Why do you respect Ivy League schools so much? (skill, high school, best)
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Hmmm, Vandy girls have a reputation for being hot, not savants. Greek life is very big in southern schools like Duke and Vandy. And both of these schools, especially Duke, put great emphasis and money in sports programs.
I think that your experience is not terribly relevant to the comparison; it certainly differs from mine, also as a hiring manager (not that being a hiring manager gives any special insight into the question at hand). Here's why:
Ivy League schools are not especially highly regarded for undergraduate engineering programs. Many students with Ivy League ability consider the low-level practice of engineering to be more or less a blue-collar trade, and consequently aim higher.
If you have engineering jobs to fill that require only a bachelor's degree, you should expect to attract only the bottom of the class from any really good school. Students from the best schools generally go on to graduate study, and then on to jobs that require advanced degrees (not necessarily the PhD). They are typically not interested in jobs that require only a bachelor's degree (logic design, cad jockey, coding, regression testing, et al.). For example, Bell Labs at its zenith would immediately send any new hire away, full-time at company expense, to a top university for a master's degree before considering him to be a productive engineer.
On the other hand, you may appeal to the top of the class from a no-name school, where students are generally satisfied to go to work in banal jobs straight out of the undergraduate program. So, your experience may be comparing the top of the no-name to the bottom of the truly good schools.
In general, the best engineering programs at any level are in the non-Ivy elites (MIT, Cal Tech, Stanford, and the like), and the flagship state universities (eg: Illinois, Wisconsin, Cal, Purdue, Michigan, and so forth).
Now if one looks at other fields, is there any question that a typical math or science graduate from, say, Harvard or Princeton is far better qualified than the typical math or science graduate of no-name U? Anyone who thinks that the two groups are peers doesn't know much about the study of math at an Ivy school. Make the same comparison of Oxford and Cambridge grads with grads from a former polytech recently elevated to university status. The obvious disparity in outcome is why the top schools are so highly regarded.
I believe that Cornell also has a highly respected engineering program, while not at the level of Caltech and MIT.
Mentioning Bell Labs brings back thoughts of how R&D was once done in this country. When I graduated, everyone wanted to work at Bell Labs or one of the National Labs/NASA. Even though I didn't work there, I was sad when Bell Labs closed because that signaled the end of an era when industry pursued research for the long term value rather than next quarter's stock report.
I work in a National facility and there is an obvious hierarchy as you mention below. It's getting harder to find folks who can be at that top level where we need top flight engineers. The lower tier schools have slipped into cookbook engineering and we can't pay enough to compete for the top school grads.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hamish Forbes
I think that we have different ideas about the practice of engineering. The jobs that you describe above don't really require much in the way of education. Indeed, most of the list could easily be done by an intelligent person with an associate's degree.
In my view, the work of Bell Labs, Sarnoff, Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab, MIT Lincoln Labs, and so forth, certainly is the practice of engineering. But most jobs at these kinds of places cannot possibly be done by anyone without post-graduate education, with the possible exception of a stray genius here and there. These kinds of jobs appeal to the best students from the best schools -- you simply are not seeing such people when you interview.
I once worked for the Bell System, in particular Western Electric, before I went to graduate school. They had the kinds of jobs that you mention, in spades. Our plant drew enough number 22 plastic-insulated wire every day to stretch around the world at the equator. We had a deep-water port and an ocean-going ship called the Long Lines to install undersea cable, which we also made. The engineers were top notch.
Nevertheless, there was an obvious hierarchy in the house of Bell. The best students from the best schools went to Bell Labs -- they had no interest in Western Electric despite its virtues. The engineers with lesser credentials went to Western Electric, if they were good enough to get in (it was a fine company, and a privilege to work there). The engineers who really weren't much interested in engineering at all, often less-accomplished graduates from lower-rate schools, went to the telephone operating companies.
Many people don't appreciate the history of the Bell System. They invented much of today's technology -- for example the transistor -- and developed bedrock engineering theory. Bell Labs was largely responsible for developing control theory, in response to understanding the behavior of undersea communications, and information theory, which led to today's understanding of digital communications.
So yes, I think that the jobs that you have described are indeed banal by comparison, although I regret having used that particular word, and apologize for rubbing you the wrong way with it.
I don't. I've worked extensively both with people who have Ivy League schooling and those with state university schooling. In my experience people from less "exalted" educational backgrounds are more realistic (more practice than theory) and better at getting the job done than Ivy Leaguers are. Ivy League education may have meant more in the past when college education in general was less common, but it's largely become a status symbol in recent history.
Ivy League educations aren't really meant for standard jobs.
Ultimately it's meant for people who want to be CEOs, start businesses, become politicians, researchers, go in the entertainment industry, etc.
Of course there are Ivy League people who just get routine office jobs, but that's a mismatch. If that's all you're going to do, save your money and go to a state school.
All of our Presidents since Bush I (including Trump) have been Ivy Leaguers, many of our famous actors, many of those who started tech companies, etc are Ivy Leaguers, and these are the people who truly pay for the Ivy League (donate lots of money) and have always been the Ivy League's core base. A lot of foreign CEOs and Presidents of nations send their kids to Ivy Leagues too. In short, they are rich kids schools.
