Who Needs Harvard? 577
theodp writes "Slate's Daniel Gross explores why big corporations are hiring fewer Ivy Leaguers. Is it because today's bosses aren't as snowed by polished young Ivy grads as they were in the past? Or are today's Ivy League graduates simply so wealthy that they no longer feel the need to find stable, high-paying jobs at big companies?"
The real reason (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The real reason (Score:2, Interesting)
-fren
Re:The real reason (Score:2, Interesting)
I went to the Univ. of Illinois where Thomas Wolfram founded a company so he wouldn't have to find a new apartment after graduation. His company produces Mathmatica (amazing software if you have a chance to use it).
-B
Re:The real reason (Score:4, Informative)
Other Schools... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Other Schools... (Score:2)
Walk into any intro-level class and you'll find that most are taught by full time and often tenure-track faculty, with a few part-timers thrown in, and some graduate students for things like public speaking. The professors went to good schools -- Illinois, Chicago, Harvard, Yale, UCLA, and others.
The catch? This is a public university with "at" in the name. Do the faculty and their allocation in classes
From the UVa Perspective .. (Score:5, Informative)
Anyway, basically what I'm trying to say is that public schools are making huge headway into almost every important field. Berkley has the amazing engineering program that the best schools compete neck and neck with. Michigan has extremly competitive law, business, and medical schools. Virginia has #4 law program, the #12 business program, the #24 medical school, a top 5 commerce school (that puts out some of the best investment bankers in the world) -- etc, etc.
Between the three top public institutions, every facet of higher education is relatively well covered from medicine to liberal arts to commerce to engineering. Today, wasting 50 grand a year on a Harvard education may still be worth it if you're not lucky enough to be living in Virginia, California or Michigan, but honestly -- the concept of building a network of connections and alumni support is well expressed in our public instituions today.
Perhaps the biggest difference between a public school and a private schools is a fact that wikipedia expresses -- the endowments are huge for schools like Harvard and Yale. UVA had an endowment of 1.4 billion dollars, harvard had 22.6 billion, and yale was at 11 billion. Harvard is the second largest nonprofit after the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation.
Those are the facts that set apart a university like Harvard from a UVA or a Berkley. I think in the coming years these kinds of huge differences between top public schools and top private schools will increase. While the economy was bad in the earlier part of this century (hehe), schools like Berkley and Virginia took hits in funding. In virginia for example, the tuition was raised somewhere around 30%, and funding dropped pretty substantially. Certain public institions in the state that weren't doing as well dropped substantitally in rank according to US News and World Reports, and without public support, pulic (!!) institions can't do well.
For now at least, UVa looks to be going more and more the private route, especially with the new legislation on the table specifically asking for more leeway in the strings the government has attached to the institution. Hopefully as a more expensive, but still cheaper top instition that's quasi private/public will make for a better University overall. As per now, I can honestly say that going to a instition other than a top public one if you live in the states of Virginia, Michigan, or California (if accepted of course) would be a mistake. Perhaps getting lots of money to go to an expensive Ivy is not a bad plan, but the majority of them don't even offer merit based scholarships.
Anyway, there were quite a few cents more than my 0.02 there, but take from this what you will. =)
Berkeley! Berkeley! (Score:3, Funny)
Or call it Berserkeley. But get that E in there!
Re:From the Ivy Perspective (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree that the Ivy aura is fading fast. At least in technology.
14 years ago I was interviewing for my first software job and I hadn't even finished my degree at a public university. The interviewer told me, "You know, earlier today I interviewed a guy with a degree from Harvard. Tell me why I should hire you instead?" It was my first real interview and thinking about it now I think I did a poor job, but I gave him a copy of a small Quicken-like finance program I had written for my own use and told him that I thought I had real experience while the guy from Harvard probably just had theoretical experience.
I got the job.
So 14 years ago a high school graduate working on a degree from a public university beat out a Harvard graduate. And that was 14 years ago. When I later moved to a new country I responded to one job offer in the local paper by sending them my resume and a disk with some software I had written. I got the job even though I wasn't yet fluent in the local language.
It's not about where you spent 4 years of your life. It's about what you can do and whether you can provide the employer with any reason to believe that you can do the things you say you can do. If you can, you'll get the job and the Harvard grad will still be looking.
