<p>I think there's still a great deal of inconsistency among the posters on this thread about what kind of "prestige" we're talking about. Let's take Penn as a sample case. If we're talking about impressions among academics, top employers, and people who are looking at top colleges, sure, Penn goes on the list. If we're talking about the guy next door, or your barber, or your cousin who's going to the State U., they won't know that Penn is part of the Ivy League, that it is a private university, or even that it is different from Penn State.
Also, you have to distinguish between schools that are household names because of their reputation for academic excellence, and those that are know because of sports. I think Notre Dame and Duke are really in the latter category for the guy next door.
Finally, about the service academies: I assure you that in the working world, they are not considered a joke--employers are very impressed by somebody who went to one of these academies, and expect them to be good employees. Of course, that may not be because of excellence in academics, per se, but because the employers think it says something about character and leadership potential.
So, again, nationwide, guy-next-door, reputation for academic excellence: HYPSM, maybe Columbia. And maybe not Stanford.</p>
<p>Sorry to the Berkeley people, but in the Northeast, the lack of top notch public schools skews people against most publics. Most people think of Berkeley, UVA, etc as just another large state school.</p>
<p>why are we pussyfooting around the subject? Prestige=class=wealth=upper class. Tempered by smarts, but wealth nonetheless. Most wealthy people don't have to worry about repaying loans when they get out of college and can therefore afford to go into medicine, law, theoretical science and other endeavors that serve society but don't necessarily pay for themselves immediately. They throw in a little extra cash for the working classes to fill the seats that they themselves can't because society's need is always going to outstrip the ability of the upper class to replenish itself. But, for the most part, higher education in America has always been about catering to the whims of the rich. My list shadows the old Social Register with some corrections for regionality:
HYP
Stanford
MIT
Dartmouth
Brown
Williams
Penn
Amherst
Caltech
Pomona
Swarthmore
Wesleyan
Wellesley
Columbia
Vassar
Cornell
Northwestern
Notre Dame
Georgetown
Chicago
Duke
UVA
Rice
Davidson
Emory
Vanderbilt
UT-Austin</p>
<p>I think the dimension that Hunt brings up is an important one: the perception of prestige among those individuals THAT MATTER -- namely, those individuals/companies that are in a position to offer you a job or admission into post-graduate education.<br>
Who cares if the man on the street thinks that Penn State is better than PENN because he assumes PENN is a community college? Who cares if your neighbor confuses U of C with UIC? Who cares if your distant relative on the east coast believes that BC is better than Berkeley? Because if that were the case, then it's quite obvious that these people aren't exactly the types of people who you'd go to look for employment -- they simply aren't read into how schools stack against each other nationally due to their regional biases... precisely why I personally believe the PA exists -- to act as a counterweight to those people in the NE who (incorrectly) believe that Penn State is a notch below HYPSM or those in the south who (incorrectly) believe Baylor or Tulane are as good as Michigan or Berkeley.</p>
<p>calicartel,
Sorry to say it, but I think you've fallen into the trap of focusing on the institution rep among academicians and not on what is important to employers. Furthermore, I think you are probably underrating places like Baylor and Tulane (which has a student profile very similar to, if not slightly stronger, than U Michigan) and the graduates that they produce. </p>
<p>As an institution, UC Berkeley might be better than Baylor or Tulane (particularly in research activity), but the students that an employer sees coming out of Baylor or Tulane are often pretty darn good and every bit as competitive as the student coming out of UCB. An employer’s evaluation is not driven by the PA of a school-instead, he/she is interested in the graduates that it produces, how smart they are, and how effectively they can learn and perform the work required for the position and whether they can work on their own and constructively with others. </p>
<p>Whether it is a student from UC Berkeley, Baylor, Tulane, Texas Christian or even Tyler Community College, the employer is hiring the student, not the school, and the employer knows that sometimes the most effective employees can come from very unheralded places. </p>
<p>If you think this is not true, then pretend you are interviewing students from Baylor, Tulane, and UC Berkeley. Now try to put yourself in the shoes of the following twenty Dallas-based firms (all among the city’s largest public companies and largest employers, but I am sure that there are many others you could choose as well). </p>
<p>Exxon Mobil
EDS
American Airlines
JC Penney
Kimberly Clark
Texas Instruments
Burlington Northern
DR Horton
Dean Foods
Centex
Texas Utilities
Radio Shack
Affiliated Computer Services
Brinker
Neiman Marcus
Michael Stores
Trammell Crow
Haggar
La Quinta
Rent-a-Center
Zale
Perot Systems</p>
<p>Do you really think that the people running these companies care that UC Berkeley has a high PA and Baylor and Tulane do not? </p>
<p>(And if you think that the folks who run these companies don’t matter, then it’s no point having further discussion on this.)</p>
<p>Don't be sorry to say it -- you're entitled to your own opinion. I myself would say that you've fallen into the trap of too heavily weighting local/regional reputations. I believe the purpose of the PA score is to counteract the overinflation of these local/regional perceptions -- to act as a standardized score, if you will.
