Hmm, based on the folks I know, I wouldn’t agree with Stanford and Berkeley being known broadly as prestigious. Techies I know obviously know about Stanford’s status, but not other people that I know. As for Berkeley, if you ask people in my circle they’ll probably say “isn’t that the hippy school?”
Thanks for that @SJ2727. I might hit you up at some point. Right now she is looking at Strathclyde (has an online friend hoping to go there), UEA, Aberystwyth (safety), maybe Glasgow.
Work (mostly people with bachelor’s degree or higher) and sports (not everyone has a bachelor’s degree).
Why would Durham bring down Chapel Hill? Duke is much more “prestigious” than UNC, isn’t it?
@Schadret Not every person knows Berkeley, but worldwide (especially Asia and in STEM) it’s known as one of the best schools, especially for CS. In the US, Berkeley’s known as the #1 public university for academics, though LA’s been more popular in the general public’s perception.
But, finish the thought. Did everybody graduate from Stanford and Berkeley, and therefore they are not much of an ice-breaker, or is your area as diverse as Chapel Hill, NC?
The people whom I know their colleges graduated from varied mostly-public universities; Stanford and Berkeley graduates are only a small number of them (Berkeley graduates being somewhat larger in numbers than Stanford, because the school is larger).
Asking about your college is just not commonly a first question.
@ucbalumnus Very common question to ask HS Seniors and parents to ask others’ kids (if anyone’s Asian, you likely KNOW what I’m talking about) but that probably speaks more to the college mentality amongst college educated families than anything else.
Do your parents and their associates talk about their own colleges of attendance, as opposed to their kids’ colleges or prospective colleges?
Also, not every Asian college student is attending a high prestige college. Many in California attend local CSUs or community colleges. For example, Mission College is 42% Asian, and San Jose State University is 36% Asian.
Yeah, I get the feeling that the answers are tilted a little bit because this is the Parents Forum and most of the adult’s social interactions are filtered through the experience of raising kids. It’s a little different for the elderly and the young. 
I live in Silicon Valley. There are lots of Cal and Stanford graduates here locally, but it’s a very diverse area. I know grads from UCSD, ASU, UCSC, ND, UMich, Oberlin, USF (SF), UoP, IIT (India), etc. Just to name a few.
Well, no, not really. It depends on the program. Both are very good schools. UNC excels at some things (their school of Public Health is #1 or #2 in the country depending on where you look) and Duke excels at some things.
You missed the context for my comment, which was the per capita percentage of advanced degrees in the city/town population. Durham is a good bit larger city than Chapel Hill (and Carrboro) and the concentration of advanced degrees is less in Durham by itself vs Chapel Hill by itself, so lumping them together brings down Chapel Hill’s percentage.
In North Carolina, I don’t think anyone would be more wowed by a degree from Duke vs a degree from UNC. They are both good schools as is NC State.
Nationally? I don’t know. Worldwide I think they both stack up.
To go back to the original question. Yes, I do think there is some level of regional prestige. I think it really depends on the field the degree-holder is going into whether having Harvard on the resume vs Texas or UNC will matter.
@ucbalumnus Mainly kids’ college and prospective colleges of attendance, given that many parents are college-educated and work at local tech companies. Can be annoying when it feel like many parents (who your parents know and you probably know through their kids) start asking you about college plans once you become a high school student. My high school itself fields from two different parts of the surrounding area, so ~70% actually goes to college IIRC, though my HS has the highest # of T20 admits and NMS (it’s not a large state, but a decently sized school----2000+ students.)
Well, to be clear, it’s not the very first question New Yorkers typically ask. Assuming they’re genuinely interested in forming a friendship and not just passing the time to be polite, the rank order would go something like:
-
What neighborhood do you live in (or, more specifically, “What’s your subway stop?”)
-
What do you do for a living?
-
Where are you from originally?
Personally, I find question number two far more intrusive (and in certain ways less interesting) than anything regarding where they went to college. But, many New Yorkers would disagree with me. And, as I posted upstream what people do often leads to a conversation about where they learned it.
Also, the subject of college doesn’t always have to be as direct as “Where did you go?” If someone strikes me as particularly brilliant or well-versed in something, I have no problem asking,
- “What was your major in college?”
Bingo.
^When I was a young professional working in NYC, a typical conversation at a social gathering with strangers who were also predominantly young professionals often started with what you did and who you worked for, then moving on to which grad/professional school you attended and then maybe where you went undergrad. In that environment/social circle, I am sure some of it was social signaling but I think it was just as much to seek commonalities of interests or experience. Once I got into my 30’s, questions about your profession or maybe grad school were still pretty common, but not so much undergrad unless someone wanted to brag about it. Now living in flyover land, only rarely do people talk about their college. People may ask about kids’ colleges, but even then the assumption is that they are going to one of the state U’s or community college.
I generally find it inappropriate to ask people where they went to college. There’re certainly some exceptions. Even in a job interview, the interviewer presumably already knew which colleges the interviewee graduated from. On the other hand, some people like to give strong “hint” where they went to schools because they, and they believe others, do make assumptions about someone based on his/her schools.
I live in MA and I have never been asked where I went to college in a social setting or even at a work related networking reception. I think the only person that knows where I went to school, other than my coworkers and family is the mailman who delivers all the alumni mailings.
Common questions here - who do you work for, what do you do, etc.
So, wait, are ALL of you here because you are simply helping your kids get into college? You have no other vested interests (in the subject of higher education in America and the world?) I find that hard to believe. 
I live in the DC area. Where I went to college doesn’t seem to be a common question. But I mostly hang out with fellow parents and soccer people. I regularly wear T-shirts/Sweatshirts with my college or my kids’ collleges on them and will sometimes get “Did you go to XX” followed by variants of “I went/applied/know someone there”.
Both schools in question are CTCL schools.
Even though where one went to college isn’t a common topic in most places, there are certain presumptions some people make based on one’s college, especially in some circles. I’ve witnessed first hand one’s college became a key factor in hiring (in one instance only graduates for a handful of schools were considered for practical purposes).
College “prestige” isn’t much different from product branding. Many of us select product, consciously or unconsciously, based on our familiarity and the perception that it would meet at least some minimum standard of quality, even though it may or may not be the best quality product in that category. Our selection of these “prestigious” brands reinforces their “prestige”.
However, as @blossom pointed out, too many colleges are “highly selective” these days and the “prestige” based on the selective process alone doesn’t guarantee a good final product, because many of them lack a uniform and rigorous process for their product.