Re:From the UVa Perspective .. (Score:3, Informative)
But it is entirely untrue that it's hard to get in here (or Harvard College) because of the number of spaces reserved for the rich, legacies, and famous. Yale law has the highest GPAs and LSAT scores of any school in the country. Harvard is #2. You simply could not maintain those averages if you were letting in large numbers of people with sub-par qualifications simply because they are rich, legacies, or famous.
Other meanings elsewhere (Score:2)
Re:Other meanings elsewhere (Score:2)
-1 Flambait coming up! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:-1 Flambait coming up! (Score:2)
Bachelor's Degree from Yale, MBA from Harvard.
Re:-1 Flambait coming up! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:-1 Flambait coming up! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:-1 Flambait coming up! (Score:3, Insightful)
On the other hand, I'd also note that grade inflation at both schools isn't nearly as bad as a at other schools where my friends went, public and private.
Education no longer matters (Score:2, Interesting)
Education has now become accepted as being acquired through experience and higher learning - not just the next step/next grade level of yesteryear.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:5, Insightful)
However, I can tell you that at my school, as well as most of the others in the Ivy League, there is a discernible difference between those who had to work hard to get in and those who are of "legacy" status. Us public school educated kids aren't necessarily a rarity anymore, but we do come from quite different worlds.
Perhaps corporations are realizing that simply graduating from an Ivy League says little more about the person than graduating from any place else....you still want those who aren't at the bottom of their class, because, truth be told, it's nearly impossible to flunk out of an Ivy League school. Few people realize that when you have a poor semester at most of these schools, you go on "academic leave" for a semester to "get your head straight"...your old grades take a more permanent vacation.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:3, Interesting)
As a side note, I was one of 22 hires to Microsoft my year (/~100 CS majors). MIT had something like 29. So I'm not sure what the article is talking about.
(For those interested, I quit after a year because I hated it. I'm applying to grad school now. And I
why education? (Score:5, Insightful)
When you focus objectively on the subject, when you do what is called "deep learning", when you really get into what you are studying, and actually get your brain working, thinking new ideas, coming up with new questions, trying to find new answers, you begin to experience the true value of education, which is, if you asked me, about learning the material, understanding the significance of astronomy or physics or ethics or philosophy or literature or art or film, or politics, economics, etc...
I am from the camp that respects education because education is good in and of itself, intrinsically. I find education to be an end in and of itself, a way to improve yourself, question your place in society, learn more about the world you live in. I am not from the camp that feels that education is a "license" to get a job.
What we are probably seeing here is a reflection of these values - perhaps ivy leaguers are more likely to be passionate about education; perhaps they attach a significance to education that goes beyond the ability to get a job or proving that one is a hard worker.
If you think about it, at least at the undergraduate level, the stuff you learn and study has been studied and taught for hundreds, even thousands of years... there must be some compelling reason for this; and I can speak from personal experience that if you open your mind and really focus on "deep learning", really get into what you are studying, that it becomes quite obvious why we are still studying these subjects thousands of years later.
Education can be a very, very powerful tool; but you have to recognize that it has value in and of itself, and that it's not just a way to get a better job. Looking at it from this point of view, perhaps the figures make a little more sense. The types of environments that you will find in these big businesses probably make those positions less attractive to people who have a genuine, deep respect for education. Larger businesses will probably place more emphasis on a degree as a qualification or requirement, potential hires may be required to possess a BS as matter of policy.
Perhaps the path to getting the most out of education doesn't lead to C* positions at large organizations; and if getting the most out of life has anything to do with getting the most out of education, and if getting the most out of education has anything to do with respecting education as being important in and of itself, not simply a means to get a job, then you may very well see the positions in large corporations being filled with individuals who are open to accepting the viewpoint of education as a requirement, as a prerequisite to employment, with less emphasis on the intellectual and creative side of education, which usually requires money and time to pursue.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:3, Interesting)
This may be true of Harvard (90% honors graduation rate), but certainly isn't true of my alma mater, Cornell. 15% honors graduation rate, a large percentage of flunk-outs and "academic leaves" freshman and sophomore years (I personally know many who never returned) and, unlike many of the other "competive schools", there's no forgiveness for freshman grades. If you don't get on dean's list freshman year you might as well transfer, because you a
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:5, Interesting)
So to say that education is less desirable than motivation and work ethic is a fallacy since it takes motivation and work ethic to get an education.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:2)
At 18 I attended college and found myself making less money than I did before I started. Now I've graduated and I make the same amount of money as I started, of course I actually have a forseeable future so I at least gained that.
