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posted by mrpg on Friday April 21 2017, @06:16AM   Printer-friendly
from the college-matters dept.

In a recent study, we investigated how many of the wealthiest and most influential people graduated college. We studied 11,745 U.S. leaders, including CEOs, federal judges, politicians, multi-millionaires and billionaires, business leaders and the most globally powerful men and women.

We found about 94 percent of these U.S. leaders attended college, and about 50 percent attended an elite school. Though almost everyone went to college, elite school attendance varied widely. For instance, only 20.6 percent of House members and 33.8 percent of 30-millionaires attended an elite school, but over 80 percent of Forbes' most powerful people did. For whatever reason, about twice as many senators – 41 percent – as House members went to elite schools.

For comparison, based on census and college data, we estimate that only about 2 to 5 percent of all U.S. undergraduates went to one of the elite schools in our study. The people from our study attended elite schools at rates well above typical expectations.

Why waste $150,000 on an education you could get for $1.50 in late fees at the public library?


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  • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:37AM (16 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:37AM (#497266)

    For whatever reason, about twice as many senators – 41 percent – as House members went to elite schools.

    I like that they don't say that they have no idea why it could be, but I think it is obvious to everyone. It's not what you know, it's who you know. Secret societies, fraternities, etc. Gee, why do most of the country's most powerful politicians come from a small group of elite schools? Gotta maintain this newfangled aristocracy.

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  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:44AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:44AM (#497268)

    You know young rich niggas
    You know so we never really had no old money
    We got a whole lot of new money though, hah

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:51AM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:51AM (#497272)

      Ugh, you're attempt at some sort of authenticity comes off as veiled racism.

      Yes, the "aristocracy" had a few decades of trouble as silicon valley disrupted business as usual. However, as we can all see the wild frontier of possibility is being locked down for strict control and manipulation.

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:59AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @06:59AM (#497279)

        Don't you know hip-hop music is a black youth's ticket out of the poverty trap. More generally any kind of nonproductive work that gains celebrity is the fast track to fortune. Because our civilization is made entirely out of bullshit.

        • (Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Friday April 21 2017, @03:27PM

          by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Friday April 21 2017, @03:27PM (#497452) Journal

          Have faith in America's leaders. They will fix everything. They lead by example. And the people should be inspired to follow in their footsteps:
          1. go to prestigious school
          2. become famous
          3. learn to influence people
          4. become successful

          For instance:
          1. (go to prestigious school) be unable to read, write or speak in complete sentences
          2. (become famous) be a reality tv star, the type of job which is the economic powerhouse of the 21st century
          3. (learn to influence people) use language like Trust Me, I Promise, Believe Me, which is the language of a con man; normal people with reputation of honesty and fair dealing don't talk like this
          4. (become successful) but don't release tax returns or anything that could reveal just how unsuccessful you actually are; or that would let the newer investors know what happened to older investors, or about any possible smoke screens concealing debt, etc

          No specific American leaders were named, and any resemblance to actual persons is unintentional and purely coincidental. Very few animals were harmed in the making of this post.

          --
          People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by ledow on Friday April 21 2017, @09:23AM (8 children)

    by ledow (5567) on Friday April 21 2017, @09:23AM (#497314) Homepage

    Bear in mind, in my country "school" means up to 18 years old.

    I grew up in a rough area, went to state school. Pretty much, I was the only person from my school year to go to university (18-21 years, generally, and completely optional) and graduate, and even then I didn't really do very well. So I come from an "ordinary" background. Neither of my parents have a qualification, for instance. And yet I think I succeeded enough to have an opinion on this.

    I now work in a private school (literally I see the kids move to Eton, Harrow, etc.), and I see the kids there every day. It's almost embarrassing how much better they are.

    Private schools are eye-opening. None of the junk that "school" was about when I was a kid. The kids come in, they come prepared, they come in excited, they work longer and harder than state kids, the parents drive them, lack of discipline (including self-discipline) is not tolerated, there is no hand-holding - if you need to be somewhere, learn something, talk to a teacher, you need to organise it. Whether you're 6 or 16. And you better not be a second late, or miss an appointment. There's teamwork and camaraderie. The kids are there earlier, there till later, and get more done. There's almost no downtime during the day, even during lesson changes.

