Does college prestige matter?
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Should you choose a top ranked college?
You are probably here to understand more about a college’s name and how it might help you in your future.
Will employers look at you differently?
Are you more likely to get hired if you attend a particular college?
Are the professors better at certain universities?
Will you make more money long-term?
What makes a college prestigious?
When you think about a prestigious college, you’ll likely think about a private university that is expensive and highly competitive. This can be true to some extent.
But does that really make a university or college better than another? Hardly not.
Boasting about attending a university because it was difficult to get admitted and expensive to attend is hardly enough to brag about. What about the skills you learned? Your future career and the impact of your education on that career?
Those are important qualities of a university to consider and offer you more than bragging rights.
The U.S. News & World Report (Morse & Brooks, 2021) categorizes universities based upon 17 indicators to include things from graduation rates, student acceptance rates, financial resources for students, and faculty compensation, among others.
They rank colleges based upon their methodology. Some could say that these high ranked universities are prestigious.
High earning potential
Besides bragging rights, when you start talking about attending a university that has a high employment rate with consistently high earners comprising their alma matter, that’s a little more prestigious.
But does that come at a hefty price tag that makes your student loan debt exceed the additional earnings you’re going to generate?
And keep in mind that certain universities might consistently produce higher earners because of the types of degrees they award.
Therefore it could just depend entirely on the major you choose and not the college itself.
However, it is still a factor to consider and may impact the prestige of a university.
Professors
What could also impact the prestige of a college are the professors that makeup their faculty. When you attend a college, you want to learn from the most knowledgeable and prolific professors, and sometimes certain colleges have more of these desired professors.
Usually it’s because of the higher pay that attracts these professors to these institutions.
It can be said that these professors may be focused on research rather than classroom instruction.
It’s not to say that these professors aren’t active in the classroom or care about their students, but that these universities have a strong research interest and that can take a lot of the professor’s time. So perhaps they teach fewer courses each term compared to middle and lower prestige colleges.
So, maybe the courses are instead taught primarily by graduate students or adjuncts instead of these prolific professors.
You don’t get the access to those professors even though they are employed by that prestigious college because of their research interests and focus on graduate studies instead of undergraduate studies.
PRO TIP : Before you select a prestigious college, make sure you review the courses within your major and see who primarily teaches those courses. If that’s even important to you.
Will you have those more experienced professors teaching those courses?
Networking
What about the networking capabilities? And their student resources?
Some colleges may have large alumni networks, access to competitive internships, strong relationships with employers and helpful resources to propel your career.
If students can easily get involved in internships, student organizations, and events on campus that help develop their marketable skills for employers, the better.
Undoubtedly some colleges will have more of these resources available for students and that would be an important factor to consider.
What does research say about college prestige?
Campbell et al., (2019) delved deeper into this topic.
College prestige usually gets quantified by the research, resources, and high standards for admission instead of academic quality in the classroom.
Some of these factors can indirectly impact you through the education you receive.
They looked at nine colleges, and wanted to see if the courses that were taught by prestigious institutions had better academic rigor than those with lower prestige, among other questions.
They categorized the institutions as high, middle and low prestige.
Through their analysis, they found that the higher the prestige, the higher the academic rigor was within the classroom.
But they did mention that it could be due to the fact that universities with higher prestige may expect their students to perform better and challenge them academically more than middle and lower prestige colleges.
They also looked at college teaching to see if there were differences across universities.
And it could be said that just because an institution has more prestige, it does not mean that they always have better in-class instruction.
This may happen because the hierarchy of these institutions, where more prestigious colleges primarily focus on research.
But lower and middle tiered institutions have faculty who can dedicate more time for their students.
Again, this is more theoretical and should be further examined by researchers.
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Do employers really care which college you went to?
After all your education, you are likely to apply for long-term positions. It can be said that a small minority of students would get a college education for personal enrichment but it’s more likely that you are pursuing an education to eventually land an amazing job.
You probably wonder if employers will even care what college you went to.
There was a business leader poll conducted by Gallup, on the request of the Lumina Foundation, and the results are surprising.
They asked business leaders to rank four factors associated with employees.
The business leaders were more concerned with an employee’s knowledge and applied skills rather than the college they attended or their major.
When asked, only 9% of surveyed business leaders thought that an employee’s college was very important. But 84% thought the amount of knowledge a candidate has was very important.
Based on these outcomes, it appears that business leaders are focusing on the value you bring to their company, not which college you graduated from.
Could a particular college help you bring more value to an employer?
Perhaps, and that’s something to consider.
Some universities may challenge you more, provide you with exceptional resources, and give you a stellar education that could help you bring more value to an employer.
If you are concerned about what employers will think of your degree, and what value they place on the college you attended, ask them.
Consider your future career and look at potential employers. Do they have a recruiter?
Contact them and have a honest discussion.
It could be possible that the employer does recruit heavily from certain higher education institutions because those candidates have been vetted by a trusted source. This could work in your favor.
Additionally, go online and search your preferred employers and see if you can find information from other employees regarding their hiring practices. Maybe something is on the internet that can help you understand if these employers are highly selective.