It may be that those Dallas-based employers would equally value a Baylor or Tulane grad versus a Berkeley grad but you're forgetting one of the realities of recruiting (especially for undergraduates) -- that oftentimes, they are for specific regions. OF COURSE these companies will heavily pull for schools in the south -- yes, there are quality schools down there with quality graduates but ALSO because generally, the graduates want to stay in the area. I wouldn't be surprised if many of these companies don't even show up at CAL's recruiting fairs -- because 1) they historically haven't been successful in luring people from temperate and beautiful CA to the muggy/humid south, or 2) on the whole, west coast people generally prefer to stay on the west coast. Don't forget that once a regional school has an installed base at some of the companies in the area, those schools are pretty much locked into the career center for life -- even over other schools that are generally better regarded.
And yes, I believe there are superstars at EVERY campus across the country. But these people are exceptions at their school (to include TCU or Tyler Community College or wherever) -- and exceptions don't make the rule.
I think another way to look at your list of recruiting companies is to examine WHY they recruit at the schools that they do. You have a fairly solid list of companies up there but seriously: Zale, Brinker, Rent-a-Center, Radio Shack, Affiliated Computer Services? Perhaps they recruit at Baylor, Tulane, etc. not because they believe those schools are on equal footing with the HYPSMs of the country but because they know that they would actually be successful in hiring them?<br>
Maybe it's just my reasoning skills or poor memory (or both) but I've never heard any of my classmates from those schools mention ANY of those companies on the short list of places they'd like to work.</p>
<p>To give you an example, if I'm running a smaller, regional company in southern California and I'm looking to hire some people, you're damn right I wouldn't be recruiting at Harvard, Yale, or even Stanford, UCLA, Berkeley, USC to look for employees. I would be at SDSU or Long Beach State or Cal State LA. Why? Because:
1) I know my hit rate for adequate new-hires would be solid at these "other" schools -- that my ROI on my recruiting efforts would be much better there.<br>
2) Because I know that there is a range of talent that would be "good enough" at a company like mine -- that I don't need a nuclear engineering grad from CalTech (the high end of the range) to do well at my company.
3) I know I don't have the monetary resources to meet the compensation demands of the graduates of the "top" schools.
