What is your criteria for a college/university to be considered PRESTIGIOUS? (PhDs, reviews)
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First of all, your ideologies are simply incorrect. With the exception of the tippy-top jobs out there, prestige has far less of an impact to one's career success than you tend to believe. I'm not sure what ivory tower institution you're writing your comments from, but you should step out and get some fresh air.
Second, the basis of your argument revolves around intelligence, for which I assume you're talking about the perceived intelligence of a student based on the results of his/her standardized test scores. GPA could be a proxy for intelligence as well, but not really - most people agree that GPA can be inflated through "brute force" effort and perserverence.
Therefore, we come to the conclusion that the SAT/ACT is the agreed upon proxy for judging a person's intelligence. My next question for you then is this: What exactly are these standardized tests measuring? Is it some biological, innate intelligence that you seem to strongly believe? Well, an increasing number of people, including researchers, psychologists, and employers don't think that they do. Here is an example.
And lastly is the issue of the "late bloomer" - the individual that coasted his/her way through high school, then finally figured things out and ended up excelling in college. Well, much to the chagrin of old-school academics, we are just now figuring out that maybe these people aren't as bad as we thought they were either... The emergence of talent: genius and precocity : The New Yorker
So you are basically listing exceptions to the rule. If you owned a company and only had the budget to visit one school. Are you picking UNC-Chapel Hill or UNC-Ashville to recruit from?
For instance, if a Noweheresville State graduate with a 4.0 were going up against a CalTech grad with a 2.1, I believe the Noweheresville State grad wins in most cases.
The winner in this contest would likely be "neither of the above -- let's keep looking."
So you are basically listing exceptions to the rule. If you owned a company and only had the budget to visit one school. Are you picking UNC-Chapel Hill or UNC-Ashville to recruit from?
First of all, your ideologies are simply incorrect. With the exception of the tippy-top jobs out there, prestige has far less of an impact to one's career success than you tend to believe. I'm not sure what ivory tower institution you're writing your comments from, but you should step out and get some fresh air.
Interesting comment. Having lived well into my 60s and having achieved some measure of success, I probably have breathed a little more fresh air in my lifetime than you have, my young friend. But that's OK . . .
They are things to consider but they aren't in the same category of importance as the quality of the college. One of the most useful things a college does is attract employers who come to campus to recruit. Companies are choosing where to hire students based on the reputation of the school and graduates.
That's the problem.
You're equating selectivity with the quality of the college. These two factors are mutually exclusive. While it's true that selectivity may give a school a more "academic atmosphere", that "academic atmosphere" doesn't have anything to do with the quality of the actual institution.
The Reed college president explained it really well...
Quote:
Reed's president, Colin Diver, cautions prospective students and parents against relying on rankings. Rankings, he says, are grounded in a "one-size-fits-all" mentality. "They are primarily measures of institutional wealth, reputation, influence, and pedigree. They do not attempt, nor claim, to measure the extent to which knowledge is valued and cultivated" on each campus. Reed doesn’t rank its students. "Why should we participate in a survey that ranks colleges?" he asks. Reed College | Admission | Reed College Admission Office
In other words, whats missing with prestige/rankings/selecitivity is an understanding of the innerworkings of a school - the services offered to students, labs, facilities, professor-to-student relationships, transfer of knowledge, etc. I will say that, at the graduate level, prestigious schools have a huge upper hand over non-prestigious schools since they get more funding and are involved with better and higher profile research projects, which benefits grad students immensely.
You're equating selectivity with the quality of the college. These two factors are mutually exclusive. While it's true that colleges that have more students who excelled in high school having a more "academic atmosphere", that "academic atmosphere" doesn't have anything to do with the quality of the actual institution.
The Reed college president explained it really well...
In other words, whats missing with prestige/rankings/selecitivity is an understanding of the innerworkings of a school - the services offered to students, labs, facilities, professor-to-student relationships, transfer of knowledge, etc. I will say that, at the graduate level, prestigious schools have a huge upper hand over non-prestigious schools since they get more funding and are involved with better and higher profile research projects, which benefits grad students immensely.
How do you go about measuring "quality of the college" or "the innerworkings of a school" or the "transfer of knowledge?" I can tell you this, in the Pittsburgh area, there are many adjunct college professors who teach or have taught at many of the schools in Western Pennsylvania including Pitt, Carnegie Mellon, Duquesne and community colleges, sometimes at the same time. The difference is not who is teaching the course, the difference is the academic and interest level of the students in the course.
Not at all the places I have worked. For example, I worked for a major consulting firm. We discussed where people went to college but never once asked for a college transcript or what someone's GPA was. Where someone went to college carried much more weight than what their GPA was.
We were reluctant to hire people from schools we never heard of, and were very skeptical of anyone with a degree from a for-profit school unless they had a good explanation.
I find that pretty amazing. Not that it hurt me any.
But still, college GPA tells you SO much about a person's sense of responsibility and maturity. I was asked about it all the time. One interviewer asked me about it two years ago and I have like 10 years of experience! (It was more as a passing point relating to something I said though).
How an employer could not want to know if the student had a 2.0 or a 4.0 is just beyond me. Unless that employer thinks college is a time for fun and kicking back and you clean the books starting at age 22. But I digress. I already beat this argument to death in the W&E forum.
You're equating selectivity with the quality of the college. These two factors are mutually exclusive. While it's true that selectivity may give a school a more "academic atmosphere", that "academic atmosphere" doesn't have anything to do with the quality of the actual institution.
Ryan -- I am not trying to give you a hard time, but do you understand the differences among the concepts of mutually exclusive, uncorrelated, and independent?
Last edited by Hamish Forbes; 06-20-2013 at 05:55 PM..
You're equating selectivity with the quality of the college. These two factors are mutually exclusive. While it's true that selectivity may give a school a more "academic atmosphere", that "academic atmosphere" doesn't have anything to do with the quality of the actual institution.
The Reed college president explained it really well...
In other words, whats missing with prestige/rankings/selecitivity is an understanding of the innerworkings of a school - the services offered to students, labs, facilities, professor-to-student relationships, transfer of knowledge, etc. I will say that, at the graduate level, prestigious schools have a huge upper hand over non-prestigious schools since they get more funding and are involved with better and higher profile research projects, which benefits grad students immensely.
The quality of the school is directly correlated with the quality of the student. This of course is all on average. As said before are with one college to recruit from are you picking UNC-Chapel Hill or UNC-Asheville?
Ryan -- I am not trying to give you a hard time, but do you understand the differences among the concepts of mutually exclusive, uncorrelated, and independent?
Yes, I do. I meant to say independent, not mutually exclusive... good catch, and thank you.
Last edited by ryanst530; 06-20-2013 at 06:28 PM..
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