Experience matters greatly, so does the education. The trick is getting both, which is something many
Gates didnt graduate.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:3)
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:4, Insightful)
Can you honestly tell me that a potential employer who sees two resumes, one with a degree and 5 years programming experience, and one with only a high school diploma and 5 years programming experience, that he'll interview the high school graduate over the college graduate?
Didn't think so.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:2)
More and more businesses are actually interviewing candidates. They are considering those that submit resumes even without meeting the qualifications.
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:3, Insightful)
Only in certain fields, which (judging from your responses elsewhere) you're a part of. In most of the world, it's still accepted that education gives students a few valuable things that they cannot and will not learn outside of an academic setting. These are things such as a holistic sense of how their particular field of study is interrelated with all others,
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:2)
One of my coworkers went to Santa Cruz in the late 90's, and she heard her cohorts in EE/CS lament that many, many Silicon Valley companies were requiring "5 years Java experience," just because it's a nice round number, neglecting the fact that Java had only existed for 2.
I'm frusterated myself. I'm an senior studying English, and most jobs I see demand 2
Re:Education no longer matters (Score:3, Funny)
I know, it's just a typo where you hit "er" together when you meant "r" but it's still funny.
Legacy Graduates (Score:5, Insightful)
Say what you will about GW Bush; the man is not an intellectual, but is an ivy league grad.
Re:Legacy Graduates (Score:2)
Re:Legacy Graduates (Score:3, Insightful)
Islamic fascists.... (Score:3, Interesting)
You see, that pesky little organization that actually thinks about issues like global terrorism and the impacts of US policy on such activities, the CIA, has this to say [washingtonpost.com] about dumbasses little escapade into Iraq. Iraq has replaced Afghanistan as the training ground for the next generation of "professionalized" terrorists...
Not exactly what dumbass had in mind, but I guess when your brain
Re:Legacy Graduates (Score:5, Informative)
I think that's a pretty huge move towards fairness, don't you?
Re:Legacy Graduates (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, if you're not wealthy, you're more likely to be able to afford an "elite" university tuition than you would a high-quality state university (assuming you are coming from out of state).
Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and I'm pretty sure most of the other Ivies will offer a financial aid package that will fully cover the difference between what (the schools think) your family can pay and what tuition (and room and board) is. What the schools think your family can afford is almost always manageable. To make things even better, they put a cap on the amount the student loan will be a part of the financial aid package.
For example, there's no way my family and I could afford $34k a year for Harvard a few years ago. They offered me a financial aid package that was about $24k a year, and my final year (in '02-'03) the loan cap was about $2k a year (so final tuition was about $10k a year plus a $2k loan).
If you're a good high school student, don't look past the Ivies because you think you can't afford it. It may be much more affordable than you think.
Ivy League is no plus for tech grads (Score:3, Insightful)
When everybody gets an A at Harvard, how could it be otherwise? State schools have to offer admission to just about everybody, but there ain't no grade inflation there. Nothing like the Ivy League, anyway. The weak are culled from the herd by the sophomore or junior year.
Re:Ivy League is no plus for tech grads (Score:4, Interesting)
Stable Jobs?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or maybe it's the fact that there aren't any stable jobs at large companies anymore. Why spend the big bucks on the school when you'll have to change jobs every three years anyway. The article mentions it, but I can assure you that C-level executive positions usually last less than five years. The same is true for most other positions now, too.
Ivy vs non-ivy... (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a idiom of ivy arrogance that the only difference between the education you get at Harvard vs other schools is that at other schools you learn about history at Harvard you are taught by the people that made history and sitting in a room with others that will make history.
Re:Ivy vs non-ivy... (Score:2)
Corrected version (Score:5, Funny)
You mean "alumnus". "Alumni" is plural, but "alumnus" is singular.
You're missing some commas there.
There is a idiom of ivy arrogance that the only difference between the education you get at Harvard vs other schools is that at other schools you learn about history at Harvard you are taught by the people that made history and sitting in a room with others that will make history.
Gosh, where to start: "a idiom", missing commas, missing "while" before "at Harvard", no capitalization of "Ivy".
They would have thrown me out of CMU for writing like that. Is that another key difference between Harvard and non-Harvard education?
Re:Corrected version (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Ivy vs non-ivy... (Score:2)
There is AN idiom that permeates all aspects of my undergraduate education: learn by doing. This has served me well throughout graduate school, but most importantly, I learned a little bit of grammar that may have eluded the ivy population.