    I don't doubt that the social aspect is a factor - the "old boys network" definitely exists. But there's a reason that not many state school kids last, even if their parents have the money to send them to private school. They raise the bar. You're there to learn, and to become an educated intellectual person, or you're not there at all. In my country, there's none of this sports-scholarship nonsense. Though they exist, if you can't perform academically as well, you're out.

    Every kid plays an instrument. Not reluctantly, they all play, and perform better than I ever could. Every kids plays every sport. All of them. There are dozens of sports teams for even the tiniest of private schools. They're all better at them than I ever was. Every kid is performing years ahead of state school peers. All of them. Even the ones that get thrown out for not performing. Every kid has dozens of school-run after-school activities to choose from and almost all of them do (or else they go elsewhere and do things too). It's not unusual to still see 10-year-olds in school at 6/7pm even if they're not boarders (don't get me started on how much extra boarders do), after starting at 7am. That doesn't happen in state schools here.

    Is it because they have so-much-better equipment and money to throw at everything? No, not really. If anything, they have traditionally avoided teaching fads and modern technology (though they can catch up very quickly if they see the need). Is it because the teachers are just so-much-better? To a degree. But they don't get paid much more than state school teachers so you're not recruiting geniuses. In my school, the most highly qualified people are two people with PhD's - one's a librarian, one's the headmaster's wife who doesn't teach either. Everyone else just has bachelor's (minimum requirement to teach) or a few of them have master's.

    But private schools just operate differently. Your kids cannot coast in a private school, it's just not possible. If you're going to affect school results, you are out. As such, having got through an elite school is not just a case of money-no-object, but on performance. The situation is the same in the UK, almost every prime minister and senior figure in government, judiciary, etc. are privately educated at elite schools. And we're not even talking about university (e.g. Harvard, Yale) but from Prep schools, to senior schools. You can't even GET into those elite schools without having the same kinds of performance. That's why state school kids can't compete. They're competing against 15 years of that kind of expectation and they have to be very good to catch up. That sort of head-start is what makes them different.

    Go watch "Harrow: A very British education". Those are CHILDREN, not even what I would class as adults (much of US "school" is actually adults). Watch what they are expected to do, and can do, every single day. Watch the level of performance. Watch how much there is no nonsense.

    Now, I'm not saying that, say, all royalty are geniuses just because they got put into those school and are handled with kid gloves just for the prestige, but most of these "elite" people just aren't important enough to a private school system to care about them differently. If they got there, it's not just because daddy is rich (all the daddies are rich), it's not just because they have a title (the titles mean nothing if they're going to have to publicly fail them for not being good enough), it's not just because generations of their family went to the school (that might get you in, but it won't keep you there). It's because they literally perform better because of the advantages of such an education, which most of them have had since they were 4 years old.

    They also come out with some amazing social skills, able to argue adults in circles just like politicians can from even a young age. They are educated, intellectual, well-versed, used to public speaking and persuasion and able to manipulate and study people, because they'd done it all their lives and been "trained" to do it.

    There's a reason the people trained at "elite" institutions end up in positions of power. It's not just "jobs for the boys". They have had a lifetime of education and intellectual stimulation.

    I'm not saying a college drop-out can't be a billionaire, we know that to be true.
    I'm not saying a private education makes EVERYONE a genius, we know that's not true.
    I'm not saying that a private education is entirely merit-based across the globe.

    But there's a correlation there, and a causation.

    Until I worked in a private school, I too thought they were just snobby places where everyone was patted on the back for being Hugo Montague Winthrope III. But that's not true of all the ones I've worked in.

    If that translates up to elite universities, etc. (which it does), and that most statistics show privately-educated people are in higher-paid, higher-responsibility, higher-prestige, etc. positions in later life (they do), then I can see why. I see it everyday.