Just because a company recruits at a school doesn't NECESSARILY mean that they believe the graduates there are the best. The flip side of recruiting is that just like college grads are looking for jobs, the companies are looking for employees. Just as a college grad applies for McKinsey or Goldman Sachs and isn't successful and so must look for slightly less prestigious places to work, so must rapidly expanding big companies who aren't successful in making offers to graduates from top schools.</p>
<p>UCBChemEGrad,
I think you are confusing my lack of kneeling at the altar of conventional academia-world thinking as somehow slamming your college. I'm not-UC Berkeley is a terrific school. What you are missing is that there are also some pretty excellent students elsewhere, including at schools like Baylor and Tulane (have you ever met a graduate of either and have you ever been to Dallas?). </p>
<p>One of the problems with CC is the absolute refusal to give any credit to those schools that are not in the "In Group" for academia. I suggest you learn a little more about these schools and the hiring patterns and preferences of Dallas employers before you go labeling my comments as "silly." If you look into this a little more, I think you will find that your hierarchical perspective is misapplied in this situation. </p>
<p>For example, Baylor has had some grads do pretty well in the world of business (eg, current Hewlett Packard CEO Mark Hurd, John Baugh, who founded Sysco, Sid Richardson who is a major oil and real estate player in Texas and, just to show it’s not all about business, let’s not forget Willie Nelson was a Baylor grad). The point is not that UC Berkeley is not a great college-the point is that it does not have a monopoly on the brains and the talent and employers see and understand this. </p>
<p>Ultimately, you will find that the value of the undergraduate degree (from nearly everywhere) is relatively low in the professional world and especially after the first job as from then on, it is about performance on the job and not prestige. Work for a few years in the real world (and particularly in an area outside of California like Texas) and you will find that the greater value of the UC Berkeley undergraduate degree may be not in the name of the school for its undergraduate prowess, but in cheering on your Bears in the Pac 10 football race.</p>
<p>cali,
It may surprise you, but I agree with 95% of what you are saying and explains why a lot of the hiring is local. Small to medium size businesses are great places for a young student to get great operating experience before going back to graduate school (MBA or otherwise). Still, I think you are underrating the quality of experience one can have a public company like Zale, Brinker et al. If you are doing something substantive in any of these companies, the business lessons can be enormously valuable for the balance of your career.</p>
<p>Yes, I have been to Dallas and Houston...I work for a major oil company.</p>
<p>I can't say I've met graduates from Baylor or Tulane, but I've met plenty from Oklahoma, Colorado, UT-Austin, Rice and Texas A&M. One of the smartest persons I have met has a degree from Texas Tech. And you're right, it really doesn't matter where you get your degree. However, a degree from a well known (prestigious) institution will open more doors for you nationally.</p>
<p>^ yea, I dont think anyone can disagree theres a difference in oppurtunity from a Princeton graduate and a CUNY graduate</p>
<p>Still the difference isn't as great as people think after several years in the workforce or after going to grad school.</p>
<p>^ Totally agree. For your first couple of jobs, yes. After that, the college becomes a footnote to your resume.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think you overrate its power for undergraduate education outside of those areas and particularly in non-academic circles.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Whether the prestige is coming from its grad schools or not is irrelevant to this discussion, I think. General prestige is for the overall institution. Hell, I know plenty of people (adults, even) who don't know the difference between grad and undergrad.</p>
<p>rootbeercaesar,
I don't think anyone is drawing any comparisons quite as draconian as you mention, but I think that the UC example is instructive. UC Berkeley is clearly an excellent state university with a superb reputation in many areas of the country and perhaps most strong in engineering circles. However, when its students go to interview in a place like Houston or Dallas, the value of that brand is not as powerful and the Texas-based employers are open to hiring students from more local area colleges like the ones UCBChemeGrad mentioned (OK, CO, U Texas, Rice, Texas A&M, Texas Tech). I think we would all agree that, in this bunch, only Rice has the consistently high student quality to match UC Berkeley, but that does not mean that there aren’t plenty of students at these other schools who are also very, very good and very, very smart. Employers know tahat and thus don’t feel obliged to have to go to all of the “prestige” schools to recruit. Plus they are in or close to Texas and have contacts and connections and alumni pulling strings for them in their job quests. Such embedded advantages would not exist for most students coming from outside Texas even if it is from a highly respected college. </p>
<p>This is not to say that the UC Berkeley student won't win a job over students from the local schools, but it is far from a foregone conclusion. The name of the school might get one the interview, but after that it is up to the individual and the system in place at the firm and industry that that he/she is attempting to enter. That is why and how students from these “lesser prestige” colleges also find their way into these companies. </p>
<p>kyledavid,
I think that your familiarity with UC Berkeley clouds your perception of how employers in other regions of the country see the school, not to mention how much the man on the street knows about the school. Employers that I know respect the school and the name, but the undergraduate student body is not national and there is not a great distribution of UCB grads all over the country. With 94% in-state students, this is not surprising to me as most of these students remain in California and the West where the school clearly has a wonderful reputation. As for the man on the street, I’m not even sure that people always realize that UC Berkeley is also California. With UCLA, there is no confusion as that school’s name has been in the sports pages for decades and LA is in the name, but Cal does not have that history, although the name Berkeley might, eg, in connection with the various movements of the 60s and 70s. In academic circles, no one has this problem, but if you ask the man on the street in Philadelphia or in Cincinnati or in Memphis, I think you might be surprised at the confusion. And as for the so-called people in the know that have been referenced frequently in this thread, I suspect that they know the difference between the undergrad and the graduate programs. </p>
<p>Anyway, these are just my personal perceptions and we may disagree, but please know that I am not trying to put the school down. I know UC Berkeley and its students well, have been on its campus literally scores of times, and am a big fan of the school as the premier public institution in the West.</p>
<p>^ I thought this thread was about prestige:</p>
<p>
[quote]
premier public institution in the West
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The USNWR ranks Berkeley as the top public institution in the nation.</p>
<p>The Shanghai Jiao Tong University survey ranks Berkeley as the #4 university in the world.
