Is it possible that none of us – let alone our kids – really knows what will turn out to have “mattered” when we – or they – look back 20 or 40 years from now?
Of course, we probably don’t even agree now about what matters. Do we want out children to be happy? Fulfilled? enlightened? Make the world a better place? All of these?
Do we even know what we want for ourselves?
What does it all mean?
I know this is anecdotal and I can only speak from from personal experience. I went to Columbia. My husband went to Wyoming after 2 years at CC. We both have JDs. I took on a small amount of debt. He had no money so he paid for his schooling by being a member of the State National guard. Our incomes are identical and 6 figures each. Where we went to school did not make a difference. But having little or no debt did; it allowed us both to take advantage of excellent job opportunities early in our careers that did not pay a lot at first but have brought us to where we are today which is living a very happy comfortable life with the ability to pay cash for our son’s education so he too can start life with no debt.
^This, because there’s no way to test the counterfactual. You can’t take a 42-year-old college grad and send them back to college and see what happens in the next 20 years.
This is an unanswerable question. Or rather, the question is probably that it depends - the dreaded response - but it really does. It depends on the field, on the student, on the interesting little quirks that could happen because of where you went. Maybe your roommate’s parent is the head of a company that you want to work for and helps get you an internship. Or maybe being a big fish in a small pond means that you get more involved on campus and your leadership leads you to great post-college outcomes. Or maybe you want to be an investment banker and going to an elite school is what’s necessary to get there. Or maybe you go to an obscure regional college that has some odd major like forestry and you fall in love and that’s your career.
In short, I think it “matters,” but by “matters” I mean in a broad sense in that your college/university will help shape who you are in a very important developmental stage of your life. You’d probably turn out different in some tangible way if you went somewhere other than the college you end up at, but that doesn’t mean “worse” or “better” necessarily.
@fractalmstr, you don’t need to be so arrogant and contemptuous in your post. You can do better than that. I of course understand things.
Haven’t read through all of the responses yet, but -
I don’t think it matters so much where you went, as what you do with that education.
My husband went to SIU- Edwardsville for Electrical Engineering. It was the only school he applied to, back in the late 70s, as it was less than an hour away from his house (although he lived on campus). And, despite the fact that he got all As and Bs in high school.
He went to St. Louis U. for law school, for the same reasons - location.
He works at a law firm in the Willis Tower. His co-workers (lawyers) have undergrad degrees from all over - Michigan State, U of Illinois, UW-Madison, NIU, UII-C, and even one guy went to Northeastern IL, which is not highly regarded around here. Yes, there are a few who went to Case Western, Northwestern, etc. Most apparently went to state schools and even lower-tier schools, or small, non-famous LACs for undergrad.
It matters that they went to these schools, applied themselves, and then got into law school later.
I also have to wonder if the “elite” status of schools that are NOT HYPS - or whatever the acronym is, sorry - is generated and perpetuated by those schools themselves, to drum up enrollment, and stay in business, and stay “selective”. ( I think most of us here realize that the USNWR rankings take selectivity into more account than they probably should… )
I’m talking about schools like NYU, Boston U, Washington U in STL, Northeastern in Boston, etc. Schools that are now considered prestigious, but apparently only in the past 20 or 30 years… I personally wonder if they marketed themselves to be prestigious and selective? And kids are freaking out because they feel like they are the next step down from Harvard? I don’t know.
All I know is, my husband and I went to state schools, and did well for ourselves. Part of that was going to grad school later, combined with hard work and personal ambition. So, it’s my belief that the latter goes a long way toward making up for the fact that you ended up at no-name LAC, or a directional state school. Because, really, those are “good” schools, too, if they allow you to get a quality education, grow up, and earn your bachelor’s degree. The rest is up to you, even at a more prestigious place, I’d think…
Add me to those who don’t know where this thread is supposed to be going.
What matters is what the individual does with the education- both the opps while in college and what sort of motivated, thinking individual he or she graduates as.
You can be a slacker at a Harvard, make it through. You can be the bright, driven kid at Nowhere State and come out polished by the experiences you pursued and hungry to climb the ladder of success, whatever that means to you.
Yale used to include, in their description of the ‘future leaders’ it seeks, the people who go on to make small, but steady impact on those around them. It isn’t all about IB, curing cancer and national power.
To me, the question isn’t “does it matter?”
It’s more, “Who are YOU?”
That said, I am very happy mine went to a top LAC that put them on the rack in terms of honing their critical thinking, the knowledge they acquired, and the opportunities which rounded them and allowed them to do some good for others and start a resume of sorts. They would not have acquired that at the local state school, where too many sleepwalk to their degrees. But, that doesn’t mean all kids at less academically aggressive schools are stagnating. (!)
