[quote=flyer]
Your daughter’s aspirations (even though I realize she’s still very young) remind me of the conversations many parents today are having, even with older kids.
Many of the kids today don’t really want to get “real jobs,” and they don’t realize the competition for “dream jobs” is extreme.
My wife runs into the heirs of tech moguls in Hollywood all the time who are immersed in the business–developing/bidding on projects, etc.–and want to be as far away from tech or the way their parents made their money as they can possibly get.
Again, connections prevail, that completely shut out many other very capable individuals. This seems to be holding true in many professions, other than entertainment.
Then, of course, professions that may be “hot” today may not be when kids graduate from college. Again, variables so numerous, that choosing a profession has almost become like throwing darts at a dartboard.
Hopefully, as their kids get older, parents will level with them concerning the realities they will be facing in life.[/quote]
As someone who got accepted at both UCB and UCLA (I went to one of them), I’m actually sad I never had or even tried to go to an ivy. In an economical asian household, UC was considered good enough so that was what I was left with.
I think one point that is mentioned and I agree that it’s the most important is connections. When you go to ivy or Stanford (which I feel is the west coast ivy), you go to school with kids who will probably run their own companies one day. Would’ve Priscilla Chan met Zuck if she didn’t study at Harvard? No…All these college classmates you have will probably be your last friends after school and a lot of these people coming out of these ivys come from families with money (some, not all)…who will start companies and hire you like all those early facebook people. Think Yahoo, Google, you name it and that’s only tech…
If you look around, you can see where the bulk of the fortune 500 CEOs come from. Look on Bloomberg TV and see where all the main reporters come from (IVYs, all). Also, look who runs the government now (ex-Goldman people coming from ivys)…Look at the past presidents…see any UC people there?
That said, yes, not all ivy grads will make it big and not all UC grads will suck shit, but (and this may insult a lot of people), UC people and their parents/families go to UC to just get a ‘decent’ job where they hit some ‘asian/or other’ glass ceiling while ivy league people just start the company with their friends or go to some better job since they knew someone else in that same circle.
I would definitely want my kids to go to Ivy if possible and think UC (having graduated from one), is just worker bee type thinking people.
Maybe it’s just my own limited career/work experience, but the network is worth a lot more I think at a Yale or Harvard while UC is less helpful (due to asians which actually ‘Don’t’ like to help other asians)…
Still, one downside is unless you are culturally fit with these other ivy people, it maybe hard to get into their circle as well. I have some family who did go ivy and due to cultural differences (foreign), didn’t really do much with that and went back to asia…
