<p>this sums it up very nicely, don't you think to many parents/students have a very unhealthy obsession/ belief that only a handful of schools are of any value?
<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/surprises-attending-a-famous-university-2014-7">http://www.businessinsider.com/surprises-attending-a-famous-university-2014-7</a></p>
<p>He went to a state school, what does he know about anything?</p>
<p>Here’s the “truth” about Ivies and elite schools: they are good schools. </p>
<p>The article’s advice to slack off and network is probably fine if your goal is to be an entrepreneur, period. Other than that, not so good</p>
<p>I see no way in which the article supports either the title of the thread or the statements in the OP.</p>
<p>consolation, the article is not about slacking…it is about a reality check on what so many people think “top” schools and the students who attend are like.</p>
<p>The author of the article makes some valid points but expresses them in kind of a dumb way. I agree that networking can be very useful (perhaps even more in the humanities than in STEM). But while I can’t comment on Berkeley, my perception of Yale, both now and when I attended, is that it is full of really interesting and accomplished people–really, even more now than 30 years ago.</p>
<p>It does not matter, kid should go to the school that kid wants to go and parents can afford. Very simple. These are 4 most important years of a young adult life. Sending to Yale jsut for the sake of the name or sending to state public just for the sake of saving money is INCORRECT. Personal fit and affordability, I do not know how you can miss on this choice. My D. way back in HS, summed it up very nicely: “I will do fine at any place”…meanning, “might as well go where I feel I belong…”.</p>
<p>@sorghum:</p>
<p>He knows how to be successful in life, which is more than you know with your attitude. Personally, I think that anyone who puts down state school grads is an insecure loser (and I’m speaking as someone who graduated from a private Ivy-equivalent).</p>
<p>@Consolation:</p>
<p>Actually, networking and all those social skills stuff is useful pretty much anywhere in the business world, which is where most grads end up heading off to.</p>
<p>^I think you have missed sorghum’s sarcasm. At least that’s how I took it… </p>
<p>The individual writing the article graduated with a degree in EECS from UCBerkeley…the most prestigious, competitive, coveted degree there…which is comparable to the top EE/CS degrees from Stanford, MIT, Carnegie Mellon (ROI…return on investment wise)…and one can’t make similar assumptions when talking about the other Berkeley graduates who graduate with other non-engineering/CS degrees…</p>
<p>I can’t claim to know why people make threads like this one.</p>
<p>They will not persuade the would-be clergy of the Harvard-Yale-Princeton-Stanford-MIT Chapel to desist, and they will alienate students who aspire to or attend those schools for substantive reasons.</p>
<p>Thus, one perpetuates the elitism and defensiveness that she wants to quash.</p>
<p>Did you miss the last point:
</p>
<p>Most people value top tier schools for the network.</p>
<p>UC Berkeley, where the author attended, admits students based mostly on stats (despite its claims of being “holistic.”) It does not allow submission of LORs or Counselor recs, does not require or allow interviews, does not admit based on legacy or race, so it is not surprising that the author found his fellow classmates uninteresting. Being interesting is not an admissions criteria for Cal, but I believe it is for most of the other tippy top (private) colleges.</p>
<p>@Bay</p>
<p>Well, he said that the Stanford people said the same thing. <em>shrug</em></p>
<p>Most kids at HYPS will have hooks of some sort, but that doesn’t mean that they’re actually interesting intellectually or interesting in a I-wish-I-could-live-his-life kind of way or interested in the life of the mind (it seems that most of those HYPS kids are prestige-driven strivers just looking to get ahead).</p>
<p>One class below me in HS was a math genius who won national awards. A girl in my class won some big science competition thing. They both went to Harvard. Neither were terribly interesting to talk to.</p>
<p>The most interesting guy (in terms of life lived so far) from my HS class went to the big state flagship. He’s a mountaineer/marketer/author with an engineering background currently starting a whiskey distillery in a small Asian country.</p>
<p>Every school has networking opportunities. I’m sorry oldfort, but ‘most’ people may say networking as their cover reason. The honest real reason most people go to top tier schools is for the ego. Parents, students, teachers, shirt-tail relatives, friends all dote on the elite school student because they want to share in the perceived glory of the opportunity. They will always claim it is networking or some such, but it is honestly the ego. That is fine, if you want to spend the money on it. The truly gifted will shine wherever they go in whatever they do.</p>
<p>The reason I pointed out #4 was because writer of the article was saying there was benefit in going to a top tier school, not necessary for better education or be surrounded by more interesting people, but for networking. He wasn’t dissing top tier schools.</p>
<p>My kid probably would have shined very brightly at any school she chose to go, but if no one (from recruiting) was there to see it then what’s the point? Prior to the recruitment week, alumni from her school sponsored meet and greet events at their respective firms so students could meet their interviewers. It maybe “perceived glory of the opportunity,” but those events definitely gave my kid a leg up. </p>
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<p>Prove it. </p>
<p>
All I can say is wow.</p>
<p>A lot of people, and parents, are embarrassed to reveal they/their kid went to a top school.</p>
<p>And some apply for the quality of a certain department, and the teachers there.</p>
<p>There are interesting kids everywhere. At Harvard, and working in restaurants without any school at all. This discussion seems kind of silly.</p>
<p>“Interesting” is in the eye of the beholder. Someone who is a math genius and won national awards is pretty interesting to me, even if he is not an engaging conversationalist.</p>
<p>It is debatable how “interesting” a person who has lived only 18-21 years can actually be. But one thing you won’t find much of if at all, at HYP et al, is students who did nothing but their homework and watch TV for most of their lives. Maybe you don’t find many of those types of students at any college, but my sense is that you do.</p>
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<p>Could you spew any more empty extrapolations?</p>