the question still stands - to the OP. Since someone eligible for GS would be ineligible for CC and vice versa, why does the question matter? (Unless you are considering one of the joint programs.) "
OP can speak for himself, but IMO:
The OP’s first sentence started “SGS is for older students…”… Implicitly acknowledging from the very start of this thread that the colleges are generally not for the same applicant. Cross-application was never his issue, seems to me.
IMO the merit to his question stems not from any false presumption about applications on OP’s part, but rather from the fact that GS and CC are not the only two colleges a prospective applicant can apply to.
An applicant who is older/out of sequence can apply to six zillion other colleges besides Columbia GS. IIRC, even within the Ivy league there are at least a couple of schools that admit older applicants into their college, without any special college for them. Heck if the applicant is female there is a program for older applicants at Barnard, I think.
It might matter to those potential GS applicants. If they are paying big bucks, and/or devoting their efforts, towards (in part) getting “Columbia” on their diplomas, they might reasonably want to know the likelihood/extent to which it will do the same thing for them that it does for a Columbia College student who does likewise.
It is, IMO, a reasonable question. It is not always the case that all programs within a university are treated exactly the same externally. (Or internally). To take a draconian case, Harvard Extension School does not generally garner the same reaction as Harvard College does. I’m not equating Harvard Extension school to GS, I’m just making the point that a potential GS applicant might reasonably contemplate the extent to which his degree will be held in the same regard as a Columbia College degree. (By graduate schools, per the OP’s initial post). Because it is not so inevitably the case, or so obvious that it is beyond questioning.
If it actually won’t be held in the same regard by graduate schools, the point isn’t that the guy can apply to Columbia College instead. The point is he can apply to City College of New York, or wherever, and, possibly, save a boatload of money while still not diminishing his chances at (to follow OPs initial post) graduate programs. Or apply to Brown/Dartmouth (whichever admits older applicants, I can’t remember) and feel more assured that he is getting the same “product” (including subsequent regard for one’s degree) as the other attendees there are getting.
“It’s not as if the fact that Columbia has multiple undergraduate divisions, and that GS and Barnard students take the same classes as the traditional Columbia undergrads is some super secret that was hidden from them.”
It’s not as if the fact is promoted as a selling point in the Columbia and Barnard literature, either. At least, it hasn’t been historically; maybe this year’s materials point it out.
re#53: “It’s not as if the fact is promoted as a selling point in the Columbia and Barnard literature, either.”
Don’t know about Columbia. but with respect to Barnard, ability to take courses at Columbia is, actually, promoted as a selling point. Not sure specifically what literature that appears in, but I think it’s safe to say that the vast preponderance of Barnard matriculants are well aware of this facet of their educational horizons. However this may be communicated to them.
I imagine it is viewed as a point of competitive advantage over, say, Vassar, etc.