Prestige of a school and your job

[Reason7194]

Hello everyone, I would like to ask the 'older' (Those who have atteneded college/Univ' and now have a career) users of HTS about how much the prestige of college/Univ' actually matters when applying for a job. Does the same education have the same result when applying for a job(Career type job)?

For example: A student has graduated with a four year degree. He/she went to a standard University called "University of Texas Dallas". Another student graduated with the same degree at a school like Harvard. Would the student who attended Harvard have a better chance at his/her career job?

[insomaniacal]

It depends on the employer's criteria. A degree from Harvard or an Ivy-League will always look more impressive though.

[Reason7194]

Ah, well ok

[midnite_cowboy]

My 2 cents:
In my experience (10 years dev), what most employers care about is (in that order):

1) personality (do you work well with others? would (in time) you make a good team leader? how good you'd be dealing with customers directly?, etc )
2) work experience (besides the job itself, the care about the QUALITY of your work experience, ie: what good practices are you used to work with? [1]? Will they have to "untrain" you from bad work habits?)
3) skill set ( languages, OSs, DBMSs, etc) Can you pick up a book and figure the answer up by yourself?
...
n) College/Univ degree (MIT Phd? Art Major at local community college?)

To sum up: most companies don't give a damn about your degree. They care about YOU, how you'd get along with the rest of the team, your potential to grow and mature in your job, etc . You'll be surprised how easily they'll relax they requirements (ie: 2 years of JAVA experience) if the "like" you.
One final piece of advice. Be honest. You won't fool anyone and even if you don't get the job you'll leave a good impression on you interviewer and maybe you'll be offered another position better suited to your actual skills.

[1] The Joel Test: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/ ... 00043.html

Cheers

[Reason7194]

My 2 cents:
In my experience (10 years dev), what most employers care about is (in that order):

1) personality (do you work well with others? would (in time) you make a good team leader? how good you'd be dealing with customers directly?, etc )
2) work experience (besides the job itself, the care about the QUALITY of your work experience, ie: what good practices are you used to work with? [1]? Will they have to "untrain" you from bad work habits?)
3) skill set ( languages, OSs, DBMSs, etc) Can you pick up a book and figure the answer up by yourself?
...
n) College/Univ degree (MIT Phd? Art Major at local community college?)

To sum up: most companies don't give a damn about your degree. They care about YOU, how you'd get along with the rest of the team, your potential to grow and mature in your job, etc . You'll be surprised how easily they'll relax they requirements (ie: 2 years of JAVA experience) if the "like" you.
One final piece of advice. Be honest. You won't fool anyone and even if you don't get the job you'll leave a good impression on you interviewer and maybe you'll be offered another position better suited to your actual skills.

[1] The Joel Test: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/ ... 00043.html

Cheers

Cheers indeed. From sad panda to Mr.Sunbeam, I thank you.