Its the networking

Sorry - typing skills are off. Ivy League provides a great education, but you can get an equivalent education at other upper level schools. What you really get at the Ivy League level is an inside on networking. If you're looking to go into industry, larger legal practices, etc. it might be worth the while to shell out the bucks to get the foot in the door. If you are planning on being a teacher, public defender, etc. and have to finance your education - then you might want to look someplace else.

College is important but choose your career wisely and don't just go some place for the name. Go to learn a skill and become great in it.

Gogle/Yahoo search: DailyJobCuts

We need to start changing the jobs market

Employers have always wanted people who not only know something, but who can DO something.

Mechanics, nurses, salespeople, teachers, the list goes on...

You don't have to attend an Ivy League school to get a good education.

An Ivy League education is worth less that mommy and daddy pay for it. A good education and demonstrated work ethic are worth considerably more.

As the article pointed out, on average smarter and most industrious people go to Ivy League colleges, and no matter where they went, they would likely be as successful.

It's kind of like saying people who drive fast cars usually drive faster than the average driver.

I'm an engineer at a fortune 500 company with a BS in Business, and an MS in Engineering, and I can say from personal experience that where I work the school matters. I've noticed that Ivy League individuals move up the chain very fast. I believe it's the "who you know" mentality. Many upper management have Ivy league degrees, and so I've seen this type of favortism over the past 5 years at this company.

Half unwhite. Is that the current way the Klan refers to Obama?

Lest we forget - George Bush graduated from Yale - enough said

am sure none of the increased unemployment was due to bad policy by Bush

Going to any ivy league school does matter. Most of the guys on Wall Street went to an Ivy League School. If you want to be a rat bstrd who learns how to cheat, steal, lie, and take the penneys off a dead persons eyes going to any ivy league school is a must. It doesn't matter whether its Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, whatever they teach the same courses the same way. You become the best at stealing and wearing great clothes, you learn how to mingle with the right thiefs and cheats. It's all there and seeing that I hire for my business the day I hire a thief from Harvard or any one of the others will be the day they pry my cold dead hand off my pen.

Will an Ivy League education pay off?

Of course it will. Look what a good job Ivy League educations have done so far rebuilding our economy and reducing unemployment.

An Ivy League education in my opinion is important because of the contacts. Other schools can provide a great education but will probably not net as many important contacts. In this job market students will need every advantage. At Princeton University alums are invited every year to attend reunions. This provides a yearly opportunity for alums to reconnect with each other. I also agreed with the study results that emphasized that great students who could be admitted to Ivy League schools would perform well anywhere.

If you have the right characters - curiosity, courage, resourcefulness, drive, leadership, etc. - then you'll be successful no matter where you go; if you don't, then no golden degrees will offset your shortcomings. But with that said, a good Ivy League education (or equivalents such as Stanford, Duke, UVA, etc.) helps you have a richer appreciation of the world around you and about yourself. You'll come out a more complete person no matter what career path you choose.

One more thing, this article focuses only on the financial yardstick as measure of success. But who is to say that a Mozart or an Albert Einstein is any bit less successful than a Bill Gates or a Donald Trump? Ivy League-type school is good at helping students discover their true potential and encouraging them to pursue their dreams.

That kind of thinking is also absurd. There are many people in this country who are engineers who cannot find jobs because companies would rather hire someone willing to work for practically nothing rather than training their own people here. It doesn't have anything to do with the skills that americans have. A lot of businesses would like to say they can't find any skilled workers, but the reality is they cannot find workers who will work for the wages they pay. Foreigners lose nothing by coming here, and so have everything to gain.

I find the recent trend to try to link the cost of a college education to the cost of your salary later ludicrous. People can't seriously think money is the only way to measure an education. What about the personal development you undergo? What about the peers you meet? What about the incredible professors you learn from? What about the classes that teach you lessons you use every day? Missing in all of this is a recognition that there is no one to one correspondence between taking a class and getting a job. What YOU put into the class, what YOU learn, and how YOU use it is what is ultimately going to determine your success.

An IVY education is great for contacts and its prestige.   An IVY education is not superior to other colleges' education.   As we know, it is the person with the best work ethic and knowledge of his position that makes the man suited to the job.   At any rate, alumni hire alumni.    Look at the bums we have had in Washington, D.C. from IVY schools.

When I went to Purdue, many students from out East said Purdue was thought of as an Ivy League school where they lived. If it is a prestigious school, it doesn't matter.