    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 21 2017, @10:31AM (4 children)

      by kaszz (4211) on Friday April 21 2017, @10:31AM (#497332) Journal

      So parents that considers it a virtue to study diligently and a no bullshit teaching environment is the key?

      I'll guess that no child left behind test schooling is not prioritized at those places..

      • (Score: 2) by TheRaven on Friday April 21 2017, @02:13PM (1 child)

        by TheRaven (270) on Friday April 21 2017, @02:13PM (#497404) Journal
        Parental involvement is the only factor that has consistently been shown to improve performance. I went to a school not too dissimilar to the one that the grandparent describes. Around 5-10% of the top year were awarded places to Oxford or Cambridge each year. Not everyone there was wealthy (and no one was super wealthy - one son of a rich person was turned away because he insisted on security arrangements that the school thought would impact other students too much), and there was an assisted places scheme to cover the fees for people from poorer backgrounds. Pretty much everyone had supportive parents and you were expected to work at school, and if you didn't work and your parents didn't do anything to sort out the issues then you were expelled (this happened very rarely - I think to three people in my year over a 11 years).

        My godmother's children went to a state school, but in a prosperous middle class area and had quite a similar experience. Their school wasn't quite as well funded, but whenever they organised a fundraising event to make up the shortfall in government funding they'd have parents helping out and lots of cash flowing in. In contrast, state schools in poorer areas often have parents working such long hours that they can't support the students and with no disposable income to support the students.

        --
        sudo mod me up
        • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 21 2017, @02:36PM

          by kaszz (4211) on Friday April 21 2017, @02:36PM (#497417) Journal

          Isn't parental involvement actually exactly that. The virtue to study?

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by ledow on Friday April 21 2017, @05:28PM (1 child)

        by ledow (5567) on Friday April 21 2017, @05:28PM (#497500) Homepage

        If you commute your teaching down to the average, your school will perform in the averages.

        Yes, pretty much, high demands are made of everyone. There are learning support (what used to be called "special needs") procedures and departments but they don't generally deal with anything near what a state SEN department would.

        And that's the problem. Although putting SEN kids (real ones) into a school makes them feel "normal" and maybe even raise their results (the science is very mixed on this, I'm not convinced that it helps them except socially, personally), it does slow down the other non-SEN kids to a certain extent, whether by taking away staff, time or resources that could be used elsewhere, or just on the impact in the classroom on behaviour, etc.

        Years ago, we would separate out children by ability (grammar schools, etc.) and then again by behaviour ("special" schools). We don't do that any more. While that might be good for the averages, for the expense and for the kids suffering, it can actually have a negative overall effect on the normal school intake.

        Part of the reason that "Academies" in the UK are able to produce temporary (1-2 years) results improvements is because they are outside regulations on who they can kick out and who they have to accept (i.e. all the kids kicked out of other schools). So after conversion from a normal state to an academy, results skyrocket. Until they are then forced to take back normal intakes - including SEN and others - when it all returns to normal.

        Private schools are literally taking those who want to learn. Same as highly-religious schools (where nonsense isn't tolerated), and well-funded schools (e.g. new Academies, those associated to particular charities or organisations, etc.).

        The question of whether this is "right" is a moral one. But before we jump into the "he became prime minister only because he has a rich daddy and all his friends are already there", we have to consider whether there's a reason behind that that's more than just "jobs for the boys". From what I see, there is quite clearly an advantage to a selective, attentive, well-funded and parent-backed education. And that correlates more highly to such positions than "who my father was", except indirectly.

        Celebrity children, for instance, are often pains in the arses to deal with. The rich celebrity thinks that no matter how stupid their child is, paying more money should see them through the school with A grades. That's not how it works. In fact, if anything, private schools aren't swayed by "new money" people, because their reputation and results are worth a lot more to them for ongoing business than saying that they have a reality show millionaire's son in the house.

        • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 21 2017, @11:41PM

          by kaszz (4211) on Friday April 21 2017, @11:41PM (#497665) Journal

          It seems that self control, self determination and a calm environment is really important key issues. So the question becomes really what would one need to break free from school and that is really money. If the state gets to steal them, then it will undermine this (on purpose?).

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday April 21 2017, @06:07PM (1 child)

      by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Friday April 21 2017, @06:07PM (#497515) Journal

      Thanks for the comment. I completely agree. I've taught in a lot of different kinds of schools over the years -- before going to graduate school, I taught in high schools, both a public lower-middle-class school and an elite private school that fed to the Ivy League. I've also taught at universities of different levels of prestige.

      At least in the U.S., I think a lot of it really is happening at the primary and secondary level. Everyone thinks that "college" is the way to get ahead, but really the gateway is the prep schools. I agree completely with the description -- I taught physics at that Ivy League feeder school I mentioned, and most of the kids were amazing.

      Something significant I'd add about my experience: support for teachers was also completely different too. There were a lot of teachers with masters degrees and several with doctorates, but that's not what made the difference. The whole school community was dedicated to teaching.

      In a typical public school classroom, you often have a couple "classroom visitations" by an administrator each year. Those are the days when all the kids are worried because the principal is in class or whatever; they're generally scheduled in advance. After the observation, you'd get some sheet with a few lines of written feedback from the principal; unless you were a disaster, nothing else generally happens.

      Not in the private secondary school I was at. In a "normal year," you had visitations on a regular basis from a "master teacher," who would generally have an extended chat with you after each observation, talking about potential pedagogical strategies. The head of the secondary school would simply wander into my class maybe once or twice each month unannounced and just "hang out," talk to the kids a bit if they were doing a lab activity, and just see how things were going. At first, this was nerve-racking to me, but I quickly got used to it -- they were there to help, and the kids were used to it, so it didn't disrupt or change class dynamics when they showed up.

      I wasn't there long enough to go through the more intensive process, but after a few years, each teacher would pair with a "master teacher" mentor for a year and go through a series of even more intense observations and detailed discussion about how to improve your teaching skills or come up with new strategies. Every teacher repeated this pairing with some other teacher every few years, encouraging collaboration and different perspectives. The "master teachers" were ones who had been through this process several times and existed as a committee at the school level, available for consultation on demand as well.

      The strange thing about this all is that it was enjoyable. It wasn't the authoritarian structure of a public school where the "principal is coming to class today!" Even when the head of school wandered in, it was just like having another teacher hanging out (he too continued to teach a class, even with his administrative responsibilities). And it wasn't like the awful "pedagogy classes" I went through with some professor pontificating on incredibly generic strategies that weren't really useful in any specific case. This was true mentorship, where everyone really just cared about making the school better, and you had individual conversations with colleagues who wanted to help you and were interested in your particular teaching.

      And, similar to your experience, it wasn't about teaching "innovations" for innovation's sake. It wasn't about buzz words. It was about real conversation about connecting with your students and often making subtle tweaks that could help them learn better.

      I don't know that every private school has this sort of thing, but I've known teachers at other elite private schools in the U.S., and I've heard similar stories. Teachers are drawn there because they know they'll teach smart kids who are interested in learning (not because they'll earn better salaries, because they generally don't get a lot more than public school teachers, frequently even less). They stay because they have a supportive community that cares about teaching and learning, and the kids pick up on that, which is why they care about learning. (This type of community also promotes mentorship, which the kids pick up on and likely leads them to be more proactive about making connections and networking later in life.)

      Even many of the GOOD public school teachers I knew had an ultimate goal of the "standard lesson plan" -- after teaching a class for 3 or 4 years, they'd have a blueprint that made their life so much easier. In contrast, many of my colleagues at a private school found intellectual stimulation in changing up some aspects of their curricula every year. And without state mandated curricula telling you what you had to do every week, you had the freedom to explore such options. It really was a community of lifelong learning, both for teachers and students.

