Is the location of university an important factor in finding a job?

<p>“Yeah, North Carolinians are unsophisticated.”</p>

<p>You really shouldn’t be that hard on yourselves.</p>

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<p>This is an unfair statement. They know their hoops!</p>

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<p>So??? Most oceanographers majored in the basic sciences (e.g. physics, chemistry, biology, geology, etc.) and/or mathematics in college. They didn’t specialize until grad school.</p>

<p>barrons,
My point was that students from the most selective colleges like the Ivies will have more geographic flexibility than those from a less selective environment. </p>

<p>I would also claim that the geographic source of the students at the Ivies and other selective privates is considerably more diverse than what one would find at a State U. These top privates will often have 60-70% of their students from regions distant from their campuses. By contrast, 69% of U Michigan’s undergrads are from Michigan and would be more likely to remain in the state or region (unless they took IBclass’s advice and moved to NC :slight_smile: ).</p>

<p>I remember reading that very few Wharton and Harvard grads go outisde the northeast to work. The value of the degree declines as you go west of the Delaware. I doubt they are anymore geo diverse than UW and UM grads.</p>

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<p>hawkette, that’s really not fair. Almost 50% of U-M living alums reside outside the Midwest, with the greatest concentrations in the West Coast and Northeast. Thats not bad for a “State U.”</p>

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<p>I didn’t know ch33s3h3ads could be so funny…</p>

<p>barrons- I guess you are considering “the northeast” as one state. I don’t think your statement is correct. It might be correct that the MAJORITY of Wharton and Harvard grads stay in the northeast, but there are many who go to other areas of the country. The value of the degree certainly does NOT decline as you go west of the Delaware. That is a stupid thing to say. You think people in Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle don’t respect those degrees? Someone near and dear to me just leap-frogged a number of other job applicants for a position in a southwestern city and his Ivy degree (non-Wharton) sure helped him get his foot in the door.</p>

<p>bc,
I thought you might be interested in the attached link on a story that was released today on Bloomberg. </p>

<p>[Texas</a> Gains Most People in 2008-09, U.S. Census Says (Update2) - Bloomberg.com](<a href=“Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg”>Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg) </p>

<p>[Population</a> Estimates](<a href=“http://www.census.gov/popest/states/NST-pop-chg.html]Population”>http://www.census.gov/popest/states/NST-pop-chg.html)</p>

<p>The US government measured population changes in all 50 states and the District of Columbia for the period between 7/1/08 and 7/1/09 and also provided data on the last decade. During the 2008-09 period, national population growth was +2.63 million. Over the last decade, the USA population grew by 25.6 million. </p>

<p>For the latest year, the state of Texas ranked 1st for population growth and parts of Texas (Dallas) even saw job growth during the teeth of the 2008 economic debacle when millions of Americans were being laid off. The South was the fastest growing region. </p>

<p>By contrast, Michigan ranked 51st out of 51 being measured. While the country’s population was growing by over 2.5 million people and all regions saw positive growth (including the Midwest), the state of Michigan was one of only two states to actually experience a decline in population (Maine was the other). </p>

<p>The 2008-09 experience continues the long-term trend of Americans preferring to live in the South and the West as over 13 million and 8 million people moved to these respective regions in the last decade. In percentage terms, some prominent states that grew rapidly were Arizona (+28.6%), Georgia (+20.1%), Texas (+18.8%), North Carolina (+16.6%), Florida (+16.0%), and California (+9.1%). I think you will find that those states were also among the leaders in job creation during the 2000-09 period.</p>

<p>And Michigan? Over the decade, its population expanded by a mere 0.3% or 31,235. That performance was dead last among the 50 states and DC. Its job growth over that period was negative and the worst in the USA. And the state continues to have the USA’s highest rate of unemployment at over 15%. </p>

<p>I repeat that students at the most selective colleges should be least affected by a state/regional economy, but rising tides such as we’ve seen in Texas and the South and West can lift a lot of boats while ebbing tides such as we’ve seen in Michigan can drain an area of people, jobs, money, energy, intellectual capital, etc.</p>

<p>tenis,
Are you going to stay in Michigan post-graduation? Given that you are in grad school at a school most noted for its grad schools, I wouldn’t expect you to be very limited in your ability to go almost wherever you want. </p>

<p>But think about the below average student finishing from U Michigan. Or think about the student finishing from Michigan State or Kalamazoo or Eastern Michigan or…How much geographic flexibility do they have and how many opportunities will they have? Of course, they can choose to move, but they are working from a position of weakness because wherever they go, the locals will prefer the locals, not to mention the fact that the student is less likely to have embedded resources in the new city to help them when they get there. </p>

<p>Again, I’m not directing my comment to the top students. I’m directing them to the lower half of the class. Even at a moderately selective school like U Michigan, that means over 13,000 undergrads. At Michigan State, it’s over 18,000 kids that make up the lower half of the school. Do you think those folks have the same opportunities as those coming out of U Michigan’s grad programs?</p>

