Depends what you kid wants to do. Prestige matters a lot in some fields and not at all in most others. The problem is that whatever your kids wants to do now probably will be different than what they want to do a few years from now, in year 3 or 4 of the degree. /shrug.
Grades matter for entry level jobs since they are an easy way to screen applications
My mom went there; in the end, it was probably my second choice. Always have to qualify it as âWashington UniversityâŚin St. Louis.â
Fun fact: my mom knew Harold Ramis. Very casually, but enough where heâs say hi if they passed each other on the way to class.
Really? Wow. Entry level jobs ask for transcripts?
In other shocking news, certain types of jobs and employers only recruit from a select set of schools
do you mean University of Washington, or Washington University in StL?
in general, i donât think college is a scam, or a bad idea for anyone. for one, i find hard to believe that people should stop learning or exploring their options at 18-19. it doesnât seem like a bad idea to be around people in a similar situation with at least a basic intention of learning. otoh, it is never cut and dry like that, and at a minimum noone should be penalized for waiting a year or five or ten. so, the pressure to go hs->college is definitely scammy, or at the very least an opportunity to scam for unscrupulous admissions, counselors, tutors.
Iâm not saying going to college is a scam, Iâm saying the pressure to pay $70K a year to go to (east coast liberal arts school with a nice quad) is usually a scam.
I went to Wash U in STL.
I think I had to give a transcript for my first job, but most are more interested in GPA
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It sounds like youâre involved in this process, so kudos, but Iâll make the point anyways: 18 year old kids REALLY donât understand the financial impact of student loans yet. Iâm ~10 years post-college now, and there are a ton of people my age who feel like they were never informed how big a difference a decision like public vs private school can make in their student loan payments. Theyâre all theoretical numbers to an 18yo but they become a crippling reality once youâre in your late 20s.
Our generation still had parents and guidance counselors who benefited from super-cheap college, so their perspectives were off. My gf is still angry that no one talked to her about the future implications of choosing a private school instead of a state school for undergrad, but now itâs the difference between having her loans fully paid off vs her current situation of $80k in loans still hanging over her head. Back then it was all âfollow your dream, go to whatever school you want!â
The people really getting hosed (on the parents side) are those making just enough not to qualify for aid. I am pretty sure the FAFSA formula basically expects parents to go to the brink of insolvency to pay for college.
Wait, people donât have their papers graded anonymously in college? Was that a michigan thing? I thought it was more widespread
This story is nuts once you find out about Princetons grade deflationary policies. IIRC, they limit strict percentages of students to getting As, Bs and etc. It turns students against each other and was super shitty⌠at least it was for my wife. Seemed awful.
If this guy was too bad for that environment, he was prob awful. Although thinking about it, I have no idea if theyâre still doing that grade deflationary bullshit
Wasnât a thing at my school. I donât think Iâve ever heard of it tbh, seems like a good idea though
This reminds me of a physics professor who would routinely give tests that everyone would fail, and he would then âT-scoreâ the grades so that they looked reasonable. A 50% would become a 90%.
Allegedly one time someone actually aced a test and got T-scored down to a 98% or something.
I think ChatGPT has killed anonymous grading. The days of handing in one paper at the end of the semester are over.
Which is especially harmful when kids go to apply to grad schools that care about GPA for the lol US News rankings. Youâre truly better off going to a directional state school than Princeton if you want to go to an elite law or medical school. If you want to be a finance bro thereâs no better place obviously.
I donât think I ever had a class like that tbh, all STEM stuff so grades were combinations of multiple assignments and tests.
I bet ChatGPT fucks up a lot of essay grading, I wonder how schools will deal with that going forward
I had one of these guys in grad school for a stat course (I think?). Found it kinda relaxing after the first exam and we understood what he was doing
Wife had that exact thing happen. She still got in but it really dragged down where she could go because she only had a 3.3 or whatever.
She hated that place.
Could have gone to michigan and started with enough credits to have 1.5 years done too
I always say this as my argument for how dumb it is that we entrust 18 year olds to make these financial decisions.
I started playing online poker when I was 15, was always very financially literate from a young age, knew the relative value of money, etc.
For about 6 months, I thought it was a toss up between taking a full tuition scholarship to Michigan and paying full freight to go to Notre Dame. With the perspective I have now, thatâs a laughable decision to even consider.
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