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I've noticed a lot of people that don't want to say what college they went/go to. It's not like they're ashamed because a lot of them go to "good" colleges. I just don't understand what they have to hide.
I've noticed this in real life too. Parents with kids at "good" colleges seem less likely to announce where their kids go to college (but then again, there are always those arrogant types that brag).
I haven't really noticed at all. I don't have anything to hide, I just see no point in telling everyone where I went to school unless they ask or it's relevant to the conversation.
Well, a lot of us were taught not to brag and unfortunately, if you say I went to XYZ awesome college, it comes off as bragging to a lot of people. Especially when it comes to the Ivies and great public schools, there are people on here who are quick to label you a stuck-up know it all because of the school you attended. Whenever there's a thread about where you went to college, you'll notice that the usual posters aren't hesitant to name their alma maters, but in other threads, they refrain so no one thinks they are bragging.
For the record, I did my BA at Pomona College, MA at the University of Manchester and I'm starting my MFA at Columbia in the fall. I'm proud of my education and so far I've had great experiences. However, when I excitedly told a few of my friends from non-academic backgrounds about my Columbia acceptance, I had a few of them ask if I thought I was better than them because I got into an Ivy. I was excited because I'd be accepted into my dream program and they took that as a slight against them, even though that was the furthest thing from my mind. That's why I don't post that info a lot on this board. If someone really wanted to know, they could find it in my post history, but in most of my posts, it's not particularly relevant to what I'm saying.
I think a lot of it is just not wanting conversations to degenerate into an "My school's better than your school" argument. There are lots of different ranking mechanisms, for starters. How is 'good' measured? A lot of rankings are simply based on the number of alma mater that replied to a survey, which is hardly an objective metric. Naming our alma maters would likely just devolve into arguments about how accurate the ranking systems are and how relevant they are.
Even using objective measurements, there are few universities that are 'good' in every way. For example most wouldn't consider the University of Iowa a 'good' school. But that depends on what you are studying. Audiology? Yeah--UofI is #1. African American studies? Not so much. So you really have to talk about specific degree programs, not just universities. (I'm not a U of I alum, I just picked it at random).
And that discussion is a lot less anonymous. There are 4,000+ universities in the US awarding more than 17 million degrees annually. Naming a university isn't likely to reveal a poster's true identity. But within each university, the degree programs are much smaller. For example, there are only ~100 universities that are accredited to award degrees in my field, and only 5 that offer my specific degree. None of them graduate more than 50 students annually. That makes it a pretty small field. Small enough that there's a reasonable chance someone will figure out who I am.
I haven't seen it happen here, but I have seen it on other forums, that were generic and not industry-specific, where posters figured out their true identity and 'outed' them. I don't want that to happen to me. I like being anonymous here. I come here to get away from the people I know in my field.
And yeah, there's the bragging thing too. And what does your alma mater really prove anyway? Other than that you are a name-dropper.
If you really think that, then why do you announce you live in Tampa?
Well, that narrows it down to only about 2 million people....
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