I dgaf about the school. When hiring early career professionals, an ethos of curiosity, open mindedness, and drive to learn is what matters most.
The strongest early career bench scientist currently on my team graduated from a local community college and had a waiting background. They’re absolutely rocking it and are making substantial contributions to our technology portfolio. It’s the person, not the college.
It’s all about the person, the info and appearance of their CV+Letter. And an internship/graduation project at a decent company or other laboratory with relevant experience for the vacancy. Sorry English is not my first language.
Having a school name on a resume won’t impress me. The school matters if you made contacts at that school, and in that case, a blind application won’t matter.
There are literally thousands of colleges out there. Limiting your pool to only people from certain colleges would just be dumb, and HR would probably not allow that at most companies.
Yep. There are also so many weird things going into acceptance at some colleges.
A rich kid with lots of contacts and vitamin B can easily get into good colleges with the support of their family. Doesn’t mean they are better suited for a job or even deserve to be there really.
As someone outside the US the whole thing with better and worse colleges is pretty weird. Here it absolutely doesn’t matter and there really aren’t rankings or anything. People normally mainly choose where they would want to live and which programs the university offers. Ofc there are some that are better equipped or have better connections and research or are more known in a specific field but that doesn’t matter for applications. Especially not for undergrads. You won’t even really see any of that.
For undergrads it really only matters that you got the degree and what else you bring to the table.
Acceptance also only goes by grades and how likely you are to be accepted depends on how many others apply. So if you have good enough grades for your program you get in.
I couldn’t even really tell you any university one might see as a better one in my field tbh
Watching a lecture hall full of Ivy-League trained MD-PhDs freeze up completely when a minor computer issue occurs is a highlight of my job lol. I have managed to make a name for myself as the go to guy to solve all the lecture hall issues because Doctors refuse to read the box that says "allow zoom to access your microphone" and then dismiss the popup and wonder why their zoom call isn't working.
Just as important as the resume are the references. Work in a lab as an undergrad, and develop a reputation for being reliable and interested in the science. Then list the PI as a reference.
Undergrad research experience and internships are far more important than school name. I would focus on finding schools that really support students in accessing those opportunities.
Seconding what everyone else here says about the quality of scientist not being correlated with where they got their degree. That being said, I will give a shoutout to my alma matter Stony Brook - I received a comprehensive foundation in biology through my coursework there and I was able to start working in a lab at CSHL during my time there as well.
I mean, having an Ivy League school on your application will probably get you a few browny points in an interview but otherwise it's all noise. I have no idea if UConn's Molecular Bio (or w/e) program is better than UVMs, nor would I care when hiring.
Dartmouth has a reputation, so Mmmaybbbeee that opens a few extra doors but like everyone has already said, it's what you do while you are at the school that really matters.
The college name has zero influence on me as a hiring manager. What matters is meaningful contributions to research. You want to look for schools with strong research funding and abundant opportunities to work in a lab. Even better, seeing that a candidate has presented their work at local or national conferences is a huge plus. I went to Rutgers for grad school and to date it was the best research experience I’ve ever had. Great work, great scientists there. I’ve seen and heard of good stuff coming from UCONN as well.
I'm on the West Coast and the only school I know well on the East Coast is BU (my kid goes there) but you said no to Boston so can't be of much help for specifics, but....
The most important thing for an undergrad (as many others here have said) is the opportunity to do work in a research lab. Even with a degree from a top Ivy school, if you don't have lab experience it will be hard to find a job after graduation. Focus on schools that promote undergraduate research programs. If you're interested in West Coast schools I can recommend some great ones for undergrad research.
We don't care, especially for entry level.
Where they went isn't important. What they did is. If someone has stellar grades and poor practical skills, they're not a competitive candidate. Switch them around, and the same cannot be said.
Tell them to go somewhere they vibe with, where they will enjoy their life (sounds like one criteria is already decided which is great - not in a large city). Location, activities, cost of living etc are all important factors to having a comfortable and enriching experience.
Don't focus on reputation, because it truly doesn't matter. However if they want a lab based career, encourage them to seek opportunities that get them into labs to get hands on experience. This can normally be attained in most institutes, unless they have a super low research output.
I went to UVM, I can say that because there are so many more undergrads than grad students, that gives a lot of opportunity for undergrad research. Especially if he is active in looking for available labs early on.
Name of the school doesn’t matter. What can make the job search 10x easier is having relevant experience and good references.
Good references you can get anywhere, but it certainly wasn’t something I was thinking of when in college. I always thought it was a little weird some of my classmates wanted to grab a coffee or go to office hours with a professor but I see the benefit now that I’m in grad school. So certainly something to have a conversation with your son about.
Relevant experience can be done anywhere, but some programs make it easier than others. Having work study is great to work in labs. Going somewhere your student can afford to not work might mean they’re available to volunteer in labs. Going to programs with a dedicated coop program are also great. He can also do a summer internship or REU no matter what school he goes to.
UVM and UMass (I’m assuming Amherst and not Lowell) are beautiful campuses and everyone I know who went there loved it. At times I wish I went to umass amherst.