Go to your preferred employer’s human resources department. Ask them if they consider the prestige of a candidate’s college.
Will you make more money at a prestigious university?
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Eide et al., (2015) conducted a survey of thousands of college graduates. They wanted to find out if graduates of prestigious colleges earned more than students who attended middle or lower tier colleges.
The researchers said that graduates from prestigious colleges saw higher earnings, but only in certain fields.
And in some career fields, the college didn’t matter.
What’s very significant about this study is that college graduates, who majored in the field of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) did not really have much difference in their earnings between colleges attended.
This means that someone who majored in STEM, or a related field, at a less selective college, didn’t have a significantly different salary than someone who went to a prestigious university.
A graduate may be drowning in college debt and see no additional earnings for that degree and attendance at a prestigious college in the field of STEM.
On the other end of the spectrum, the researchers found a difference in earnings in some fields, such as business.
They said that graduates from selective institutions, who earned a business degree, were earning 12% more on average than their peers who graduated from middle tier colleges, and a staggering 18% more than the graduates at less selective colleges.
Now this could be for a variety of reasons, but the authors stated that earnings could be impacted because of the alumni networks of the more prestigious colleges, or even networking with employers.
And these relationships can have some value. It appeared to only impact earnings in certain fields.
To explore this further, I looked at the College Salary Report for 2021 on payscale.com. And I listed the top 10 colleges by their mid-career pay.
And then I compared that to the 2022 U.S. News and World Report to see if those rankings correlated with the highest earners.
I only reviewed national rankings and national rankings for liberal arts colleges for the identified colleges.
Seven of the top 10 highest paid university graduates also made it in the top 25 national rankings from the U.S. News and World Report. One of the colleges (Santa Clara University), that is the 9th highest earning college for graduates was ranked #55 in the U.S. News and World Report for their national ranking.
It looks like the top earners correlate with the top rankings too.
See the table below to learn more about the top earning graduates and if those colleges ranked in the top 25.
You should understand that a degree at some of the most elite colleges will likely cost you more over time because the cost of tuition. However, you could potentially earn more.
Consider your return on investment (ROI) before selecting a college primarily on earnings. This will depend on your circumstances.
*I considered national university and national liberal arts college rankings only. Some of these universities may rank higher when you scale down the rankings. For example, Harvey Mudd College was ranked #28 in the national liberal arts college rankings but was ranked #2 for engineering programs where no doctorate was granted.
But does it really all matter in the end?
Someone once asked me, when was the last time you went to a doctor’s or dentist’s office and asked them where they got their degrees? Did you ever inquire about that when you sought assistance for anything from a professional?
Did you have a surgery and stop the anesthesiologist and ask where they got their degree before you went into surgery?
Probably not. And would that change your mind about seeking their care if they didn’t attend a prestigious university?
If you are a student who can get accepted into a prestigious university, you likely have plenty of skills that employers will seek regardless of your alma matter. But getting an education from a highly ranked college could also provide some value.
If you will swim in debt later, don’t stress and instead considering going to a university where you won’t go into debt, excel in organizations, volunteer in the community, and attend all lectures to get the most out of your college career.
The elite colleges accept the most qualified students, so undoubtedly, they are going to have some amazing statistics to boast about. But again, this topic needs more research.
A recommendation
Figure out what you want to major in. Attend a community college for the first two years. Transfer to a four-year university based upon your major. Go to a college that has excellence in your desired field.
Now, if you are still fixated on college prestige, go to their campus, and talk to students. Have real conversations with them. Ask them about their classes and experiences.
Next, try to audit a class.
Some colleges will let you audit a class, which means that you get to sit in on a lecture and see what their classes are like.
Find out if the colleges you are interested in offer this.
At the very least, read the reviews of the college professors online. I don’t normally recommend this, but if you look at an institution, and a vast majority of the professors are average or below average, it could be telling of their classroom instruction.
You’ll have to do some digging deep inside yourself to figure out what matters most to you.
A student can overcome obstacles and be just as successful independently. Some of the most successful people in the world didn’t even attend college at all.
Maybe you can’t stop thinking about the clout you will have by attending the top ranked university in the United States or the world and you will not stop until you’ve achieved it.
Campbell, Corbin & Jimenez, Marisol & Arrozal, Christine. (2019). Prestige or education: college teaching and rigor of courses in prestigious and non-prestigious institutions in the U.S.. Higher Education. 77. 10.1007/s10734-018-0297-3.
Eide, E.R., Hilmer, M.J. and Showalter, M.H. (2016), IS IT WHERE YOU GO OR WHAT YOU STUDY? THE RELATIVE INFLUENCE OF COLLEGE SELECTIVITY AND COLLEGE MAJOR ON EARNINGS. Contemp Econ Policy, 34: 37-46
Morse, R., Brooks, E., (2021). How U.S. News Calculated the 2022 Best Colleges Rankings.
U.S. News and World Report (2021). Best National University Rankings.
Disclaimer : The information provided above is not intended to be professional advice and is for informational use only. The opinions provided in this article are the sole opinions of the author.
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