It's because... (Score:2)
"Ivy League" = Fucking rich, so who cares either way ?
Re:It's because... (Score:2)
You're only a contrapositive away from "Community College" = Kenny McCormick, so who cares?
Someone will write a book one day called "The Rise and Fall of the American Middle Class" and plug it on the talk show circuit as a quaint look at a historical curiosity. The rich people will chuckle at those uppity poor people and the other social class will marvel that there was a time when the rich let it happen.
Isn't it enough that the already-rich attack
Re:It's because... (Score:2)
I do! Unfortunately I faint at the sight of blood and I hate people...
Stable? (Score:5, Insightful)
But the 1950s career ladder is gone.
sPh
Re:Stable? (Score:2)
Re:Stable? (Score:2)
From what I hear, tenure isn't the job-for-life it used to be. If you're not publishing and bringing in grant money, tenure won't save you. Of course, academics who don't bring in grant money don't get tenure in the first place, so the only ones in danger are the very rare few who slack off once they're "in".
Re:Stable? (Score:5, Funny)
No?
Then what is this? [about.com]
Harvard? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Harvard? (Score:5, Funny)
the law of conservation of r's also states to place them where they do not normally exist, such as idea->ide'ar
hope this helps
Re:Harvard? (Score:2)
When we have open positions, we put the applicants (Score:2, Insightful)
Nothing worse than hiring an ivy-league graduate who cannot do the job very well and then proceeds to display an arrogant attitude towards his or her non-ivy-league coworkers who can.
Alumni support (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, to me it seems people at the top schools have tough times finding jobs. I'm not sure why, maybe it is an over-reliance on technology(they don't network, they just resume bomb on monster) and a lot of them end up hiding out in grad school for a while, maybe never going to work at a big company.
I have only one word...one word....just ONE WORD! (Score:5, Funny)
My opinion... (Score:2, Flamebait)
Ivy is still a big bonus! (big deal) (Score:5, Insightful)
According to the US Census, about 13 mil employed white males from 35 to 64 have a bachelors degree or greater.
There are 8 Ivy League universities, but let's be gracious and include schools like Stanford, MIT and Chicago and up the number of "top" schools to 12. Let's assume an average enrollment of apx 1,500 students per year per school between the years 1960 through 1990 (the years those white males went to school), leading to a total of 12 x 1,500 x 30 = 540,000 graduates and let's assume that 2/3 are male (it's only 1/2 nowadays), leading to apx 360,000 ivy leaguers out there.
This means that ivy leaguers make up apx. 2.8% of the eligible CxO candidate pool.
So, the conclusion is that having an ivy degree increases your odds of becoming a CxO by about 3.5x today instead of the 5x it did back in the day.
Of course, all this is meaningless drivel since they Ivy League is a *football* league, not some sort of academic standards association and, more importantly, as if increasingn a 0.002% chance to 0.007% means anything at all.
Re:Ivy is still a big bonus! (big deal) (Score:2)
Also, consider how often a new IL-grad will be offered a job by a previous-generation ILer based on having been in the same dorm/fraternity/drunk-tank as new grad's parent.
Re:Ivy is still a big bonus! (big deal) (Score:5, Insightful)
More than a football league (Score:5, Informative)
While the Ivies do play football (of a sort), the Ivy League is much more than a football league [ivyleaguesports.com]. The eight Ivy League schools, with MIT, do cooperate on issues like admissions, financial aid, etc. In years past the cooperation was extensive--enough so that the Federal Trade Commission sued alleging restraint of trade (since the Ivies would coordinate financial aid offers to prevent "bidding wars" for students).
Ivies vs. high-profile non-ivies (Score:4, Insightful)
Compare this to the competition at other competitive schools whose degree programs are still tough (see above), and A's mean something. These schools - some mentioned in the article as ivy alternatives - are picking up the slack. I know for sure that the high-profile companies the article mentioned (McKensie, Goldman-Sachs, etc) do recruit heavily among top-tier non-ivies these days. They do here at Caltech anyway.