      None of this is to disparage public school teachers. I've seen some slackers as teachers there, but I've also seen plenty of public school teachers who care A LOT too. But the community and support is just different... not to mention the most significant factor: in public schools, I generally taught 6 sections with a total of ~150 kids each year. In the private school, I taught 4 class sections, with a total of ~50 kids. That made a HUGE difference in the kind of interactions I could have with my students and the time I could devote to preparation, grading, etc. I barely remember any of the students I had taught in public high schools, because there were just so many of them. But I still can think back fondly on many of the students at that private school, because I got to know a significant number of them very well.

      And they cared about me too: when it was announced at a schoolwide meeting that I'd be leaving and going to graduate school, I had students I hadn't even taught stop by my classroom afterward just to congratulate me and tell me how their friends enjoyed my classes and how they were sad they wouldn't get to take a class with me next year. What kind of teenager does that sort of thing? But that was normal in that community.

      • (Score: 2) by ledow on Friday April 21 2017, @11:18PM

        by ledow (5567) on Friday April 21 2017, @11:18PM (#497649) Homepage

        Precisely.

        The school environment is radically different. Though in the background the drive for results is that, it's not the focus. The focus is on getting the kids to the point where they know that themselves, and drive that themselves, and have enough interest, support and enjoyment to make themselves do what's needed.

        I spent years in school feeling "held back" by my peers, my teachers, even the senior teachers and "best friend" teachers. They could not deviate, or take time to do things. I was a pest because I finished my work and wanted to move on and couldn't because it wasn't on their plan and they had to get all the others even STARTED on their task. Because I was "obviously" going to do okay, I was sidelined. There was little point wasting time on me when they could get a borderline kid into something that showed up on the results tables, or their appraisal. It wasn't just a handful of poor or distracted or overworked teachers, they had no drive for their subject because it had been sucked out of them by administration. I'm not bitter, I did better than virtually everyone else there, and I came out with the greatest gift of all - realising that's not how it should work and learning was a thing you needed to be able to do for your whole life. The frustration actually instilled it in me to do it myself, after a while. And the teachers who tried will always be the "best" teachers I will remember long after they're dead.

        As an adult, I worked for state schools for about 10 years. The same was true on the backend as an adult as I saw first-hand as a child. Kids were side-lined because they over-achieved, while those who played up got all the time and attention. I started to take activities and extracurricular classes, as a way to give what I had to those kids who could benefit from it. It worked, I was proud, I made differences. I literally had people CRYING in my office because they lost pages from their lesson plan, I had teachers REFUSE to let me backup their data because it contained a lesson plan (like it was some kind of top-secret document) and they didn't want me to see it in case I gave it to another teacher. It was literally that bad (and pointless, I'd like to point out, because the lesson plans were not even that good and often cribbed from Internet sources and even paid books full of nothing but lesson plans).

        But then an opportunity came up at a private school. I'll be honest, it was luck. I responded to a forum post for a job, at exactly the time I was hating the school I was at, when all the staff were changing for pen-pushing morons who couldn't speak to adults, let alone children. Instantly a reply come back that I'd be perfect and would I like an interview. The next day I sat an interview with a private school. Within a few weeks I was working there.

        It totally changed my opinion. I stood at the backs of classes while I did my work (IT), or watched the lessons from afar. I got kids who were interested BROUGHT TO ME (the IT guy) because staff recognised an interest within the child and thought they could benefit by speaking to me and helping me out. It was literally a place to walk in, help people learn and then go home. Little else was involved, and everyone had a focus. Sure, there are endless meetings about all kinds of things for the teaching staff, of course, but that's more to do with legislation, professional development, and even just working out what to do and how to apply things. The teachers work just as hard but there's a purpose rather than a checklist.

        And if a child deviates in the middle of the lesson, people know their subjects and jump off to deal with the deviation, provide the knowledge and then steer it back to the topic. It's all there, in their heads, not on paper in a lesson plan. I'm sure they have things written down. I'm sure they have to cover topics fully. I'm sure they have checkboxes to tick. But that's NOT the lesson. I've never seen anyone care about lesson plans in private school, in fact they tend to throw them all on Google Docs or a shared drive for everyone else to be able to see "best practice".

