Top 25 schools whose graduates were the top-rated by recruiters. | Hacker News Reader

Top 25 schools whose graduates were the top-rated by recruiters.

online.wsj.com

17 pointscwan17 comments

Just skimming it, I noticed two errors:

1) The University of Maryland is only 4 miles from DC, it is 10 miles from the National Mall.

2) MIT is not in the Ivy League. The Ivy League is an athletic conference and not some subjective grouping of elite institutions. Not to say that it isn't at the same level.

Maybe this is part of some larger story that I'm not finding the links to, but which recruiters? How many? And for what industries? I can't imagine that each of the programs at any given school are of exactly the same quality.

.. and who paid for the survey?

All questions any decent journalist is meant to be open with.

And what criteria are we rating on? "Which schools I make the most commission on" vs. "Schools that produce graduates that satisfy my clients needs" etc.

I see some fairly large schools on there, but I wonder how smaller schools like Rose-Hulman, Case Western, Olin Institute, etc. would stack up if the results were adjusted somehow for size.

Yea, I don't understand at all how this list is made. It can't be based on average-recruit-quality, in any sense, because the highest-average quality schools will always be small ones (simply due to averaging and statistics).

I don't know. A very high-quality small school will have a tendency to get bigger.

Over a long time, perhaps, but probably not quickly. Getting bigger requires more than just attracting more applicants. It also requires hiring more faculty and staff and expanding facilities (which itself eventually requires taking up more land).

Many of the best schools in the US are the small liberal arts colleges (Swarthmore, Williams, Amherst, Pomona, etc).

These schools accept 10% of applicants, have large endowements and could easily triple in size, but they have been the same size for 50+ years.

The last time I listened to some recruiter he added a line on my resume indicating how many lines of code I've produced. While highly inaccurate, every single interviewer who received that resume correctly questioned that line. I listen to what recruiters have to say about this (---) much.

Maintain your resume in latex, only send out a PDF, and give a flat 'no' when recruiters ask if you can give them a copy of your resume in MS Word format. They're specifically asking for Word so they can alter it in ways they think will help them, not you.

Good thing my alma mater is ranked at something because the "nationally ranked" football team is absolute crap this year.

// not bitter at all about 2 losses in the opening season.

Have no fear... we're not so nationally ranked anymore.

I went to Virginia Tech specifically for their extensive co-op program and large & effective career services department; nice to see that they're still running on all cylinders 10 years later.

NB: Having a good engineering & Comp Sci curriculum didn't hurt either.

I also chose Tech for their strong engineering program. But it seemed to have really pick up steam in the last few years and they've developed a strong reputation, internationally. Where if you weren't Ivy, UC, Stanford or MIT you couldn't get much respect.

Last time I stepped foot in Blacksburg they pegged me with $100 parking ticket and wouldn't release my transcripts until it was paid. They get you coming and going!

Unless they've raised rates (entirely possible), the only $100 ticket you could get was parking in a handicapped zone... tsk tsk tsk!

As a UVA student, all I have to say is that it gets better with time. Losing to an FCS team is never easy, but eventually you will be able to laugh again.

At least it was only once. We're making losing to Duke a yearly tradition.

These schools are placement agencies and not education institutions

Reply on news.ycombinator.com