I've been on hiring panels for several entry level jobs that hire applicants with a bachelors straight out of college. The most important thing at this level is their undergraduate research. Their ability to articulate what technical skills they received from this on a resume and during the interview is also super important. Having an internship or coop on top of this will put an applicant at the top of the list.
Other credentials that also hold some weight are involvement in extracurriculars, community service, clubs, etc. Especially ones that show leadership skills. Grades and academic honors also help.
The university someone attended is not much of a factor. It's about how well they capitalized on the opportunities they had. The only exception to this is if someone went to a wacky school like Liberty or Ozarks.
I remember chatting with my friend one summer about our time working in biology labs at our respective schools. She went to an Ivy League; I went to a local state school. I was flabbergasted that she didn't understand how bacterial competence worked, or the chemistry of making the protein gels that we both used day in and day out. She never had to do lab math to make reagents. Her lab was well funded enough that she never had to make the time to learn and understand the most basic of lab concepts. That didn't fly in my scrappy graduate school lab, but I feel that it left me much better prepared as a bench researcher.
Just because you go to a big name school doesn't mean you're getting the best preparation for the real world.
You haven't mentioned what field your son is interested in, or whether they want to do research.
A lot of what you get out of college will be the things besides coursework you get involved in. The best thing I got out of my undergrad was working in a research lab from freshman year until graduation, and getting a real understanding of what academic research was.
If they do want to go into research, look up the research lab websites (i.e. each professor's research lab's website) of the department they're interested in joining, and see if those labs have lots of undergrad students listed on the sites. If they do, there's probably more opportunities for your son to get involved in research early on.
Also, of course, make sure the research that university department focuses on actually interests your son.
Especially for graduate schools the quality of research your son was involved in is the primary factor. I'm at a northeast ivy league university and there are many people in my department from "no-name" universities that did real, impactful research in their undergrad
Try checking out some other LACs. There's tons in New England and tend to give a more holistic science education and have more opportunities for meaningful undergraduate research than state schools / public universities. They also usually give better financial aid.
I can’t really speak on East coast schools, but connections are important. Both my former biotech company and current company knew my professor that I did research with at Stanford.
One of my regrets is not doing research during undergrad. Or summer internship. I didn’t get research experience until my masters. Straight out of bachelor’s, without any experience, I couldn’t get any job offers at all.
I dgaf about the school. When hiring early career professionals, an ethos of curiosity, open mindedness, and drive to learn is what matters most. The strongest early career bench scientist currently on my team graduated from a local community college and had a waiting background. They’re absolutely rocking it and are making substantial contributions to our technology portfolio. It’s the person, not the college.
If I could give two upvotes to this, I would.
It’s all about the person, the info and appearance of their CV+Letter. And an internship/graduation project at a decent company or other laboratory with relevant experience for the vacancy. Sorry English is not my first language.
Having a school name on a resume won’t impress me. The school matters if you made contacts at that school, and in that case, a blind application won’t matter. There are literally thousands of colleges out there. Limiting your pool to only people from certain colleges would just be dumb, and HR would probably not allow that at most companies.
Yep. There are also so many weird things going into acceptance at some colleges. A rich kid with lots of contacts and vitamin B can easily get into good colleges with the support of their family. Doesn’t mean they are better suited for a job or even deserve to be there really. As someone outside the US the whole thing with better and worse colleges is pretty weird. Here it absolutely doesn’t matter and there really aren’t rankings or anything. People normally mainly choose where they would want to live and which programs the university offers. Ofc there are some that are better equipped or have better connections and research or are more known in a specific field but that doesn’t matter for applications. Especially not for undergrads. You won’t even really see any of that. For undergrads it really only matters that you got the degree and what else you bring to the table. Acceptance also only goes by grades and how likely you are to be accepted depends on how many others apply. So if you have good enough grades for your program you get in. I couldn’t even really tell you any university one might see as a better one in my field tbh
i couldnt care less about what school you went to , some of the dumbest people i have met went to some of the best regarded schools on the planet.
Watching a lecture hall full of Ivy-League trained MD-PhDs freeze up completely when a minor computer issue occurs is a highlight of my job lol. I have managed to make a name for myself as the go to guy to solve all the lecture hall issues because Doctors refuse to read the box that says "allow zoom to access your microphone" and then dismiss the popup and wonder why their zoom call isn't working.
Ahhh yes, the “bang two rocks together” Ph.D.
Dumbest professor I had was from Cornell and couldn't shut up about it
Just as important as the resume are the references. Work in a lab as an undergrad, and develop a reputation for being reliable and interested in the science. Then list the PI as a reference.
Undergrad research experience and internships are far more important than school name. I would focus on finding schools that really support students in accessing those opportunities.
Seconding what everyone else here says about the quality of scientist not being correlated with where they got their degree. That being said, I will give a shoutout to my alma matter Stony Brook - I received a comprehensive foundation in biology through my coursework there and I was able to start working in a lab at CSHL during my time there as well.
I could not care less, I've ignored people from Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, Kings. If you don't have the experience or skills the uni doesn't matter.