I think that your experience is not terribly relevant to the comparison; it certainly differs from mine, also as a hiring manager (not that being a hiring manager gives any special insight into the question at hand). Here's why:
Ivy League schools are not especially highly regarded for undergraduate engineering programs. Many students with Ivy League ability consider the low-level practice of engineering to be more or less a blue-collar trade, and consequently aim higher.
If you have engineering jobs to fill that require only a bachelor's degree, you should expect to attract only the bottom of the class from any really good school. Students from the best schools generally go on to graduate study, and then on to jobs that require advanced degrees (not necessarily the PhD). They are typically not interested in jobs that require only a bachelor's degree (logic design, cad jockey, coding, regression testing, et al.). For example, Bell Labs at its zenith would immediately send any new hire away, full-time at company expense, to a top university for a master's degree before considering him to be a productive engineer.
On the other hand, you may appeal to the top of the class from a no-name school, where students are generally satisfied to go to work in banal jobs straight out of the undergraduate program. So, your experience may be comparing the top of the no-name to the bottom of the truly good schools.
In general, the best engineering programs at any level are in the non-Ivy elites (MIT, Cal Tech, Stanford, and the like), and the flagship state universities (eg: Illinois, Wisconsin, Cal, Purdue, Michigan, and so forth).
Now if one looks at other fields, is there any question that a typical math or science graduate from, say, Harvard or Princeton is far better qualified than the typical math or science graduate of no-name U? Anyone who thinks that the two groups are peers doesn't know much about the study of math at an Ivy school. Make the same comparison of Oxford and Cambridge grads with grads from a former polytech recently elevated to university status. The obvious disparity in outcome is why the top schools are so highly regarded.
Cornell's engineering program is highly ranked and in recent years Bloomberg gave them 11 acres of land on Roosevelt Island, along with 100 million in city money and some of his own money for their graduate school of applied science and engineering. Bloomberg held a contest for universities to bid for tech schools in NYC, and Cornell won the beat (they beat Stanford). Columbia was a runner up, and after expanding considerable in West Harlem Columbia has definitely put more resources into engineering and tech. It was a part of NYC's initiative not to be dependent on financial services (the city encouraged the expansion of tech, film and tv, advertising, tourism, and other industries in NYC).
Columbia expanded itself not only in graduate programs in engineering, but the business and law school at Columbia closely collaborate with graduate programs in engineering. The same for the University of Pennsylvania and Cornell. The money that this brings into their endowments is too much to turn down, and clearly Silicon Valley filled Stanford and MIT endowments. You'll find a lot of Ivy League tech startups these days, and Ivy Leaguers are well repped in Silicon Valley.
I was talking to someone who goes to an Ivy League school and immediately I was impressed. But now I'm not really impressed anymore. I'm left wondering whats so special about Ivy League schools.
I understand it's exclusive and hard to get into. But there are plenty of things more exclusive and with an even limited admittance.
So I must ask, what's so special about Ivy League Schools? How are the schools and students life changing? Outside of the campus grounds, what does it mean?
Ivy league was a rough yardstick of excellence when it was first coined. But its now been overtaken by events. Now the ivy league simply overlap with excellence, but do not define it or even dominate, by majority, the top.
Some people still think US News rankings are the best rankings.
Some people still think people who work with computers are nerds.
Ivy league was a rough yardstick of excellence when it was first coined. But its now been overtaken by events. Now the ivy league simply overlap with excellence, but do not define it or even dominate, by majority, the top.
Some people still think US News rankings are the best rankings.
Some people still think people who work with computers are nerds.
Some people still think you need a landline.
There are always stragglers.
When it was first coined, it was a sports league between 8 Northeastern private universities. That's what it STILL is today, they compete against each other in athletics.
When it was first coined, it was a sports league between 8 Northeastern private universities. That's what it STILL is today, they compete against each other in athletics.
They tend to absolutely slaughter the public universities.
...All of our Presidents since Bush I (including Trump) have been Ivy Leaguers, many of our famous actors, many of those who started tech companies, etc are Ivy Leaguers, and these are the people who truly pay for the Ivy League (donate lots of money) and have always been the Ivy League's core base. A lot of foreign CEOs and Presidents of nations send their kids to Ivy Leagues too. In short, they are rich kids schools.
No they are not. It is unquestionably true that many wealthy kids are in the Ivies. But it is FAR from true that these are "rich kids schools." Take a look at this list of the schools with the largest share of students on Pell Grants, which are federal grants to poor kids and a good indicator of how many of them attend a school.
Of the top ten schools with the most Pell Grant students, five are Ivy League schools: Harvard, Columbia, Penn, Brown and Cornell. (And the other five schools are arguably Ivy-equivalent). Add in to that the total (non-loan) financial aid packages at the Ivies, which can be extraordinarily generous to poor families, and I think it's no longer true to say that these are just schools for rich kids.
Of course poor kids, even very academically talented ones, are so often badly counseled about college that they're unaware that these schools can be far more affordable than they think. But that's another story for another thread.
There are certain schools whose programs are impressive to me, but Ivy League status doesn't really have any bearing on it.
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