<p>hawkette,
I thought you might be interested in a more sophisticated take on that same data, to be published in tomorrow’s NY Times:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/us/24census.html?hp[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/us/24census.html?hp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Here are some highlights:</p>

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<p>In short, except for Texas, the much-vaunted growth of the Sun Belt has now stalled out or in some cases is moving in reverse. Some of these states are continuing to show a small absolute growth in population due to natural increase and immigration from overseas, much of it undocumented and/or unskilled. But people are voting with their feet. Roughly as many people moved out of Florida (as measured by net net migration) as moved out of Michigan in 2008-09. </p>

<p>I’m not saying things are rosy in Michigan. I am saying your Sunbelt hype is living on fumes from last decade’s news. The present reality is different; the economies of many of these states are dead in the water. Maybe some will reverse themselves. But much of the growth in formerly high-growth places like Florida, Arizona, and Nevada was fueled by runaway real estate speculation. That bubble has now burst, and there’s not much underlying economic strength there. Other parts of the Sunbelt, notably the Carolinas, have been as heavily dependent on manufacturing as states like Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and those Sunbelt manufacturing economies have now also collapsed, producing unemployment rates that rival Michigan’s.</p>

<p>Fortunately, we have a national economy with free movement of workers—skilled or unskilled—across state borders. The nation’s great research universities perform several crucial roles here. First, they’re powerful economic engines in their own right, magnets for talent and incubators of technological innovations that often spawn new industries. That’s why metro areas like Ann Arbor, Madison, Columbus, and Minneapolis-Saint Paul continue to grow and produce high-wage, high-skill white collar jobs, even as the old industrial economies around them shrink. Same is true in North Carolina, to be sure, with the Research Triangle; but it remains to be seen how many banking jobs will remain in Charlotte, that other pillar of the north Carolina economy, once that industry is consolidated and streamlined. But what works for the Research Triangle also works elsewhere. </p>

<p>Second, our colleges and universities have always been a ticket up and out for young people whose life prospects would otherwise be bleak. That’s why half or more of Michigan’s alums live outside the Midwest. They come to Ann Arbor, gain some skills, make some contacts, get their ticket punched, and they’re gone to where the jobs are. What you fail to realize, hawkette, is that this has been happening in Michigan for at least the last 30 years, in some ways longer. Manufacturing employment has been shrinking at a phenomenal rate for many decades now. That goes back to the 1950s. Over that entire period Michigan, long one of the nation’s most manufacturing-dependent states, has perennially had one of the nation’s highest unemployment rates—and there have been times, like the early 1980s, when it was even higher than it is today. But Michigan has always had excellent public universities and still does to this day, even though the state legislature has cut back on its funding enormously beginning many, many years ago. The University of Michigan in particular found ways to make up for a shrinking pool of state dollars by going semi-private, building up a large endowment, opening its doors to more OOS students (and their tuition dollars), and building an enormous, and enormously effective, research capacity that brings in roughly a billion dollars a year, dwarfing the state’s financial role. And over those years the University has produced thousands and thousands of skilled, smart, capable graduates. Some have stayed; and by and large, they’ve done well for themselves. Many have left; and by and large, they’ve done well for themselves, too. There’s nothing new, here, really. That’s part of what great universities are for. It’s always been part of what they are for, and always will be. Harvard and MIT didn’t collapse when the New England manufacturing economy collapsed. The Universities of Michigan and Chicago won’t collapse with the collapse of the Midwest manufacturing economy, any more than Duke or UNC will collapse with the collapse of North Carolina’s manufacturing economy. You may wish it, but wishing doesn’t make it so.</p>

<p>“barrons- I guess you are considering “the northeast” as one state. I don’t think your statement is correct. It might be correct that the MAJORITY of Wharton and Harvard grads stay in the northeast, but there are many who go to other areas of the country. The value of the degree certainly does NOT decline as you go west of the Delaware. That is a stupid thing to say. You think people in Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle don’t respect those degrees? Someone near and dear to me just leap-frogged a number of other job applicants for a position in a southwestern city and his Ivy degree (non-Wharton) sure helped him get his foot in the door.”</p>

<p>No but they are not awed by it either. You have far fewer companies that make a practice of only recruiting at the Ivy schools and FAR more that are run by grads of the local state flagship or in the case of Chicago–the entire Big 10. I have actually worked in the major markets outside the northeast–Chicago, Atlanta, LA, Seattle, Denver, Austin and rarely ran into many Ivy grads and frequently ran into grads of UT, UGA, the Big 10, Udub, Boulder, etc. UW and UT are also among the top producers of major corporate CEOs.</p>

<p>Universities with the most CEO undergraduate alumni:
Harvard (private): 13
University of Wisconsin (public): 13
Stanford (private): 10
Princeton (private): 9
University of Texas (public): 9
Yale (private): 8
University of Missouri-Columbia (public)
University of Washington (public): 6
Cornell (private): 5
Duke (private): 5
Northwestern (private): 5
Ohio State (public): 5
U.S. Naval Academy (public): 5</p>

