As the spring semester approaches, college students across the country are all likely busily brushing up their resumes and diligently applying and interviewing for jobs at some of the top companies in the world. I remember it fondly, from both friends and random people alike – the nervous and stressed tension as we waited for responses from potential employers like McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, and Google; the pains of having to work on your thesis while attempting to squeeze in a few trips to New York for some interviews. For students at top colleges around the country, this is a fairly common experience – not at all surprising when you consider that top companies would presumably look to hire the top talent. However, it seems that sometimes some of the top companies don’t simply recruit the bulk of their new talent from top schools, but, rather, take more into consideration the proximity of institutions. Or, at least, that’s what the data suggests per a recent report compiled by Poets & Quants for Undergrads that ranks the top feeder schools to top companies like Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon.
When it comes to finding jobs at top companies like Google or Facebook, the numbers definitely suggest that applicants stand a much better chance if they attend a university close to that company’s headquarters. For instance, while MIT is renowned as an intellectual powerhouse with top programs in engineering and computer science, the number of MIT alumni at companies like Google or Apple vastly pale in comparison to the number of Stanford alumni employed; indeed, MIT doesn’t even show up as a top feeder institution at Facebook. If you want a job at one of these tech giants, it seems that you may be in a better position if you attend a college near their headquarters. Looking at Apple, for instance, San Jose State University – a college next door to the Cupertino, CA-based company – surpassed Stanford as a top feeder school. Or, for an even more exaggerated example, more than 2,000 employees of Amazon graduated from the University of Washington, with the next feeder school (Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani) only having a little more than 300 alumni at the company.
The lesson here? Go West, young man (or woman – because the tech industry desperately needs more of you). Check out the top feeder schools for Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google below. You can also visit the entire post from Poets & Quants for Undergrads if you want to see the top feeder schools for companies like Goldman Sachs.
The Top Feeder Schools to Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Apple (via Poets & Quants for Undergrads)
