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Does where a person went to school influence your opinion of them? Why or why not?

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philipy
philipy
Marked as Best! October 15, 2009 06:21 PM
Yes and no. :)

Yes, if for example I don't know much about them, in which case whatever few things I do know will influence my expectations of them. Not that it will influence them very definitely. For example I'm not going to assume that if someone went to Harvard they must be an intellectual giant, just that they are probably reasonably bright, or at least not downright stupid.

The more knowledge I have about the school and the particular department, what kind of people go there, and the kind of work that's done there, the more it'll influence my expectations.

On the other hand, the answer is also no. Because after not too long spending time with a person, talking with them or working with them, things like what school they went to quickly become irrelevant, and my personal experiences with them take over.
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faye12
faye12
October 14, 2009 08:52 PM
Sometimes it does and sometimes it does not. Some colleges are general learning centers, while others are more specialized. I try not to let it matter to me but at times it does. When I hear that someone went to Yale, I instantly think of someone in the medical industry, and I have a lot of respect for them because of it. If I hear Berkely, I think Psych 101, time to go. If I hear Harvard law school, I am put more on the defensive, as lawyers probe info from people even if they don't mean to. I know I should not do this, but I think we are all guilty of evaluating people for some reason or another at some point in out lives.
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raerae2
raerae2
October 15, 2009 06:01 AM
Only if they went to a prestigious ivy league school. I must admit that my opinion of people who went to ivy leagues schools is either an opinion of great respect and admiration or that they are spoiled and ungrateful because they've never had to do without in their lives. Depending on their attitude toward me, it could go either way. Regardless, though, I'm admittedly jealous of an ivy league education.
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lotusla
lotusla
October 15, 2009 09:18 AM
NO. In my opinion ,we should not generalize what we think of people when he or she comes from a certain school. Even we do not know that person personally, one should not make a judgment of that person. For me being judgmental is wrong, I look at a person for what he/she is, the character, accomplishment ,personality which is individual in each of us, not the school where he went to. The problem with people before and until now is that people tend to generalize their opinion on everything. We should base our opinion individually,if we don't have the facts
straight, just keep it to oneself or better yet to know the person well before making assumptions.
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