Also, as things move more and more toward technology and fewer employers care about the liberal arts, the smaller ivies don't have the resources to compete - science is very expensive. Even Princeton and Yale didn't crack top 10 in many of the sciences, last I checked, and the other ivies aren't close. In sciences/tech, Harvard is the only Ivy that can even COMPETE with many of the the schools I listed at the top.
why? (Score:2)
Now for a rant:
Besides, nobody likes working with know-it-all smart-ass trust fund babies. Pedigrees aren't the mark of true intelligence. It's also a matter of economics--It's easier to higher a state school grad from the top of his class for lower salary expectations than some snotty
Pedigree/prestige are over-rated (Score:5, Insightful)
By all means go to the school that will best enhance your personal talents. But don't stand on your head to be admitted to 'the' school, especially if this effort is contrary to developing your individual talents. Admission to university is a beginning, not an end.
Re:Pedigree/prestige are over-rated (Score:2)
Convincing the wannabes of this is one of the keys to the Bush and Kerry families of the world maintaining their positions. How many of the Bushes went to Nowhere Massachusets State or Just North of the Border Texas U? Filtering and mating for the super-rich and super-insiders in one of the key functions of the Ivys. They let in just eno
other reasons (Score:3, Insightful)
The majority of kids attending Ivys might come from rich families but I would argue this is much different than 50 years ago when the majority came from families that were both rich and had high status. Admission has become tough, even for legacies (well, unless there isn't a building named after your dad) so a lot of the kids being groomed to take over the family empire are more likely to not get into an Ivy and are more likely to not want to go even if they could. Ivys have become a lot dorkier in recent years.
Having attended both an Ivy and non-Ivys I can say that the difference is that the non-Ivys tend to be more practical, teaching things employers actually want to know. Ivys are about theory and thinking...which is what learning should be about, even if not as useful right out of college.
Opposite argument (Score:3, Insightful)
wealthy? (Score:2)
F@!ing morons (Score:3, Insightful)
You want to see spoiled rich kids, take a look at BU. Brandeis. Bennington. Fairfield. Holy Cross. Schools where the kids of rich people go when they're not smart enough to get into the Ivy's, and not lucky enough to be a legacy.
Gawd, this attitude really ticks me off. I got into Harvard, graduated with honors, and got a good job (in IT, no less). I'm far more typical than the spolied rich kids.
Well rounded (Score:2)
- Well Rounded... not just knowledge of the job, but working with people!,
- proven ability to learn something new.
- Experience
- overall industry knowledge
- Has previously handled job of equal stress/commitment
- has reason to be a long term employee (show job commitment)
explanation
1. All jobs require working with people. From dealing with the boss, to clients, to fellow employees on a group pr
Qualifications vs Experience (Score:2)
They see through the corp BS (Score:5, Insightful)
Pretty much everyone knows that there is no corporate loyalty to their employees anymore, and that you cannot expect to have a position next year EVEN if you do a great job (strategy changes, mergers, sales of divisions, etc.).
Corporate pay is no longer what it used to be either. Except for getting to the absolue top, you may live comfortably, but you will not get wealty on 4 decades of corporate pay. And they are getting better at extracting more work for less (real) pay -- its called increased productivity.
In contrast, there are now many examples of excellent success in entrepreneurship, and the better control over your lifestyle. So, if you were smart and had a top education and a choice, would you go be a wage slave for some corp? Maybe for a few years just to get a bit more background and maybe connections, but not for long. Pretty soon, you won't put up with the corp BS, and you'll choose a better lifestyle running your own show. Ergo, there are fewer Ivy-types available to rise into those positions
Grade dilution, playpens, party animals (Score:4, Insightful)
I refer to people who don't enjoy learning, who prefer not to think, who generally don't retain what little they do learn, and who often don't pick up the infrastructural skill of critical, organized thinking.
These people are suffered to finish because the schools and departments themselves have incentives to process as many people as possible.
IMHO, that has devalued higher degrees and academic grades so far that they aren't helpful predictors of future performance. We're seeing that reflected in the Fortune 100 statistics.
I'm sure the number one reason is... (Score:2)
a better summary and different hypothesis (Score:2, Informative)
And from the actual paper: "Between 1980 and 2001, the percentage of Fortune 100 top executives with Ivy League undergraduate degrees fell by four points (to nearly 30%) while the proportion from public schools increased by 16 points (to 50%)." The paper then goes on to say that this effect may be because there are more people graduating from state schools than ivy league scho
... OR (Score:2, Interesting)
The stories about it may be completely bogus but if they are giving out that many A's then something is definately wrong.
Devaluation (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Devaluation (Score:3, Informative)
Dear submitter.... READ THE ARTICLE (Score:5, Informative)
Based upon the erroneous conclusions of the submitter and the author of the original article, I would say that both probably attended a public college.
