Ph.Ds From MIT, Berkeley, and a Few Others Dominate Top School's CS Faculties 155
An anonymous reader writes "A Brown University project collected the background information of over 2,000 computer science professors in 51 top universities. The data shows a skew in their doctoral degrees, "Over 20% of professors received their Ph.D. from MIT or Berkeley, while more than half of professors received their Ph.D. from the [top] 10 universities." For those professors, fewer work in theoretical computer science and there is a growing trend of recent hires in systems and applications. The original data is also publicly-editable and available to download."
No faith in thier own. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's pretty sad that the other 90% of universities have so little faith in their OWN graduates that they won't hire from within.
If I had just gotten a PhD, and it ended up being so worthless that even my own school wouldn't accept it, I would demand a refund.
Re:dream on (Score:4, Insightful)
If a candidate is not smart enough not to understand simple concepts about the nature of interaction of social species, he are too dull to warrant employment. If he understands the concepts but ignores them, he is immediately declaring that he rejects the importance of established standards, and would make a substandard engineer. Either way, a person who does not communicate well with a goodly proportion of people is always the worse choice when pitted against someone who communicates well with many people. And engineers are a dime a dozen, while good communicators are rare.
Re:dream on (Score:5, Insightful)
If an employer is petty enough to not hire someone because they use 'swear words' instead of something that amounts to the same thing, they're illogical and not someone you want to work for.
The ability to control oneself and behave in a manner that does not offend other employees is important to building and maintaining a productive workplace rather than, say, a hostile work environment. Conforming to some minimum standard of politeness shows that one can work as part of a team and is not some aggressive "loose canon" that will disrupt the workplace and become a liability.
And I'm not buying the "CIO" thing at all, unless it's a one or two person operation functioning out of a garage someplace. There is really no way that any real company would hire a guy who mouths off like this. He sounds more like a guy who is jealous of those who were able to attend schools like MIT. I'm sure he feels his personal experience added to his Associates degree is more than equil to 4 or 6 years at MIT, but I'm not buying it.
Re:dream on (Score:2, Insightful)
The ability to control oneself and behave in a manner that does not offend other employees is important to building and maintaining a productive workplace rather than, say, a hostile work environment.
If you feel like you're on a razor thin wire because the people around you are oversensitive, controlling assholes and feel the need to control how other people use language, then that *is* a hostile work environment.
Just because someone has an irrational hatred of certain words and has bought into the religious and illogical notion that some words are inherently 'bad' doesn't mean they should be able to stop everyone else from saying those words.
Conforming to some minimum standard of politeness shows that one can work as part of a team and is not some aggressive "loose canon" that will disrupt the workplace and become a liability.
If "politeness" is controlling how other people use language in order to create a facade where everyone acts and speaks exactly as you want them to, then I don't want to be polite. I don't care about being polite, and apparently neither does my employer.
Those types of artificial environments are hostile to any intelligent person's well-being.
There is really no way that any real company would hire a guy who mouths off like this.
Maybe not all employers are authoritarian imbeciles? Mine isn't, at least. I have no clue if he's actually a CIO.
So yeah, as I said, those are not the types of employers you want to work for. Find someone who isn't a complete moron.
People are very diverse, come from a variety of backgrounds, cultures, and socioeconomic situations. Part of maintaining a professional work environment is understanding that groups of people have diverse viewpoints on what is acceptable and comfortable (I will note that this is also part of being an adult). Labeling someone as "uptight" or "razor thin" just because they value the accepted professional behavior norms in the work environment shows an extreme lack of social intelligence and inability to see the world from other perspectives. You would be a liability at any respectable tech company. You come across as the guy who doesn't understand why putting up a bikini calendar on your cubicle wall might create an uncomfortable environment for female coworkers.
You certainly wouldn't ever be hired at my company. Yes, sometimes there are sensitive people or people who get upset over things we may feel are silly. However, these people can still be very productive employees. When you don't respect that you are preventing these employees from being productive. You create drama that prevents people from focusing on work and getting the job done. If you worked for me or my company (and you wouldn't, btw), you don't get paid to be buddies with me or your coworkers. You get paid to work as part of a team. You also won't get coddled to feel like you can roll into the office and feel like you're back at the frat house.
Re:dream on (Score:4, Insightful)
It's also the world you live in. Whether you like it or not, people make impressions based on their interactions with you. These impressions override most everything you claim about yourself. Just ask yourself how many times a well dressed and respected person gets off with less penalties than the guy who shows up to court for the same charges acting like a street thug while trying to convince the judge he is an upstanding pillar of the community. There is nothing religious about it, it is just the other person's expectations.
As for the rest of your post, communication is often essential in work whether it be engineering or prostitution. It's a basic reason behind TPS reports and various other forms one has to muscle through while actually getting work done. It standardizes the communication process somewhat to make up for poor communication. Those who communicate better and are around better communicators, are likely to excel more so than those who do not communicate well. With the exception for foreigners for whom English is not a first language (for some reason, they are excused), not to many fortune 500 companies employ people with poor communication skills unless it is for some quota or to fill low level jobs that aren't really relevant to the operation. Those jobs are the lower paying jobs in the establishment too. It is just a fact of life- if you want to get ahead, you have to act like it.
Re:So the conclusion is... (Score:4, Insightful)