<p>'Gee, thanks for the reassurance! Here we have been worried that S's totally impractical degree would lead him straight to starvation lane!'</p>
<p>Oh come on Marite don't short change your son's future. A math degree from H will land him at any place that requires higher end math knowledge - hedge funds, algorithm development companies like google, gambling companies like IGT, WMS gaming and so on.</p>
<p>
[quote]
If you work in high tech in Silicon Valley, you likely make over $100,000 no matter which school you attended. Your school may make a difference when searching for your first job (good tech schools are favored), but after that nobody here cares (speaking as a sometime tech hiring manager).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And many don't make enough to afford to buy a house they'd want anyway in that area....</p>
<p>Here's a link to the full text of the article that doesn't require registration:
<a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/search/ci_7578047%5B/url%5D">http://www.mercurynews.com/search/ci_7578047</a></p>
<p>My header should read "Not sure what the Ivies have to do with it." I messed up this post royally. Sorry.</p>
<p>Also, from some of the sideline stories not in the main article:</p>
<p>"The Pac-10 is the dominant athletic conference among valley CEOs, with at least 22 undergraduate degrees, while the Big-10 is a distant second with 13."</p>
<p>"Only 1 of the CEOs has three degrees."</p>
<p>"The 116 CEOs who earned their undergraduate degrees in the United States chose taxpayer-funded public universities over private colleges by a 2:1 ratio."</p>
<p>Some top schools in terms of how many CEOs received degrees there:
Stanford - 17
UC Berkeley - 13
MIT - 8
Harvard - 7
UC Davis - 6
Princeton - 5
Oregon State - 5
Arizona State - 4
UCLA - 4
Carnegie Mellon - 4
San Jose State - 4
Wisconsin - 4
Illinois - 4</p>
<p>Only 145 CEOs (out of 250 possible) were included in the survey "because some companies do not post such information and didn't respond to queries."</p>
<p>I think the originally cited article's headline writer was out to lunch on this one, BedHead. Unless one imagines all those disappointed Ivy aspirants may have to console themselves with Stanford, UCB, and MIT (non-Ivy = chopped liver?) acceptances come spring. Now I'm really confused. Two of the eight Ivies made the list. But wait! Another sidebar article notes the degrees held are overwhelmingly technical, not exactly the strong suit of the Ivies. Still, one-quarter are in "other" fields like finance. Are the Ivies actually over- or under-represented, considering the chopped-liver schools are pretty spiffy in the business disciplines themselves?</p>
<p>This is all too much for a CC cognoscente to bear. ;)</p>
<p>^^^^</p>
<p>Yeah, if one looks at the CEOs in particular, the headline as well as the set-up of the article (thought up by a Stanford guy, run by a Harvard guy) is actually very much off the mark. When it comes to the VC world, there is much more of a concentration there, though, and that is something that holds more.</p>
<p>Also, I had agreed with the following poster about the grad/undergrad statement, and that doesn't hold up either, if you examine the data. For instance, it's a fairly even match in terms of the number of Berkeley undergrads/grads who are CEOs. </p>
<p>
[quote]
My point was that it's a little silly to suggest that state universities are more important there than Stanford or Harvard. Silicon Valley as we know it was created by people from those schools, and to a lesser extent Berkeley, MIT, and Cal Tech -- all elite universities. But: grad students, not undergrad.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Mudder's Mudder: The clear pecking order of CC cognoscente is indeed thrown off....</p>
<p>Oi. The VCs are way deeply Ivied.</p>
<p>And Stanford.</p>
<p>Wow, this article was so surprising. I'm honestly floored to find out that the, oh, let's say 30ish great public schools (each of which is big) turned out more CEOs than the 8 small Ivies. I couldn't have figured out that likelihood with a pocket calculator.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Seriously, what's up with this continuing "yeah, but the Ivies aren't THAT good" thing? The Ivies are great. A lot of top public schools are also great. Why can't that be enough? Why are some people always putting the Ivies on a pedestal, and others always trying to knock them off? Really, who cares?</p>
<p>The parents who will fork over $100K difference.</p>
<p>^^touche'!</p>
<p>
[quote]
Seriously, what's up with this continuing "yeah, but the Ivies aren't THAT good" thing? The Ivies are great. A lot of top public schools are also great. Why can't that be enough? Why are some people always putting the Ivies on a pedestal, and others always trying to knock them off? Really, who cares?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yeah, and I think a big point of some of the posters are that the Ivies are sort of an irrelevancy, except for a headline and a facile set-up. Some of the IL schools number among many schools, both public and private, that have fed the ranks of Silicon Valley. That's all. But this does go against conventional wisdom, particularly here on this site, so it's natural that people would want to tear down a sacred cow.</p>
<p>99cent--but they're not the ones who keep bringing the subject up. I agree with 1in42, if it's really no big deal, why can't some people let it go?</p>
<p>Yeah. The parents who are making the decision between publics and Ivies for their kids aren't the ones hopping around crowing about CEO education statistics left and right. They're the ones doing the research and figuring out if the fit is worth it. It's everyone else that wastes all their time on this idiocy.</p>
<p>Again lets simplify the discussion. The future leaders in any segment of the economy are those people who are most talented and driven. It matters little where they went to college. Many happen to have attended highly selective private colleges and many happen to have attended public universities.</p>
<p>Talent and individual initiative seizes the day.</p>
<p>"Talent and individual initiative seizes the day."</p>
<p>well said. It is not other way around. Ivies or top schools don't guaranty talents or initiatives.</p>
<p>Back in post #5, JHS wrote:</p>
<p>"Finally, the article doesn't exactly contradict the notion that a lot of the CEOs have Harvard MBAs, since it only talks about undergrad degrees, and, yes, HBS does accept non-Ivy students."</p>
<p>However, this isn't true. The article does not only talk about undergrad degrees. Some of the comments on its statistics include just undergraduate degrees (and when that is the case, it says so); but when it lists how many attended a particular school, for example, both the undergraduate and graduate schools that the CEOs attended were considered.</p>
<p>"A vast majority of HYP graduates are both very talented and have received a wonderful education which virtually guarantees post graduate success if this is what they strive for."</p>
<p>Let's try this statement- The vast majority of students accepted into a public flagship honor's program are both very talented and have recieved a wonderful education which virtually guarantees post graduate success if that is what they strive for. Sound right?</p>
<p>My D's teacher graduated from an Ivy. She makes 42K a year. I mean... if it is all about the money...</p>
<p>I'm pulling the HYP applications for Stanford and UC Berkley. Why go second rate.. go top shelf.</p>