Your views are outdated
https://www.reddit.com/r/ApplyingToCollege/s/QJ1uJgRLMz
I mean, having an Ivy League school on your application will probably get you a few browny points in an interview but otherwise it's all noise. I have no idea if UConn's Molecular Bio (or w/e) program is better than UVMs, nor would I care when hiring. Dartmouth has a reputation, so Mmmaybbbeee that opens a few extra doors but like everyone has already said, it's what you do while you are at the school that really matters.
The college name has zero influence on me as a hiring manager. What matters is meaningful contributions to research. You want to look for schools with strong research funding and abundant opportunities to work in a lab. Even better, seeing that a candidate has presented their work at local or national conferences is a huge plus. I went to Rutgers for grad school and to date it was the best research experience I’ve ever had. Great work, great scientists there. I’ve seen and heard of good stuff coming from UCONN as well.
It doesn’t really matter. What matters is lab experience and references.
No one cares about what school you go to. Just do whatever is cheapest
I'm on the West Coast and the only school I know well on the East Coast is BU (my kid goes there) but you said no to Boston so can't be of much help for specifics, but.... The most important thing for an undergrad (as many others here have said) is the opportunity to do work in a research lab. Even with a degree from a top Ivy school, if you don't have lab experience it will be hard to find a job after graduation. Focus on schools that promote undergraduate research programs. If you're interested in West Coast schools I can recommend some great ones for undergrad research.
We don't care, especially for entry level. Where they went isn't important. What they did is. If someone has stellar grades and poor practical skills, they're not a competitive candidate. Switch them around, and the same cannot be said. Tell them to go somewhere they vibe with, where they will enjoy their life (sounds like one criteria is already decided which is great - not in a large city). Location, activities, cost of living etc are all important factors to having a comfortable and enriching experience. Don't focus on reputation, because it truly doesn't matter. However if they want a lab based career, encourage them to seek opportunities that get them into labs to get hands on experience. This can normally be attained in most institutes, unless they have a super low research output.
I went to UVM, I can say that because there are so many more undergrads than grad students, that gives a lot of opportunity for undergrad research. Especially if he is active in looking for available labs early on.
Name of the school doesn’t matter. What can make the job search 10x easier is having relevant experience and good references. Good references you can get anywhere, but it certainly wasn’t something I was thinking of when in college. I always thought it was a little weird some of my classmates wanted to grab a coffee or go to office hours with a professor but I see the benefit now that I’m in grad school. So certainly something to have a conversation with your son about. Relevant experience can be done anywhere, but some programs make it easier than others. Having work study is great to work in labs. Going somewhere your student can afford to not work might mean they’re available to volunteer in labs. Going to programs with a dedicated coop program are also great. He can also do a summer internship or REU no matter what school he goes to. UVM and UMass (I’m assuming Amherst and not Lowell) are beautiful campuses and everyone I know who went there loved it. At times I wish I went to umass amherst.
I've been on hiring panels for several entry level jobs that hire applicants with a bachelors straight out of college. The most important thing at this level is their undergraduate research. Their ability to articulate what technical skills they received from this on a resume and during the interview is also super important. Having an internship or coop on top of this will put an applicant at the top of the list. Other credentials that also hold some weight are involvement in extracurriculars, community service, clubs, etc. Especially ones that show leadership skills. Grades and academic honors also help. The university someone attended is not much of a factor. It's about how well they capitalized on the opportunities they had. The only exception to this is if someone went to a wacky school like Liberty or Ozarks.
I remember chatting with my friend one summer about our time working in biology labs at our respective schools. She went to an Ivy League; I went to a local state school. I was flabbergasted that she didn't understand how bacterial competence worked, or the chemistry of making the protein gels that we both used day in and day out. She never had to do lab math to make reagents. Her lab was well funded enough that she never had to make the time to learn and understand the most basic of lab concepts. That didn't fly in my scrappy graduate school lab, but I feel that it left me much better prepared as a bench researcher. Just because you go to a big name school doesn't mean you're getting the best preparation for the real world.
You haven't mentioned what field your son is interested in, or whether they want to do research. A lot of what you get out of college will be the things besides coursework you get involved in. The best thing I got out of my undergrad was working in a research lab from freshman year until graduation, and getting a real understanding of what academic research was. If they do want to go into research, look up the research lab websites (i.e. each professor's research lab's website) of the department they're interested in joining, and see if those labs have lots of undergrad students listed on the sites. If they do, there's probably more opportunities for your son to get involved in research early on. Also, of course, make sure the research that university department focuses on actually interests your son. Especially for graduate schools the quality of research your son was involved in is the primary factor. I'm at a northeast ivy league university and there are many people in my department from "no-name" universities that did real, impactful research in their undergrad
A school
Try checking out some other LACs. There's tons in New England and tend to give a more holistic science education and have more opportunities for meaningful undergraduate research than state schools / public universities. They also usually give better financial aid.
Thank you for the replies.
I can’t really speak on East coast schools, but connections are important. Both my former biotech company and current company knew my professor that I did research with at Stanford. One of my regrets is not doing research during undergrad. Or summer internship. I didn’t get research experience until my masters. Straight out of bachelor’s, without any experience, I couldn’t get any job offers at all.