Harder than Harvard

On Tue, 20 Mar 2006, Kamal R. Prasad

It is a fact that a degree from a high prestige school, eg. Ivy League or MIT or Harvard, really does open doors that would not be opened by a degree from a low prestige school. If you look at the faculties at any of the schools, you will find professors at MIT got their PhDs from other high prestige schools, and some MIT PhDs are professors at other high prestige schools. And, they get higher salaries, too. You almost never see faculties at high prestige schools with PhDs from low prestige schools.

It is also a fact that kids who get BS degrees from some of the small, elite colleges do end up in high prestige high paying jobs, high positions in the government, or other key positions. And, a very large fraction of the students at high prestige schools are getting student aid, student loans, and student fellowships and scholarships to help. And, even foreign students at many prestige US schools are getting aid and cut rates on tuition, and have sometimes their own programs (Arab programs at some schools were set up with oil money and meant to favor the kids of the rich Arabs; I went to one school with one of these programs and the kids told me about their rich parents and how they get degrees from US schools, go back to Arabia and get nice jobs there. Its been the situation for many countries to send their kids to the US for degrees, then go back to their countries for jobs saved for them. I could tell many stories about this).

School rankings also depend a lot on who does the ranking, how they do the ranking, and what criteria they use, and who they ask. The validity of these rankings are rarely questioned. Ultimate placement rates may have nothing to do with where people got their degrees.