<a href="http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2007/ARWU2006_Top100.htm%5B/url%5D">http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2007/ARWU2006_Top100.htm</a></p>
<p>You need to go to a more definitive source versus "the man on the street".</p>
<p>Usnews is ranking undergrad. Shanghai is ranking grad. Not the same animal</p>
<p>
[quote]
Willie Nelson was a Baylor grad
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Wow! That's an upstanding individual.</p>
<p>Calicartel is correct in his assessment. It is fairly common knowledge that people who come from a top school...not even from just HYP...let us say, from Cornell, or Dartmouth...and want to work in Dallas or Houston, will be eagerly interviewed, and all things being equal, will get the job over grads coming from those schools with the lower prestige factor. </p>
<p>Hawkette: If the companies that you mention were overrun with applicants from the top 20 or so schools, sorry to say (and perhaps this is a commentary on our prestige-oriented society), the grads coming from the other more "local" schools would have a great deal of difficulty competing. The reason these grads get the jobs in Dallas, for example, is because so few grads from top schools are looking for employment in those companies mentioned. And this is certainly not to denigrate the intelligence of kids coming from those schools. I do realize that lots of kids want to stay in their own regions for college. My son turned down two ivies because he intensely disliked their locations. So I do understand that there are reasons why lots of smart kids make the decisions they do. But this does not really matter to employers in these areas, who want what they want, and will not settle, because they don't have to.</p>
<p>Anyone who wants to compete in the Northeast, or in California, has to been prestige conscious, because so many bright and talented grads from the top schools converge upon these regions, making competition very tough. This is not true in many other areas of the country, where relatively fewer top grads wish to live.
If one could visit top investment banks in New York, for example, do you think they would be filled with Baylor grads, or grads from the top 20? Sure those other Dallas based companies have lots of smart kids from the more local schools. But those companies are not attracting the kids from the top schools in any meaningful number. In my opinion, Hawkette, you are looking at an outcome, and not understanding the reasons behind that result.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think that your familiarity with UC Berkeley clouds your perception of how employers in other regions of the country see the school
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Ah, that's a bit of an assumption. I'm familiar with it, of course, in part because I live in California, but I was born and raised for a good portion of my childhood in the Midwest (northern Illinois), so I'm familiar with the prestige of midwestern universities, too. Even there, though, Berkeley has a name among the others. I asked my mother, who spent 40 years of her life there, and she knew Berkeley's name in part because of the 'college week' on game shows (wherein college students would compete on Jeopardy, etc.) and because of the constant references to it in movies -- Berkeley researchers in Phenomenon with John Travolta, PhD graduates in Legally Blonde, etc.</p>
<p>Cal's research reputation is very solid -- no doubt about that... but let's be frank, when most people think of Cal for undergrad, they think of tree hugging hippies like the ones living in the trees in front of their football stadium this weekend to protest the building of Cal's new athletic facility...</p>
<p>"Prestige" isn't exactly what pops into mind like it does with HYP or Stanford.</p>
<p>maybe not quite up with hyp and stanford but coming from florida berkeley's name does carry quite a bit of respect.... some may think of hippies but most people also think that you must be pretty darn bright also....ps the people in the trees weren't Berkeley students...most employers and people who aren't totally ignorant would know that.</p>