<p>Adjusting for enrollment size, HYPS >>> state flagships.</p>

<p>Adjusting for for general smarminess HYPS>>>>flagships</p>

<p>Adjusting for enrollment size, YP>Washington&Lee>H.
Stanford? Dunno. Adjusted for enrollment size, it was somewhere down past Northwestern and Davidson.
([WHERE</a> THE CEOs WENT TO COLLEGE A FORTUNE survey of the nation’s top bosses shows that the Ivies and Big Ten schools rank high. But wait! Little Johnny or Janie may want to consider Washington & Lee.](<a href=“http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1990/06/18/73671/index.htm]WHERE”>WHERE THE CEOs WENT TO COLLEGE A FORTUNE survey of the nation's top bosses shows that the Ivies and Big Ten schools rank high. But wait! Little Johnny or Janie may want to consider Washington & Lee. - June 18, 1990))</p>

<p>Well, that was a 1990 article anyway. According to a 2006 tally of the Fortune 50:
Texas,Harvard (3 each)>Duke (2)><a href=“%5Burl=http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1227055,00.html]Where%20the%20Fortune%2050%20CEOs%20Went%20to%20College%20-%20TIME[/url]”>47 other schools with 1 each</a></p>

<p>According to a USA Today tally of colleges attended by CEOs hired at Fortune 1000 firms in 2004, 2005:
Harvard College: 0
Yale College: 0
Princeton: 0
Stanford: 2
Cornell: 2
Texas: 3
Michigan: 3
([USATODAY.com](<a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2005-04-07-ceo-colleges.htm]USATODAY.com[/url]”>http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2005-04-07-ceo-colleges.htm)</a>)</p>

<p>I guess this means MT>C>S>>HYP ?<br>
Or do we want to concede that the sample sizes are too small to be meaningful?
Or even better, that these population outcomes have very small implications compared to your own personal efforts.</p>

<p>“I guess this means MT>C>S>>HYP ?
Or do we want to concede that the sample sizes are too small to be meaningful?
Or even better, that these population outcomes have very small implications compared to your own personal efforts.”</p>

<p>No, I like the first sentence of this paragraph. :-)</p>

<p>Bc,
I greatly enjoyed your post. It’s really funny. All the wonderful spinning and everything. I bet you could even sell the idea that Obama will expand health care coverage to 30 million people AND cut spending! All that was missing was musical accompaniment provided by Shostakovich. </p>

<p>Re Florida, I’m not sure what’s up, but Frey’s comments don’t jibe with the Excel data that is provided in my link. The table that I’m looking at shows that Florida actually gained 114,091 people in 2008-09 and over 2.5 million in the last decade. No question that the housing market there got waaaaay overbuilt and tourism took a major hit in the economic downturn, but regardless of what’s happened in the last year, the sun is still warm and shining and God’s Waiting Room will continue to take population share from the snowy tundra. </p>

<p>As for Texas, please stop linking articles from the NYT that say nice things about Texas. You’re going to make my Texas friends nervous. </p>

<p>Look, U Michigan is a good Midwestern state university that happens to be in a chronically economically depressed state. That’s the reality and it does have an impact on the job prospects for thousands of graduates annually. If it makes you feel better, then you keep on believing that the Sunbelt story is all hype and that the Brobdingnagian U Michigan is the center of the universe. But it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure the actuality.</p>

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<p>Hmmm. I see someone’s figured out how to use a search engine…</p>

<p>Anyway, I knew I’ve always liked that Washington & Lee more than those other “Wash U’s” (e.g. WUSTL, Eastern/Western/Central Washington Universities, etc.). </p>

<p>But you know that W & L is not a “state flagship,” right? Neither Nw nor Davidson are, for that matter…</p>

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<p>“Hired” CEOs /= Sitting CEOs. You guessed wrong…</p>

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<p>Smarm-y makes my heart warm-y…</p>

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<p>Thanks, I do try. And as long as it’s the season to be jolly, I should be happy to return the complement when you figure out how to make a balanced, nuanced argument that advances the discussion while avoiding these inane, ad hominem comments. </p>

<p>Now if you want to play at being the court jester, the Don Rickles insult comic of College Confidential, I suppose that’s fine too. There’s a software “mute” button for anyone bothered by it.</p>

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<p>Yes. And you know what a “non sequitur” is, right? I was focusing on the left side of your latest little inequality.</p>

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<p>As the hiring patterns change, it does take a while to cycle through the “legacies”.
“Between World War II and the early 1980s, just about every major company shopped for future CEOs in Cambridge, Mass., Princeton, N.J., or New Haven, Conn. That hasn’t been the case in recent executive suite shake-ups.”
([USATODAY.com</a> - Wanted: CEO, no Ivy required](<a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2005-04-06-cover-ceos_x.htm]USATODAY.com”>http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2005-04-06-cover-ceos_x.htm)) </p>

<p>But anyway, you are referring to a rhetorical “guess”.</p>