5/29 Related to the career thread below...do schools really help
make a difference in terms of salary, career advancement, etc?
Everywhere I've worked, people from Cal States make almost
as much as me and I never have a fancier title either.
\_ Actually, some economists have done studies of this
sort of thing. Controlling for your ability, school
doesn't have that much of an effect except if you
are really smart and go to a 3rd rate school. Then
you tend to make less money than a smart person who
went to a competitive school. -fab
\_ Hello. Just thought I would point out that
taking a sample of people with the same ability,
and observing their school and their salary will not
tell you the effect of school on salary. You cannot
determine effects from observations in general. -- ilyas
\_ There are surveys that track people through the life course.
Random samples of people. For example, the national
longitudinal study tracks a random sample of seniors
through college and into the labor market. By "controlling,"
I mean "throw the ability variable" into the regression
eqn. Nothing wrong with that. -fab
\_ First place I worked at, HR asked me if I had a degree. I said
that it was from Cal, and asked whether they'd like to see it, and
was told "no, your having a degree from there means enough".
Started at ~$75-80k. Depends on company, country, area, luck,
economic situation, but yes, it helps to have a degree from a
good school to get the interview. -John
\_ education from Cal gets you in the door. Once you are working,
it is all up to you to advance your career.
\_ For me, a degree from MIT gets you an interview, pretty much
automagically. A Cal degree gets you laughed at. Seriously,
it's moderately depressing how few resumes of Cal grads cross
my desk.
\_ I had four MIT co-workers. Three are smart. The fourth
is actually kind of dumb. All four were promoted, though.
Caltech gets similar respect. As for Cal, there are two
others, including one very respected but I am sad to say
that my old secretary had a Cal degree (current is from
UCSD). That was really hard to accept.
\_ Cal is a big, diverse school -- the degree in question
matters at least as much as the University.
\_ I've met 2 significantly stupid MIT grads, one of them
a MIT PhD. The rest (certainly numbering in the many
10's) were all more than average bright. That's a better
hit rate than any other school in my experience.
That's why MIT boys get the auto interview.
\_ I haven't met any really stupid MIT people. What is
an example of something dumb he/they did? All the
people who did caltech undergrad have been really
smart. Berkeley depts like MassComm or PhysEd are
of course a world of difference than say Physics.
I cant think of any "really dumb" UCB physics people.
\_ Something dumb: Used drop tests from a helicopter
to test a parachute instead of a wind tunnel despite
much contrary advice with predictable (bad)
consequences. Is this IQ 80 stuff? No. Is this
a credit to MIT, though? (The Cal guys were on the
right side of this one, FWIW).
\_ A MIT boy once interviewed with me who can't answer
simple 6.111-type questions. Another guy I am
working with now with can't reason his way out of
a paper bag even with written directions. I spent
an afternoon trying to explain cache associativity
to him and finally gave up.
\_ not my field, what's 6.111?
\_ It's the MIT version of CS150, except
much harder (or so the MIT boys tell me).
\_ how would they know unless they took both
at which point they'd already have the
experience from one to make the other easy?
\_ Don't be so parochial.
\_ You almost had something to say.
Would you like to try again?
\_ No. I'm not in the business of
providing people with directions
to reason their way out of paper
bags.
\_ Take a look at past exams, hws and
projects for 6.111 and compare with
150. 6.111 is *much* harder.
\_ Did they dumb down 150 recently?
\_ 6.111 was much harder than 150
even 15 years ago. It wouldn't
surprise me (and in fact I'd think
it likely) that 6.111 has always
been more difficult than cs150.
\_ Can I send you my resume?
\_ If there are any insecure motd readers who are saying
to themselves, "Really? People will laugh if they see
I have a Cal EECS degree on my resume?", the answer is
no, unless the company is run by Stanfurdites or MIT people.
\_ Yes, they do. Not always the way you think, though. There are
always certain schools preferred because their programs are good,
past hires worked out well, or the boss likes students from that
school for some reason (alum network). The company matters, too,
as does the type of work. --dim
\_ I've had a few former managers who've made side comments like,
"he's from such-and-such school, he's smart". Sometimes they
really were smart but not always. It's a matter of perception.
Certainly, going to a good school won't hurt you unless you're
at the kind of place that has hiring managers that don't hire from
top schools because the hiring managers have small parts.
\_ could you explain that last statement?
\_ small dick = insecure = don't want anyone smarter
\_ A few things I have learned:
1) Public schools have a lot of schmucks that I wouldn't trust to
do anything worth while, but who successfully slipped through
the system without offending anybody.
2) The top percent from any school is great (whether it is MIT,
Cal, or CSUN).
3) Being able to communicate is extremely important (and if you
haven't yet noticed, that isn't high on Cal's list for its
EE grads).
\_ But when the ya know, right, eh? Whassup dauwg? Know what
I mean?
\_ I have a Chemical Engineering degree. And I can tell you this,
Cal is very respected in the Petroleum / Chemical Engineering
field. Also, my experiences is that Cal carry a big weight
when you apply for grad school. I would agree with the earlier
post. Cal degree give you an edge to get an interview. It may
not carry as much weight as MIT/CalTech or even Stanfurd, but
it give you an edge over all other schools. The rest is
up to you. Life is a struggle, and the struggle doesn't end
even after you obtain the degree.
-career never took off, but felt that Cal
had treated me fairly.
\_ interesting. my career took off but I don't think Cal treated
me fairly. it was the worst few years of my life. however,
after the sheer Hell that was Cal, everything else is easy.
want, and got all A's for the final 3 papers.
\_ care to elaborate on your career? my life at Cal
was also the darkest days in my life...
-Chem Eng, age of 30, still need career advice.
\_ In brief: I make a shitload of money doing what I like.
\_ ...yet somehow, either before or after your time at cal you
figured out how not to use phrases like "cal carry big weight"
unlike the above. This comes back to the point above about
communication skills.
\_ Before, actually. I learned at Cal that writing well was
of no value. My papers in fuzzy classes would get C/B
grades because they didn't like the content even when the
classes were supposed to be graded on correct grammar,
spelling, etc as in Subject A, English 1A, etc. I saw
other people's papers I'd be ashamed to turn into my HS
English teacher, which the reader bloodied with corrections
get an A+ and a note at the end about how great the paper
was. I started writing crap papers with the right content
and my grades went up too. Fuck Cal. --bitter alum
\_ Me too. For my English 1A class with 6 papers, my
and fucked her and gone over to Sproul to drop.
grades went B, C, D, and then I realized what they
wanted, and got all A's for the final 3 papers.
\_ well, it looks like we all learned a useful lesson
from 1A/1B. Grad students in English and
comp lit are stupid assholes. I actually told
one of them to fuck off once. I had gotten an A on
the first paper, but they told me that they would
give me a straight F for the class if my attitude
didn't change. they had started talking about
how relativity meant that everything was relative
or some other horseshit, and were not interested
in what i had to say about what relativity is really
all about(i was a physics major). So flipped the
stupid cunt off, told her "fuck you" and
went straight over to sproul to drop.
\_ I would've rather flipped the stupid cunt open,
fucked her and gone over to Sproul to drop.
\_ No, you wouldn't. You didn't see her.
\_ The best thing about a Cal degree is writing right here on
the MOTD with my homies and the one or two brave enough
homettes.
\_ YO DAUWG!
\_ GO BEAH! |
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