It's not what you know, but who you know. It's easy to get into ivy league if you have 3.7 to 4.0 GPA from a 2 year college or in the top percentile of your HS class, but money is the barrier preventing many to go. I shot high and was accepted by several ivy league schools, but couldn't figure out how I was going to afford it without any support so I had to retract those applications. Despite having excellent grades, I found scholarships to be severely lacking so I had to borrow $33,000 to go to a state school which has since ballooned through capitalization to $42,000 due to unemployment and underemployment where I can't earn anything more on average than a Walmart cashier working 30 hours a week and often less. You shouldn't be driving a 20 year old car and staying at your parents many years after graduation, but that's the reality of this job market severely lacking opportunity. Self employment is ideally the way to approach this problem.

    Instead of borrowing big money to study 4 maybe 5 years at a traditional university, a 1 or 2 year small business study coupled with a trade skill like plumbing or welding commonly studied in 2 year tech schools would be the smartest move if you know nepotism isn't going to open doors for you.

Top tier schools with large endowments are often more likely to provide need-based financial aid including grants. I graduated from an Ivy League at $50,000/year tuition with only $6000 total in loans and it was worth it!

I think that it makes total sense to get the Ivy league education if one can afford it. One of our kids attended an Ivy League college for less than what it would have been for him to attend a State University. This is simply do to the amount of help that the school gave him. We are not rich nor are we poor, just middle class americans trying our best to help our kids get through college. Once it was determinded that his Ivy League education was going to be cheaper than that of the State University it was a no brainer. I believe it just comes down to common sense. It was easy for us, but if he would not have received outside help with the cost he would have attended a State University. Would he have come out with the same success ? Absolutely, not a doubt in my mind!

" Ivy League provides a great education, but you can get an equivalent education at other upper level schools. What you really get at the Ivy League level is an inside on networking. If you're looking to go into industry, larger legal practices, etc. it might be worth the while to shell out the bucks to get the foot in the door. If you are planning on being a teacher, public defender, etc. and have to finance your education - then you might want to look someplace else."

Dave1384240

Totally agree.

I'm a Columbia grad. There is an absolute advantage in terms of recognition, of respect and in networking with an Ivy degree. Having said that, all these qualities are meaningless if not exploited. So if someone is non-motivated or in a field such as (?) library science or social work, the cachet is probably wasted. While the Ivy degree also helps with grad school admission, once one is a doctor or dentist, etc, the advantage diminishes. But in business or law, it maintains its value.

Additionally, since the most accomplished students are the ones admitted, logic implies that the success levels will be higher anyway. But when this is coupled with the higher quality of instruction (see article) and the above mentioned edges, there is and has been an overall advantage.

One benefit to an Ivy League degree that's been hinted at but not clearly stated is that there is less of a requirement to justify one's degree. You don't have to qualify your degree with your GPA, or demonstrate that you perhaps finished in less than 4 years, highlight awards you've won. Often you can mention or note that you went to a particular school, and that's it. Your abilities are spoken for.

However, lest we forget there is such a thing as legacy admissions, which can get otherwise less qualified applicants acceptance to the alma maters of their family.

My own experience and those of colleagues:The school you come from matters in the beginning of the career. It may readily open doors to opportunities, especially at top rated companies (bias re schools exists: Yes!). Then it's up to you to show what you can do. After the first couple of years in a job nobody asks to show your school diploma or transcripts, it's performance that counts! Coming from a second tier school your talents will show also but getting the opportunities (and promotions) just take longer to come about.

I'm an ivy league graduate. ivy league schools attract the 'best and brightest' from certain socioeconomic backgrounds and, in addition, cater to the already rich and well-connected. most of my classmates were extremely well-off and would have found employment via family contacts in the event of attending ANY school. in my experience, the alumni are willing to sometimes speak with you, but I have never received a job offer or any type of 'favoritism' due to my alumni status. I do, however, receive the ire and competitive jealousies of peers and potential employers - people want to boss around and knock down ivy league grads. Being middle-class and an ivy league alumni with no 'family connections' is a difficult situation - people expect you to be connected and successful due to your degree and if you aren't....something must be wrong with you...because geeeze you went to an ivy league school and it should be a cake walk. It is not. Nepotism and perks (both financial and personal) are the issues at-hand in regard to job promotions, opportunities and, to a staggering and unsaid level, admissions. Most people do not understand that Ivy League schools are simply a very expensive brand name. 'Prestige'...the latin root means 'conjurer's trick'...