Trained Crooks... (Score:3, Insightful)
Plainly, Harvard and others, did not spend enough time teaching ethics. Aristotle is forgotten...
More CEOs who've worked their way up (Score:3, Insightful)
Look at the recent McDonald's CEO and the current nominee for Commerce Secretary (or was he confirmed already?) from Kellogg's.
Who? (Score:4, Insightful)
Slashdot should know better than to publish an article like this. Life is more than getting a fancy title in corporate america. Criminy.
Re:Gezus (Score:2, Funny)
-Anonymous Third Year College Student
Re:Gezus (Score:2)
-Pseudonymous Postgraduate Research Student
OK, I'll bite (+5, Troll) (Score:2, Insightful)
So, if their representation cooresponded with the population percentage, they would compose 12% of the university, but they actually have 8%, showing that blacks are also under-represented. Your source spins this such that blacks appear to be taki
Bullshit (Score:2)
By any reasonable criteria for "seats that could/should be given" Harvard's bias against white gentiles is greater than the bias against blacks.
That you read something more into it is your own prejudice blinding you to the actual arithmetic stated.
may be flamebait, but... (Score:2)
Re:Diversity's Losers (Score:4, Interesting)
Those stats didn't sound quite right to me, and they seem to contradict the numbers in Harvard's own information book:
http://vpf-web.harvard.edu/budget/factbook/current _facts/enroll_ethnicity_7.html [harvard.edu]
It shows (American) whites as comprising 44 percent of the student body. And since a third of the international students [harvard.edu] are from Europe, that probably tips the total over half. No info on how many are 'gentiles' though.
That's less than the 70 some percent whites make up of the population, but lets see who is even more under-represented: Wow, even though blacks make up about 12% of the population, they're just 6.3 percent at Harvard! And Hispanics, who I believe recently passed blacks as Largest minority in the US, have just 5.5%!
Of course we all know who the real culprits are: those crafty Asians and Pacific Islander's. Of course their status as the lone over-represented race is due to white guilt, not a culture that values academic achievement. (/end sarcasm)
To disclose my slight personal connection to the issue: My uncle was the first Irish Catholic to get tenure at the history department at Harvard.
Your faulty definition of "white" (Score:2)
Second, your assertion that Harvard's definition of "white" excludes Europea
Re:Your faulty definition of "white" (Score:3, Insightful)
Can't comment on your first statement, I just happen to not trust statistics cited in racist diatribes. I'm not going to spend any more time digging around. And you know, the real reason the statistics aren't right there isn't because of some massive conspiracy, it's because no one cares about this stuff anymore except racists like you.
But
Pay close attention to the responses (Score:2)
This is a reflection of my original statement:
Implausible (Score:2)
It is simply implausible that blacks are 3 times more likely to apply to Harvard than the members of the ethnic group that founded that institution.
Re:Diversity's Losers (Score:2)
What I'm claiming is that American companies, quite reasonably, are not placing much value on a degree from a seminary of the state religion of political correctness, of which Harvard is now the exemplar.
Remember what I said:
Intergenerational punishment (Score:2, Insightful)
Apparently you believe it is inappropriate for people to restrict educational institutions which they founded to people of their culture.
Do you also believe it is appropriate to punish subsequent generations, based on their ethnicity, for the "crime" that their ancestors committed by trying to exercise freedom of association within their private colleges?
Re:GW bush factor (Score:2)
But wait... (Score:5, Insightful)
First of all, it's unamerican to not make fun of the President. That's what sets us apart from other nations.
Second, people who whinges about making fun of GW were probably saying nasty things about Clinton, Gore and Kerry, so
Re:Origin of term Ivy league? (Score:2)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_League [wikipedia.org]
Re:The decline of generalism (Score:5, Interesting)
I interview lots of job candidates. While specialization that will make them applicable to the problem their being hired for is a plus, it's not the deciding factor, because I will need to use them on something completely different in 6 months to a year. Adaptability is key. Quick learning is key. The ability to flesh out a hard technical problem and come up with an innovative solution to it is key. I've never seen anyone with a liberal arts degree who could do those things. I see physics, mathematics, biochem, and engineering people do them routinely.
The one kind of liberal arts major I've seen a general use for is history majors. They can pull together large quantities of scattered data and write a coherent explanation of what it all means. That's a niche, but it's a highly useful niche.