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I graduated from University of Washington, a school that ranks 41st on that list. My roommate in my freshman year of college was Chinese. His dad, a college professor in Hong Kong, always gave him shit for not attending a university that placed higher in the rankings. This is despite the fact that my roommate was a computer science major, and UW has one of the best Comp-Sci programs in the nation. It always seemed to me that his dad cared more about the prestige factor than the actual quality of education his son received. It wouldn't surprise me to find out he has dreams about bragging to his friends that his son went to Harvard or Princeton.

What a shame.

6 comments

Doesn't US news have per-degree rankings? If not, taking a more "objective" ranking in computer science of the number of paper awards received at CS conferences [http://jeffhuang.com/best_paper_awards.html#institutions], UW easily places in #3, among Stanford, CMU, and MIT. Maybe the roommate could show his dad that...

Yes; they publish degree-specific rankings (at least for grad school). However, it remains that people will still consider UW inferior to grad schools even if you went there for CS. When you tell people what school you went to, they're not going to cross reference it with your degree.

Speaking specifically of computer science programs, in eastern Canada (mostly Quebec and Ontario), there's a computer science contest called the CS Games. It's mostly just for fun and networking, but it's interesting to see where different universities ranked in different events. Relatively unknown universities like Carleton (my alma mater) placed excellently in extreme programming and algorithms, but not so well in debugging and shell scripting.

But to draw a parallel to your comment, both Sherbrooke and Harvard attended. Sherbrooke being relatively unknown outside of computer science circles. Well that year, Sherbrooke absolutely dominated every competition placing 4th or better in every event, and 1st overall. Harvard however placed last nearly every event (except AI where they were in the middle of the pack).

Looking at the overall reputations of both of these universities, Harvard is by far the more well known and respected. Just like the article was saying, overall rankings aren't very useful, and that if you're serious about getting a good education, you'll have to dig deeper.

Well to be fair Harvard isn't ranked that highly for CS, and this single data point doesn't say a whole lot about it either. You'll find CS undergrads that are willing to enter, but would place last in this competition at MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Carnegie Mellon.... every school.

Just playing devil's advocate here. Rankings are a crapshoot, and I don't love the Ivies at all.

A competition isn't necessarily the best metric b/c the competitors are going to be a biased subset of the overall student body, and may not actually represent the quality of the education. I didn't go to a great school but there were still some very brilliant people there.

It's just a Chinese Parent thing. I went to Berkeley (EECS) but my mom is always telling me about her friend's son who's doing a PhD at Harvard, or her friend's son who's a director at some chip firm, etc. You get used to it after a while.

If it makes you feel any better: I get my hair cut at a place here in Silicon Valley that's full of Chinese tiger moms (incl. the staff). When I was sitting in the chair a few weeks ago, a tiger mom came in the shop with a book of 8x10 photos. She went from Chinese woman to Chinese woman, holding the book open and announcing, "This is my son. Here he is [pointing at the photos, and slowly turning the pages] at his graduation last week. He graduated from Berkeley in electrical engineering." Then, pausing for effect, turning her head and nodding slowly and meaningfully, added, "...with honors."

She would then move down the line to the next woman and repeat the whole thing verbatim, down to the pause, slow meaningful nod, and "...with honors."

Most women she spoke to tried to look unimpressed, which I thought was a bit rude. Some even sniffed and turned away. It was amazing.

I was the lone white guy in a room full of Chinese women (and some kids) and apparently the only one who was happy for her and willing to look at her pictures. No luck. When she got to me, she sniffed at me and skipped past me to the next Chinese woman.

I wasn't sure whether that was because my opinion was irrelevant to her sense of social status or, more simply, that she knew the Chinese women but didn't know me.

I asked my hair stylist who, like most of the staff, has been a friend of mine for years. She told me that she had seen the woman a couple of times but that she didn't think anybody in the shop knew her by name. I (the only one in the room with a EE background and apparently the only one happy for her) was just not somebody whose opinion mattered to her.

So it seems that your Berkeley EECS is plenty good enough to ruffle the feathers of other Chinese moms and to impress me--if that helps any. ;-)

Haha, thanks for sharing. I do think it's kind of odd that that woman would do something like that. You don't generally approach random people and boast about the accomplishments of your children. In my mom's case, she socializes at church and a line dancing group, so no doubt they're always talking about their kids.

I do think you've picked up on something with the whole social status angle, but I can't say I have a good understanding of it. Chinese moms are deeply invested in their children's education, and no doubt they judge themselves (and each other) by how much their children have achieved.

The sad thing is that some of those women may actually have been unimpressed by a Berkeley grad. You no doubt are aware of the tutoring centers that dot the Valley, catering to Asian students and their demanding parental units. Besides AP and SAT prep, some of these places also offer "college counseling" that runs many thousands of dollars over several years.

My sister, who is quite a bit younger than me, is on the verge of applying to college. Last time I was at home, my parents had collected a pile of brochures from these tutoring places, which advertise successful applications to Stanford, UofC, UPenn, and the Ivy League. The UCs are an afterthought. It's all about the exclusive brand names, if you will.

I'm just thankful I never had to deal with any of this madness.

As an Asian American with parents that broke most of the stereotypes regarding "tiger moms", I hate to hear stories like this. My blood boils when I hear Asian parents talking about how they only want their kids to go to either Stanford, MIT or one of the Ivies so they can become a doctor, lawyer, or engineer.

With the crapshoot that is college admissions nowadays, it's completely unreasonable to expect your kid to go to such a small list of schools. Especially when there are a few thousand other 2400 SAT, valedictorian Asian Americans with identical goals...

It always seemed to me that his dad cared more about the prestige factor than the actual quality of education his son received.

Sadly, the prestige factor doesn't end when one enters college. My sister and I are Asian American and our parents emigrated from the Philippines. My sister's majoring in Urban Studies at Stanford. Despite this, my father insists on telling family, friends, co-workers, etc. that she's studying law.

Quite a shame indeed.

This is despite the fact that my roommate was a computer science major, and UW has one of the best Comp-Sci programs in the nation.

The important question is whether his father would have preferred he attend a higher-ranked school with an inferior CS program, or whether he just wanted his son at a "better" school with a similarly spectacular CS program.