        And the kids thrive. They make friends with the caretaker not because he's a nice old man, but because he shares their love of plants, or playing guitar, or even mathematics. The parents know the staff, the staff know the kids. The kids come to ask questions. They'll come out of hours, to anyone who can answer, and they'll listen and learn and come back and show you what they've learned.

        Until you work there, you can't quite understand it. You can stop a random, say, 7-year-old in a Prep school. You can have a conversation with them just like an adult. They'll talk to you about all kinds of things. They won't clam up, or not want to be seen talking to you, or be embarrassed. Then they'll come and find you later in the year just to show you something they think you might be interested in because of that conversation, even if they aren't into it. They'll find their friend that plays guitar (or whatever) and bring them to you because they thought that the two of you might be able to talk and learn from each other.

        It's an entirely different kind of atmosphere.

        And I cannot see a single reason that all that wouldn't translate positively to adulthood, further education, the rest of their lives, career and experiences.

        My school has things like "breakfast with the headmaster", kids look forward to it because they like talking to him and being invited to do so, and it makes them feel like any other adult to be allowed to do so and have the same expectations of them as any member of staff doing the same.

        It's not because "breakfast with the headmaster" would turn any school into a fabulous wonderful place. It's because it's just a natural consequence of the kind of atmosphere, people and pupils that are already in place.

        And, to be honest, I meet an awful lot of parents, and an awful lot of alumni (even the ones in their 80's still come back every year to talk to the teachers and look around the school again). They're just pleasant, educated, intellectual people. They'll talk to the caretaker in the same friendly joking way as they talk, swearing away, and they'll talk to the headmaster or the governors laughing politely in an official meeting. They get on with people at all levels, because they understand all levels, because people are all people, all different to them, and they know how to talk to the them. They're not upper-class twits or better-than-thou's.

        They've been taught to be well-rounded individuals who just want to learn about others, and learn from them, and teach them things. And that's because that's what private schools have always taught them.

        And, yes. Some of them are politicians. Most of them are successful. And one of them came back to work as a caretaker at the same school he was a pupil at 50 years earlier. The caretaker who has better elocution and knowledge of some subjects than the people now teaching it. He just slots back into the atmosphere because after having his life, he decided it was the best place to start his slide into retirement.

        If I could afford it, I'd put my kid through that system immediately.

    • (Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Monday April 24 2017, @07:05PM

      by linkdude64 (5482) on Monday April 24 2017, @07:05PM (#499002)

      Uh, yeah, sure, that was like a really detailed and informative perspective or whatever but you didn't even mention skin color once???????????

      /sarcasm, for the record

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @12:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 21 2017, @12:57PM (#497371)

    One more group to add to the list, the country club set. I noticed this years ago (USA) -- all the big deals seemed to be nailed down on the golf course.

    I don't play golf, de facto limits me to smaller deals...

  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Weasley on Friday April 21 2017, @04:50PM

    by Weasley (6421) on Friday April 21 2017, @04:50PM (#497488)

    I think it is obvious to everyone

    But it's not. The middle-class/lower-class believes that success comes through competence and hard work. They willfully ignore the fact that the highest levels of leadership are usually appointments from among the ranks of the upper class, and that upward mobility is far more rare than they think.

  • (Score: 2) by eravnrekaree on Friday April 21 2017, @08:18PM

    by eravnrekaree (555) on Friday April 21 2017, @08:18PM (#497571)

    The reason for the statistics is not that college produces geniuses but that its a way to keep the same elite families in power. Look at the average politician and large corporations in the USA, companies like GM which were destroyed by these geniuses and the fact that politicians have run the country trillions into debt, started pointless wars, etc. It contradicts the idea that they are where they are because of merit. Its due to the elite cabal who keep the same families in power and the only point of elite college is to keep these famileis in power, the ive league is sort of like a certificate of belonging in the elite cabal where elite parents certify their children to be elite like themselves.