Perception of prestige is what society imposes on you after your sincerity has been compromised. Resist it as long as you can.
Merc- if your comment is directed at me, thank you for the chuckle.
For July 2013 Michigan Bar Exam-
Thomas M. Cooley: 43 percent passed, 57 percent failed.
University of Michigan: 94 percent passed, 6 percent failed.
I doubt sincerity has anything to do with it. One of these law schools is in the top ranked “prestige groupings” in the country, and the other is in the bottom grouping. Got it?
@blossom: Your post #141 was a helpful assessment based on your extensive experience, so my subsequent comment wasn’t intended to detract from your contribution in any way. I really could have inserted my post anywhere along this thread.
I’d say, however, that based on the figures you provided, the University of Michigan Law School is in a high “quality grouping,” and that would be one of the bases on which I would repect the school.
I wouldn’t assume that just because a thread is long means that the topic of hand is one of importance as opposed to one of interest.
Btw, “Got it?” Were you trying to be harsh? If so, I’m sorry you felt the need.
You are right. People who think “prestige matters” have a vested interest in making others believe it does, too. If they have invested effort and money into helping their kids get into prestigious schools, they don’t want them to end up competing side by side for jobs or grad school admissions against students from “lesser” programs. They want their investment to have paid off with a guaranteed “edge” in life. So it behooves them to reiterate the importance of an elite degree at every turn.
People who don’t “believe in prestige” based on themselves or their kids doing well without degrees from prestigious schools (or having a degree from one yet not seeing a perceptible advantage in their own outcomes) are comfortable sharing their experiences and reassuring others that there is no One Right Way to be successful. With all the pressure some families experience over college admissions, trying to persuade them that all is not lost if their kid has to go to the local state school or a liberal arts college few have heard of seems to be a good use of a forum whose purpose is to help people make smart decisions about higher education.
I would agree that prestige is highly regionally dependent. In NM, a lot of people think New Mexico Tech is THE COLLEGE to go to, when while it is decent, it’s not as spectacular as some would have you believe.
mfamum, this comment as well as several in another thread dismissing “directional college airheads” leads me to believe you are still in high school.
People in the real world do not sort themselves by where they went to college. I’m sorry to burst your bubble.
Mfamum, you’re a bit confused. It’s the UNsophisticated who think such things as “UPenn grads never associate with Penn St grads” and such. Sophisticated people know that there are fields in which prestige matters and fields in which it matters less and fields in which it matters not at all. Sophisticated people know that different schools are regarded differently in different parts of the country. It’s the rubes who think there is a small list of prestigious schools and being part of the Ivy League conference confers special magical dust.
And this isn’t sour grapes. I have a degree from a top 20, as does my husband, and my kids are each at top 20 schools. So, no, I’m not justifying East Bumble U at all.
Sophisticated people also know that where someone went to college is not what defines them.
Where I live the rube-snobs don’t care where you went to undergrad–it’s where you got your PhD that matters.
@sally305: The only “vested interest” I see here so often is that if the “conventional” pecking order is not working “my way”, then it either doesn’t exist or it’s not justifiable (e.g. it’s regional and provincial). But in any case, It’s silly to think that a discussion like this would change how the reality works, so IMO, posters who are carrying out their “secrete agenda” here are fooling themselves.
I care about my kids going to excellent schools. Whether or not Joe Q Public has heard of them is irrelevant. I want to buy classic, timeless, well made clothing. Whether it is made by a brand that most people recognize is beyond the point. Prestige, by definition, is related to “in the eyes of others.” Excellent is an inherent quality that is true even if no one else knows about it. Now, in the US, most prestigious schools are indeed excellent, but the reason to go there isn’t the prestige, it’s the excellence IMO. The prestige is just the icing on top.
If applications to Harvard dropped by 90% and Goldman Sachs stopped coming to campus, it wouldn’t make the education one iota less excellent.
For some people, the most prestigious thing you can do is make $50 mm a year and live like Jordan Belfort in the Wolf of Wall Street with yachts and luxuries. For another social class, prestige is living on a beachfront property in Maine with deliberately hand-me-down aesthetics because people who really have it don’t need to show it. For still others, prestige is that you have your PhD and you live in a somewhat ramshackle house with books spilling out all over with a front porch where you entertain grad students and think deep thoughts. Each of these people has their own definition of prestige.
"The only “vested interest” I see here so often is that if the “conventional” pecking order is not working “my way”, then it either doesn’t exist or it’s not justifiable (e.g. it’s regional and provincial). "
Who here has said that there aren’t industries or social classes where prestige doesn’t matter? Of course there are. Of course I’m not getting into Goldman Sachs or clerking for the Supreme Court from East Bumble U.
What we object to is the notion that the only places that do or should matter are those places where *one particular definition of prestige matters.
Benley, if the true “conventional pecking order” still counted for anything I should get points for having my ancestors come to this country in 1633 and having a signer of the Declaration of Independence (who was also the first governor of a New England state) in my family background. Where a modern-day student attends college is not the determinant of his or her life trajectory. Nor is any other single factor.
To me, blossoms post about what law school graduates pass the bar is significant. For UG in engineering, or accounting, I’d like to know per cent who graduates. I can see differences in psych grad schools about which ones have higher numbers passing the national exams.
If those Ivy graduates want to associate with the friends of my son who went to a state flagship that is less well thought of in its state than is Penn State, I guess they’ll just have to sacrifice and work as developers in some of the top tech companies, or go to medical school or Ivy League law schools. No one at Bain, though.
The ones I work with do 
And I don’t live/work in NYC or Chicago.
This one cracks me up. I skimmed but couldn’t find where it originated, but it had to originate out of the mouths of babes. OMG young people don’t REALLY think this is the way the world works do they?
For what it’s worth, the original quote was posted by someone who at least claims to be the parent of a college student, not a student herself. But, ahem, you never know if it’s just another bridge-dwelling creature…