Add me to those who know EXACTLY where this thread is going…the same place all these threads go. To the land of " that question can never be answered but lets debate the pants off it because we have to justify our choices"
That said, I am very happy mine went to our state flagship that put them on track in terms of critical thinking, the knowledge they acquired , and the opportunities that rounded them and allowed them to do some good for others and start a résumé.
***sorry lookingforward, but it had to be said.
Sax, lots of opportunities for a good education. But it’s about the kid, not this CC thing that it has to be about the college’s rep and media ranking and supposed superiority in networking. Lots of great kids out there maximizing. I love 'em. Glad you’re happy. 
(I was referring to our state flagship. Not state schools in general.)
Glad you took my post as intended. I always like what you have to say.
Absolutely agree it is about the student taking full advantage of his opportunities
LF,
I agree with you, as is commonly the case. If a student can find a fabulous academic and financial fit, that’s ideal. It’s not about window decal glory or bragging rights. Or coming out of school with a lot of debt despite that well known name on the diploma.
I think some people exaggerate academic fit to be honest. While average SAT scores may vary significantly from school to school, the reality is that virtually any good-or-better college is going to have a subset of high achieving students with high scores. You don’t need a homogeneous student body of high achievers to be challenged… There are also honors programs, and various other perks awarded to high achieving students at non-elite schools.
I went to an “elite” grad school after “non-elite” undergrad and never once did I feel like I was underprepared for the material in grad school; I did fine. If it can work for me, I see so no reason why it couldn’t work for anyone else.
To me, an academic fit would include attending a school where students like to get together to talk about something philosophical, etc. While certainly not impossible to find anywhere, it may be less of the “culture” at a rah rah party school.
A friend said the reason you go to an elite private school is you learn the mannerisms of the upper and upper middle class. You learn to fit in and this gives you opportunities…if that is what you want.
@lookingforward 's post #26 is an example of the hypocrisy that is pointed out here on CC often. It doesn’t matter as long as it’s not my kid. Are you implying that your kid isn’t bright or driven? You say your kid would not have acquired “THAT” at your local state flagship. You went there? You work there? You personally know each professor?
Hypocrisy, sigh. It’s often pointed out one should read the darned posts. My complaint is against my own state U, where they were down to one prof in D1’s major interest (yes, she was driven to pursue this) - and he was set to retire after the following academic year and the U had announced they would not fund a replacement, not even an adjunct. (More than you need to know.) Her specialty was a subset of one of the majors where many kids (you only need a C hs average to get in) do sleepwalk. Yes, we checked with prof friends there about the quality of this dept (two were IN this dept and DH knew them professonally.) I’m a huge fan of families digging in to what a school does offer and not going by rep or other superficials. You can bet on this: had we lived in MI, WI, CA, VA, NC and many others, we absolutely would have been looking at the flagships or others strong in her program. But at the time she was applying, OOS costs and low finaid would not have cut it.
This was as far from the typical CC reliance on USNews to guide us as one can get. And, I’ve admitted the tour of our state school was, in fact, the best we had. But the match wasn’t there. Our state U is, btw, tops in 3+ fields, none of which she was interested in or qualified to pursue. I periodically work with last-year students in two of those depts and am blown away by them. But that wasn’t her arena.
@lookingforward I read your post. And your post #26 is not the same as your post #35.
We did not send her to her college for the prestige or some vague thing like superior networking or international name recognition. In fact, most LACs aren’t known to the wide swath of folks out there, no matter their ranking. We sent her for the actual semester to semester strength of the dept. I do believe more people should be looking at that (though so many kids don’t know their majors when they apply.) Her second choices hovered much, much lower in USNews. One was around the 50 mark, but again, had a fab dept, great profs really immersed in their work. I don’t need to explain it all, in any one post or thread. But we are happy with what she gained. As are many families, at whatever colleges turn out to really serve their kids and grow them.
Sort of a silly discussion. While we all accept there are exceptions to everything in life–of course it matters. Here is a simple fact: if you go to a top university, even the bottom half, goes on to rather productive lifes. Conversely, say at about 70% of state universities, about 40% will not even graduate. That in itself provides a rather lucid answer.
Are you comparing similar students between top universities and state schools? Selective colleges as a whole admit students with stronger academic backgrounds who are far less likely to fail out for academic reasons, more likely to be interested in advanced degrees, etc. While there are numerous exceptions, you are far more likely to find less academically successful students at less selective colleges.
A better question would be among those who were accepted to both the “state university” and the “top university” would there be a big difference in outcomes between those who chose to attend the state university and those that chose to attend the top university? The study that they referenced in the Atlantic article found “students who attended more selective colleges earned about the same as students of seemingly comparable ability who attended less selective schools.” Income is not the same as success, and there are numerous possible criticisms of the study, but the point is when you compare similar students at different colleges instead of the entire college population as whole the answer is not as obvious.