High Cognitive Minds

Serendipity strikes fairly often when I’m surfing the net. In a five minute period yesterday I found an article on why the college you go to is less important these days, and then one on a coach who guarantees high school students acceptance by the first college of their choice.

The author of the first article is a partner in an investment firm specializing in small startups. What he learned in the process of interviewing applicants was that he and his partners tended to favor those from prestigious colleges, assuming that they were the smartest and the best qualified to develop and run a business. And that turned out not be be true.

It turned out that if he just paid attention to the candidate’s ideas, rather than the resume, he couldn’t tell the difference between those who went to the best colleges and those who went to so-so colleges. “...how much you learn in college depends a lot more on you than the college.” Graduates of elite colleges do qualities that give them an edge in some situations: “They're good at doing what they're asked, since that's what it takes to please the adults who judge you at seventeen. And having been to an elite college makes them more confident.”

But being good at what others want isn’t much of an asset for entrepreneurs. Not only that, if you’re starting a business that involves customers or any kind of users, they don’t care what college you attended. All they care about is your product and your service.

These ideas haven’t filtered down to the general public, unfortunately, and for many parents, the contest for their children’s entry into the best schools starts in infancy. In the belief that the right schools do matter, These parents will pull strings, play politics, and pay extraordinary amounts of money to push their kids ahead of the pack. Top college coaches are pulling in as much as $40,000 per student to guide them through the process. And it’s not just a matter of how to fill out the application. The coach’s work sometimes begins while the student is still in middle school, and it involves turning him or her into a brand, into something that the college wants. Nixing summer activities or jobs for something with more class, or steering the student away from some interests and toward others, is also part of the grooming process.

Does all this add up to adult success? Does the image that’s created for college admissions officers have any relation to the real person?  One of the students profiled in the article started as a music major. That was his primary interest at the time, and that’s the image that was created. But he graduated with a degree in religious studies and is working as a paralegal in a law firm.

http://www.paulgraham.com/colleges.html
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_43/b4055063.htm